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CONSTELLATIONS
I never thought
I would find
Love in your big brown eyes
Comfort in your touch
Strength in your words
Laughter in your jokes
I wonder if meeting you was
Inevitable
There is honor in the way you wear
Your pain
I see you
Beyond your flesh
Under all the hardy exterior
I see you
And boy you are the embodiment of
Just magnificent
Every scar every mole
Perfectly placed
Like stars aligned
Forming constellations
Aunt.
She is her.
Mostly noun, given,
And she is an English teacher and shall berate me should she find this;
but she is her. Beyond grammatical repair, or rule of prose.
I do not care, for she is why I am me.
And if she does see this- you are her.
My aunt- a woman more mother then extended family,
a woman who's heart can break and bend.
A human so giving nobody notices until her efforts are missing,
a human so sweet the earth cried the very day she got sick.
I remember it too well. I remember about her more than myself, like a broken bone.
It aches now, her pain- my bone.
Her feelings are mine- only I feel them.
I feel them miles away, and do I feel them deeply.
I react how she cannot, due to her heart.
I react when she is not sure how to.
I bow my head at her anger, and revel in her praise.
If my grandmother is the queen, my aunt is her heir beyond birthright.
She spent the last of her serotonin on my laughter.
She spent the last of her smiles on us all.
And I gasp from the severity of the loss.
She is still with us- which is why I reflect her pain.
She is sick. But she is her.
Within my scar tissue exists her- within my flesh,
within whatever is good to me is given by her.
Love is her. She is love.
Seven Years
I am not as I once was. My skin is thicker, cuts white and banded beneath ink, muscle strong, brain more settled. And yet I think of you. Someone who caused me so much strife in my youth, were the cause for much of my shifting mind and bleeding skin. The reason my muscles are bigger then yours.
I haven’t seen you in seven years and yet I think of you. I am unsure if I miss you, or perhaps being a teenager where everything was easy to digest. How do I digest this?
Seven years of hating you, seven years of having loved you. Is your impact truly so big, that I will always feel as like I am mourning something that never died? Buried a living creature that causes me more grievance then something as pure as love ought to?
Why do I still feel a pounding in the back of my skull like fists on a one way partition whenever I kiss, touch, try to love someone else? It isn’t fair.
I wonder if I ever cross your mind. I hope I don’t. I wish I do. I wonder if you feel my fists on the glass reverberating when you kiss, touch, love others.
I wonder if it’s the horrible twisted strings of fate, or if I am truly insane like you once said I was.
False God
When you said
you loved me,
was that before you knew me?
Before you saw my hastily bandaged wounds,
reopening from your constant prodding.
My snapping maw, from your pressing fingers
that sought out the me that I must have buried.
The me you created.
Out of shiny bridles and easy to fit,
upon the pedestal of manacles and Heavenly light.
But you cannot love something that has never existed,
has never been fitted in this world.
You cannot love something that wears my face but does not share my mind.a
That is not love.
That is a false God.
“For restful death I cry”
When you said
I think about death all the time
my heart shattered
as someone who has lived with death
invited him over even
once or twice
the sentiment was nothing new
we’re old friends, he and I,
buddies;
but you,
You
who have always loved life
who never entertained thoughts
of mortality
never wanted the trip to end
who found joy in each phase
life threw your way
for you, for me, this was devastating
a normal stage of progression,
perhaps,
but one I’d hoped you’d never meet.
I Look After You
My therapist asked me, knowing me for most of my teen and adult years, if there is anyone I miss from who I have cut out of my life in those brief but annual cleansing stints I randomly have.
Soberly, no. Drunkenly, I know I do.
I miss myself. Miss the innocence and joy before it was taken in the end.
I think of myself, if I had to ask someone for forgiveness.
I would ask my baby self if she forgives me- but she would cling to my earlobe the same she does to her own for soothing, with wide and imploring eyes. I wouldn't need to say a word, so long as I held her. She wouldn't understand, anyway.
I think of my preteen self, so traumatized she isn't sure how to compartmentalize. I wouldn't ask her to. I would have slid into bed beside her as she weeped with wonderings as to why she wasn't good enough, and tell her she is beautiful- matted hair and thinning pyjamas and all.
My teen self wouldn't be so easily soothed by my presence. I would try a greeting word to start, but she would glare and spitfire hatred. I would brunt it with a bowed head, knowing she was simply too sick to know what she was doing.
But I'd return to her, the only one who ever did. I would find her that night, where her world fell apart, and tell her it will be okay. I would bandage her wounds, and kiss her forehead in a way she hadn't felt since she was that wide-eyed babe.
No- I wouldn't ask forgiveness for and from any of them, which makes this story moot. But I wouldn't have had to. I would have simply tended to them, tender and kind, until they would never be hurt enough to need to make amends. Until they felt filled with my love that there would be no one begging for a second chance.
I would have looked after them enough to not warrant the pain, nor the longing, for an apology.
