there are times when i feel clustered, an enormous pressure to put the pieces back together, this enormous need to put things back as they were, but i don’t recognize the pieces, i don’t recognize my hands. what were, what when, what now. i look at all of you and i am shattered, a million sharp edges without remorse, weeping for stones, for something to rest my head against. and i cannot find a way back in and i am terrified of finding a way out, the streets beckon me, the harsh kiss of leaving this life, any life behind me. i want to forget this, i want to forget my name, i want to forget the history that travels in this blood. i want to forget i am my father’s son, i want to forget the taste for cruelty the years have given me. how perfect you left this life, you cold cold bastard, without ever opening your eyes again, without ever fucking even acknowledging what you’ve rendered in me. i will cut my face off for you to let me be. i will shave my scalp, crack my skull, bleed my wrists open to get your blood out of me. do you understand? i am twisted up into mourning for you and for who i could have been but i need to be free of your legacy to be anything normal. i need to you to leave my thoughts, i need you to no longer be the shadow behind every gesture i make. i need to look at my children without pain, without the fear that i too will do to them what you had done to me. i scratch and scratch my wounds and i know it’s not because the air is dry. you’re still there, you’re still here and only i wish to remain.