They are pulled from me;
Stretched, knotted, and
Burned in a fireplace
Where trust and human emotions,
Are turned to blackened ash
I am left an empty roll.
The ribbons of my feelings,
Manhandled, manipulated
Mitigated, and misunderstood.
......
Four corners of my home
As if I knew what home was.
Was it the screaming of pain?
The shouting of my mother,
Or was it my dad, abusing her?
I Remember that time
Of Old rain and thunderous clashing
The breaking of pots and pans
To the dishes that crack.
And the monstrous yell,
......
Brightest smiles. Sometimes worn by the molested and abused.
The smile shows what they wish to feel and that which they are hiding.
Hiding what they wished didn't happen.
Putting it in the back of their minds.
Hoping that the bright smile will outshine the dark depths.
Brightest smiles. Sometimes worn by the controversial abusers.
The ones that hurt; the ones that ruin.
The ones that destroy something before it's built.
Smile and hurt to hide that they were once hurt.
......
You missed it when you walked in,
The tiles in the bathroom that looked like an ogre,
That had captured my imagination as a child.
You missed that the bottom stair was harder,
The leak in the upstairs bathroom that was neglected and left to the care of a bowl,
Emptied weekly as if this chore was less than fixing it.
You missed the dent in the paint from the arguments,
Doors slammed haphazardly into walls,
The stain on the carpet from way back when,
......
They say it's cold outside,
That the wind cuts like a knife.
Is it possible they lied?
I can't feel it.
They say its warm inside,
That home's where the heart
abides.
Am I frozen in time?
......
They are pulled from me;
Stretched, knotted, and
Burned in a fireplace
Where trust and human emotions,
Are turned to blackened ash
I am left an empty roll.
The ribbons of my feelings,
Manhandled, manipulated
Mitigated, and misunderstood.
......
I never see the waves of grief coming
why would I
I’m not dead
yet
every now and then
I think about all the things
that have happened in my life,
everything I thought I was desensitized to,
and I am unbearably saddened
because what I went through
......
They say forgiveness is for those who were wronged
But so is choosing not to forgive
You don’t have to forgive those who hurt you
In order to move on from that time
It doesn’t matter how many times
they did or didn’t hit you
It doesn’t matter how many times
they did or didn’t scream at you
......
Grizzly and gory, I refuse,
To let your fingers frill my hair.
And lies and falsehood
That you carefully sow, to any longer infest me.
How is it when the sailor sets,
To leave your island away,
That the siren song so beautifully sung,
Thwarts his mast into disarray.
......
My house is just that
A place for sleeping and belonging
But I don't want to go into it
Because of my issues from my trauma
My social media is for connections
But I'm terrified of the prison
Of my family's hate
and their relentless criticism
......