The Man
I’ve never yearned to be a man in the sense I am uncomfortable in my femininity, in my sexuality. I am happy to fret over my hair, and groan as I set off to hastily apply makeup for a last minute trip to the bar.
But in the sense of culture- I adore the old days. Most will argue against it; the conditions, the prejudice, the suffering. But the glamour? The glamour of being a man who has enough power simply because of the thing between his legs to do as he wished without threat?
To, in modern frame, dress in however they wish, to get up and not need to do their hair for it to not look horrific. To not worry about perfectly smooth legs in shorts during the summer, or be concerned how their arms look in a tank top.
To be like my brothers- able to drink a dozen pints and stumble home at day break with a clap on his back and broad, prideful smile from a neglectul father, rather then a constant little girl who cannot handle one diluted beer and needs to be conservative in appearance and soul.
To take whores to bed and be labeled a champion, rather than a scallion with the same body beneath me.
To have my body convert fat to muscle without lifting a finger, rather another joint to their lips on a day in the field because it should be fine for a male dominated field to succumb to ways of old, but never fine for a woman to wish to implement the ways of today.
I lift weights heavier than the average man at my gym. I kiss more pretty girls than them. I have more money. Yet, and yet. It is never enough.
No. I do not wish to have a man’s body, or a man’s face. I do not wish for a deep voice or his words. But I do wish I could be like a man. Just for a day.
The Displaced Shoe
I remember the look on his face.
I couldn’t have been more than nine years old at the time, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget the look that crossed my father’s face on a Saturday during an eventful afternoon in August of 1967.
A year prior, my father had packed his bags and left home unexpectedly, giving no forwarding address. My mother, at the initial onset, understandably had been horrified. How would she manage? She had no formal education, no self-sustaining type of employment, but she had two children, aged fourteen and eight, for which she must provide food, clothing, and a house. Fear became a very real, palpable force that invaded our tiny house on Canterbury Street that winter. The meager forty dollars my father would infrequently send my mother (through a local attorney, all the better to ensure his continued privacy) managed to pay only the house note. Still, my mother, struggling, alone, and afraid, became a substitute teacher and managed to earn enough income to put food on the table, pay the house note, and buy fabric with which to sew clothes for us. Needless to say, being the younger of two sisters, I wore a lot of hand me downs. The best thing I remember about the year that followed my father’s departure, however, was that we were able to eat all the spaghetti we wanted. My father disliked spaghetti, so when he’d been home, my mother never cooked it. With his absence, we ate spaghetti at least once – if not more – a week. To this day, it remains one of my favorite meals.
I apologize for I have digressed from my opening sentence. I felt a need, however, to elaborate on the premise provided and offer a bit of background before I continued. I promise to get to just why I remember the look on my father’s face more than I remember any other particular thing.
It was a year after he’d left home that my father returned. Being only nine by then, I was delighted and hopeful with his arrival. Not so much my mom, and certainly not my sister, who was determined to never, ever forgive the man who dared to call himself ‘father’. Of course, my father had returned expecting a glorious reunion that included moving back into our home. My mother, much to her credit had grown wiser – and so much stronger – than at first. Much to my father’s chagrin and increased anger, she put a halt to his moving back into the house. Still, he continued to visit, both to see his children and to bully my mother into changing her mind.
It goes without saying, and even my sister would tell you it was so: I was my father’s favorite. I was the child he often, especially when drunk, called his “eyeballs”. I suppose that’s country talk for ‘the apple of my eye’. I’m not really sure, but speculation has led to such a deduction over the years.
We lived about forty-five minutes away from the Atlantic Ocean, so visiting the beach was a common occurrence, especially in summer months. This particular Saturday, my newly returned father had indicated he would pick me up and we could go to the beach. I was ecstatic. I remember waiting and watching for his car as I played outdoors with friends, my swimsuit worn beneath my shorts and my beach towel by the front door. I was more than ready.
To the best of my memory, it was well past four o’clock once my father finally pulled in the driveway. We were all outside – my mother, my sister, and I. Extremely excited, I ran to hug him as he got out of the car. Being nine years of age, I should have recognized the telltale signs but maybe I was too excited. My mother, on the other hand, long having been subjected to my father’s use of alcohol, must have seen (and smelt) its effects immediately.
A detailed conversation between my parents ensued and escalated quickly into an argument. My mother forbade my father from taking me with him. I don’t remember her citing the alcohol as the main concern, though I know it was. I think she was probably too frightened by his proneness to anger, and understandably so. It was also, unfortunately, a very different time (in the 60’s) when people drank everywhere: at work and home, on the streets, in their cars, and in the local bars. My mother’s main argument was that it was too late to go to the beach. There would be no reason for such a visit since it would be dark by the time we arrived. Whatever her real reason for arguing, she stuck her heels in and refused to let me go, and I am left to wonder if she, in fact, saved my life.
