Strangled by oppression, eventually anger will build and pool in the very soul that was created in love. Out of fear and doubt, the inability to speak, my insides cry and lash out. Why can’t I exhume my deepest thoughts? What I say matters, intellectually inspiring, there is so much to share.
Convicted as a child with emotions to express, ridiculed for feeling, thinking, with wants needs and desires. This would carry on and haunt me like the enemy adores, but God is my one and only, He blessed me with an almighty voice. Choosing to write is what’s saved my own life.
A reflection of what I’ve been carrying around, the pen flows my truth, saving me from being buried underground. At times there are poems rhyming and sometimes not. Uncomfortable to some, embraced by those who aren’t fearful nor flee. My words unbound placed upon my heart. The freedom to shed that has both kept me together and torn me apart.
Truly a masterpiece, His prized work in this aspiring vessel. His Mercy and Grace bringing forth what has been nestled. Now I can see it, my truest self worth I’ve always hidden. Staying this course will revise how I’ve lived, protecting the gifts I’ve been given.
There are people I love and things that I need, but in the end, I always receive everything I believe. When I stop chasing after those who run and hide, I am equipped to move towards what beckons from inside.
I turned my head for just a moment and you were gone. A panic washed over me as I frantically called your name. Pushing garments of ladies apparel aside, rack by rack, I could hear a faint giggle. You were only 2 and you loved to play games like that. Unbeknownst to you, the fear that arose in my chest, as you would grow accustomed to saying, “I got this mom”, and you always have. Somehow that would be your way of assuring me you would always be okay, no matter what.
I feel so lost without you now. You got this, right? Yet that all too familiar panic has risen up and taken residence in my heart. This time I blinked and tried again, but I don’t hear the giggling in the air. I can’t see your face. I can’t find you anywhere.
Before you could form sentences or even threw your binky away, I could tell there was a mystery about you. Over time it was the little things that made you cry, often inconsolably and I couldn’t figure out why, but you knew.
Years would pass. You were growing up, trying to find the place where you belong. Never feeling liked by the kids on the school ground, not knowing how much you actually were. Was it your hyper activity that kept you moving? Sports became an outlet, baseball, soccer, dirt bikes, skateboards, bikes and scooters. Anything that would occupy your energy and free your spirit, but still, you sought after anything that would grant you acceptance. You tried basketball, even wrestling and joined the school band on drums. Then one day you asked for a bass guitar. Please mom. Happy birthday sweetie. You joined brothers, forming a band, the 3 of you, so young and talented, you were more than good, you were amazing.
Sports and all “that” began to fall away. You’d found this passion deep inside playing bass. Self taught, you wouldn’t allow me to “waste money on lessons when you could teach yourself” and you did. Yet all those years I’d watch you on stage, self conscious and insecure, as if you were still searching for that place of belonging, because you were.
Your pain continued to haunt you. I couldn’t read it, put my finger on it, then he left and you were devastated. The dad you tried so hard to please, to be like and feel included by. This was a whole new level of despair while I was desperately working to be all I could for you 3, but somehow I saw it in your heart, for you this grief of loss was affecting you in some other way. It was different and deeper.
That same 2 year old resides within, still inconsolable, try as I may. “I love you” are all the words I have, with everything I know. Life was harder back then, but we were gaining everyday as we made our way through, just us 4.
We got this, right? Wrong… “We” crumbled. My turn. You’re gone. Here I sit. Motionless. Breathless. Helpless. Guilt. Hands in the air. Heart splitting in 2. Inconsolable. I’m still searching for that place of belonging, just for you.
There’s this thing I do when I feel afraid or alone and I can’t or won’t cope with what’s happening all around. I disappear. Not in the physical sense of the word, but into a place of secret hiding where I feel safe. It’s simplistic and calm, but especially it’s quiet. So quiet that I really can hear myself think and there isn’t anyone else there to rearrange those thoughts or disregard them. It’s just me and me.
I guess I started visiting this magical place when I was a young girl. I could walk along the cement pathway Grampa poured to connect my front door to theirs, walk through the front door and make myself at home. This became the space where I could just be. Where everything was in its place and everything had a place. You know, that sense of belonging? I was always welcome anytime I wanted. I knew I didn’t have to ask, but I did just to be polite. Once inside the only rule was, if Mama said no, just ask Gramma.
