she says to me,
last year we were like all our other friends, we were happy.
and i cannot stand it, i cannot stand the smell of me, i cannot stand the fact that i breathe, that i can hold the steering wheel and not spin out of control, all the self-hate isn’t enough to end it all.
is it cold?
-here, he said, wiped the dribble of her chin. ok, let’s try again.
-dad?
-yes?
-where are we?
-we are here.
-is it cold here?
-it can be. but not always. mostly, mostly it’s-
-sad. it’s cold and sad here daddy.
-no it isn’t. don’t say that. you shouldn’t be saying that.
-but look. she points out the window, rain sweeps the street, a neighbor runs from their car to their driveway. no one parks in their driveway.
-that’s just rain.
-but it’s cold.
-yes, he hugs her, yes i guess it can be.
needing past
The trick is to run past the rabbit hole, to keep moving, to keep alive. You are not alive when you are alone: you are only breathing. The presence of others, of talking, touching, holding, being needed, this is living. It’s a certain kind of box, a certain kind of definition. And although it eats at you, their needs, their words, their beckoning, it gives you shape, it keeps you moving, keeps you breathing past that rabbit hole, keeps you from falling in.
they get away
matters of confusion from delving into the pain. we all weep wonders. and there the significance: his yowl, her ache, the crack in their mother’s spine, their father’s immutable impatience. how thorny, pricks of the skin, she tousles the sheets, wraps herself into suffocating and roaches crawl across newly stained wood floors, skittering legs that slip and slide with little traction. but they get away, they get away.
safe enough
and it surges up and anger all rage all frustration the incompetence in me the vile and viciousness and gnashing of teeth i yell at the little one i snarl at her annoyed at the intervention annoyed with my loss of control and i barely have a grip on any of it and they all think i already where my heart on my sleeve when they don’t know how much of it i keep in check how much of it i swallow how much of it bounces around in my head but i never feel safe enough to let it all out i never feel safe enough
or me
we are at the worst it has ever been in this country: home foreclosures, bank closings, credit crisis and nothing to shore up the underpinnings of the economy in sight except for the government. in a week, my son turns one. little over a month away we face a historic election where an african american is running against a ticket with a female vice presidential candidate, the first for republicans. my daughter and i rock out to chemical brothers while my son laughs in glee as i bop about. she cries in the car because i talk of how i desperately long for self-oblivion but cannot because of her and the children.
& the world goes round & the world spins & i cannot save them from any of it-
or me
at the end of each
the tensions pulling me apart, keeping me whole. i was told, often enough, i was a pain junkie, that i got off on it, the pitch of despair, the dark rebellion. i really need to rewrite all of this, but life isn’t like that, there is no rough draft, only unwieldy appendages, unyielding. it’s all quite alright if you circle the rim and not get caught up in the tide. it’s nonsense i know, but it comforts me like nothing else, not even the bottle or the bed or the fleeting oblivion promised by each.
hands of thorns
down the rabbit hole we go, hand in hand, arm in arm, off to see the wizard and have a bed time story read. there are three things to remember two of which i’ve forgotten but the least important of which is never to forget the other two and i smelled something that was intestinal and it was good. here we go again with the levees bursting around us and an undefinable anger permeating the sheets. i’d keep it safe and sound if my hands weren’t made of thorns.
the alternative shatters me into rage
but the alternative shatters me into rage and tears and remorse and an overwhelming sense that you were meant to be alone, that all the nightmares are going to come true, and there is a comfort in that, that you were ultimately right.
how absurd, how absolutely insane.
rigmarole
rigmarole, how do you spin, spoon fed on codependency and nostalgia? you are so beautiful, like an over turned car set aflame in the middle of the highway with no causalities. honesty is brutal and such a weapon in the right hands. he swung it against me such force that my forehead exploded into something not quite human. we stream this all through the night, tossing and turning and never coming back again.