My father’s alcohol induced rage grew with the repeated denials to give him what he wanted: me. In his rising anger, he lunged at my mother, striking a blow so hard across her face she fell backwards, landing on the ground just underneath an oak tree in the front yard. Her right shoe, as a result of the force, flew across the leave littered ground. In horror, I saw my mother lying on the ground, struggling to stand, and my sister, crying where she stood on the front porch. Without another thought, I picked up the displaced shoe and flung it as hard as I could at my father, striking him dead center in his chest, my young face contorted in anger. He immediately stopped mid-sentence and mid-stride where he stood. He stared at me for what felt like centuries. I don’t remember what I said to him, but in fierce defiance, I stood my ground and yelled something at him. I swear to this day, if I’d have had more shoes, I would have thrown them all at him no matter the outcome.
Yes, I remember the look that crossed my father's face that day oh so well. His favored “eyeballs” had seen him in his truest form and in defense, had managed to kick his ass, at least as much as a nine-year old child armed with a single shoe could. It was an eye-opening moment for the both of us; a reckoning of newly imposed adulthood for a mere child and regret and shameful awareness for a sad, disillusioned man with a horrible disease.
I am proud to say that my mother chose to deny my father's return home and eventually divorced him. I know the fear she must have had in making such a profound, revolutionary choice, especially during that day and time. There were many instances when we didn’t have much food or couldn’t afford to do things, but because of the decision she made, I have always been amazingly proud of her persistence, strength, and growth in the face of such adversity.
This may not be your average Father’s Day recollection, but I fear the prompt given initiated the memory that unfolded herein. I pray others are more fortunate in their accounts of wonderful, wise, kind, and supportive dads. As for me, I am thankful instead for lessons learned, both in childhood and adulthood, as well as a mother who filled in for a father when needed and the amazing men who helped me much like a father would through the years.
“I am still learning.” Michelangelo
Try
I've known a long time my reflection has become askew. A palate of colours I cannot stomach for too long.
But it hit me today, as I washed my hands and glimpsed myself, how deeply I loathe it. And it is no fault of my features, nor genetics. I have many times found myself beautiful, in a way that does not boast but simply soothes.
But tonight, my flesh is swollen with liquor, the lines on my face procuring and growing beyond their time due to the smoking.
Each time I try to quit, I will glance briefly at myself. Never long enough to feel guilt bleed in into cracks where childhood may play, but enough that it makes me feel determination grow.
That is not enough, I realize.
I need to feel the guilt. The regret. The rage of being 3 years old and my only worry an empty box, yet to be filled by easter chocolates. The aching pain of being a teenager with a horrid history and no one to hear me. I must feel their muted fists against my chest until it bruises. Their desperate attempts to save me when they could not save themselves.
I have drank, and drank, with the promise of doing better next time. But the second it upsets I give up. Why? Because it is hard?
I have done harder. I will try again, for the time past my years on this earth. I will try.
Press Send
This morning I got a “Facebook memory” from my long-ago high school friend. I wanted to reach out to her, but didn’t. Mind you, I graduated from high school almost fifteen years ago. Mind you, she’s dead.
When I imagine this friend now, I imagine her on the doctor’s inspection table, being told her ovarian cancer had a 20% survival rate. I only know that fact now (and isn’t everything we remember influenced by the future?) because my ballet teacher recently got diagnosed with the same stage of ovarian cancer. Her GoFundMe page relayed this brutal fact: by the time we feel any pain, it’s already too late.
By the time people become only Facebook memories, it’s hard to remember them except in their most glaring circumstances, in a doctor’s office where I wasn’t even present.
In her case, she lives on in this short piece of writing, my reflections of her now fact for the reader, when my memory of her is very much flawed, and only centered on my view of myself.
For, what else does a girl do in high school but relate the rest of the world to herself, first and foremost?
In high school, I didn’t know a thing about working memory, or death when we least expect it.
It’s not fair, perhaps, that this is what I think about when I think of her. She posted on Instagram two months before she died, saying: my body has changed so much because of chemo - “I don’t recognize myself in the mirror most days.” I thought of my lame attempts at diminishing my own bodily frame, even during the time in high school when I knew her. It’s like comparing apples and oranges. No: it’s like comparing a death sentence, on one hand, to an insecure white girl with a complex on the other. We were perhaps never going to be the same.
I wonder where she’d be now, had she lived longer. I wonder if I’d still see her social media posts and flip past them, or linger on them. If I’d see the version of herself she’d want me to see.
Or maybe that’s just me relating the rest of the world to myself, first and foremost.
When her sister posted she was dying, and to reach out now with any last words to her, I wrote a short, uninspiring paragraph - that I would miss her and remember her. But then I thought, she doesn’t need to hear from her long-lost “friend” on her deathbed. I was probably as self-centered then as I am now.
That’s perhaps not fair to myself, is it? Harsh, I guess. Looking back, I was probably right that she wouldn’t want to hear from me. But how would I know?
This morning, when I got my “Facebook memory”, I pressed “post”, to share it. Or maybe I didn’t.
What do you think I did?
It’s never too late, I suppose.
She deserves to be remembered, a phoenix out of her own ashes.
No matter how flawed memory is.