Their home was always a comfort of warmth, like a big cozy blanket I could cuddle up with. There were cookies in the Oreo cookie jar, usually sugar ones, but sometimes actual Oreos. The gum was double mint and waited for me on the second shelf of the pantry cupboard. Then my favorite and always just for me, was vanilla ice cream in the kitchen freezer with a backup in the deep freeze, with my own can of Hershey’s chocolate syrup waiting for me in the fridge. I’d grab my lap tray from behind the back porch door where it lived and settled in next to Grampa’s chair in the living room to watch whatever it was he had on tv. It didn’t matter to me, so long as I was next to him.
Some nights Gramma and I had our own special “shows” we liked to watch together and we’d spend time on the back porch laughing and having a snack together. Me with my ice cream and her with some popcorn and a pop. I cherished these times and often dreaded having to walk back across that long, cement pathway to the other house, but I got to keep this ritual until I was about 10 years old.
Midway through 5th grade, I was uprooted and moved clear to the other side of town. It may have well been in another state. Grampa couldn’t pour a path that big. My heart was crushed. My safe haven was out of my reach. This is when I learned to retreat inside of my own world where nothing bad could reach me or touch me. It became my new escape. My fantasy world.
I became a different girl when I’d visit there. That girl was fearless. She said what she wanted to say and sang at the top of her lungs. She was bold. She spoke words no one had heard leave her lips and she was loud enough to be heard. She was courageous. She tried things that frightened her out there, but in here, she conquered it all. She was confident. She walked with her head up high and carried herself tall and proud. She was fierce. She was strong. Then one day, she just slipped away. She didn’t know where she had gone or how to get back and she was alone.
Her safety net was shredded. Her life was unstable. She felt uncertain for the first time in this life and she stumbled and fell, forgetting how to get back up, she stayed down. Her light had begun to dim. Her tenacity had slipped through her fingertips. She was becoming invisible and slowly, she disappeared. Where had she gone? This bright light, exuberant young lady, with sparks in her eyes and fire in her soul, what happened to her she had asked, but she had no answer. She had become a shell of herself, the kind that’s kept upon a shelf.
Years passed by and she grew weaker in her heart that once was explosive with desire and hunger for love and for life. She evolved into some version of someone else to keep peace and harmony for others. She realized that the world told her she couldn’t, so she didn’t. She believed them when they struck her down, leveling her to their limitations of her. They put her in a box that they designed and there she would remain, unable to grow and be that little girl who once had everything in her possession.
Gramma and Grampa never knew of her disappearance or maybe they would’ve come looking for her. Rescuing her and brought her back to where she first knew of her capabilities, her worth and her sense of belonging. How she longed for the safety of her home with them. The smells of comfort of joy of connection of acceptance of love and that familiar sense of knowing where she belongs.
I’ve suffered for you beautifully and yet, I don’t know how to be your friend any longer. When I’ve stepped into the roles of friend, companion, lover, partner, even acquaintance, I’m not me, but rather a version of what you need and now I have to be stronger.
A box has been created that can no longer contain this mind, body and soul. I don’t feel right in my skin, but you try and pull me back in, stunting my growth with the smoke you exhale as I push harder against you, the more I derail.
He wasn’t the first, she won’t be the last, those pushing to conform me from deep in my past. I’ve lived my whole life afraid of what won’t be if I become who I am, the most authentic me. She looks at me with sadness in her eyes as he pushes hard for what he sees inside.
Don’t pity me for who I am, where I’ve been and how I got here. I have a story to tell from this life I’ve been living. I’m proud of my strength and the courage I’ve been given.
At times I disappear, overwhelmed by what I feel in my heart. So much focus is put on what I don’t bring instead of what I do and that is what keeps us so far apart.
The vampire was the one who depleted me from every emotion that was found. Reciprocation wasn’t in the game and that defeated me beneath the ground
Time spent together for so very many years dependent upon how much I would give. Stretched beyond my very own limits finding this was no way to live
Breaking free of those who no longer serve or hold that depth in my very soul Releasing you all as I begin to let go, time for these wings to spread finally allowing me to grow.
No longer accepting your crumbs. I deserve, The Whole Cookie…
The Whole Cookie 