i try to look at mother's face
in the mirror
as she holds her mouth wide
to put on the lipstick
and put on makeup to hide
violence is never the answer
my little friend tells me
i tell her that the life doesn't
abide by the rules of a child
it's what my father says
as i stand between him and mom
and tell him it's wrong
but he doesn't listen
and my mother says
it's what alcohol does to him
it's the drinking's fault
through the corner of my eyes
i see her sob
holding her head in bruising hand
through the gaps in her fingers
she sees my father walk away
when i am too young
to remember
i ask my mother
why she still stays
she says she has to
i look at the holes in the walls
his fists made
and i ask why she still stays
she says she needs to
i watch her go to bed
i look at her pulling over a
tattered bed sheet
and cocooning in it
but it isn't her molted shiny chrysalis
she doesn't emerge as the moth
within it
she says it's her comforter
but i don't believe her lie.
my father lies on the floor
his head under halo of spilled alcohol
shattering his tree of anger for now
roots are still intact though
i quietly walk past
and move inside my room
welcome to the place i hide in
when the branches can't bear
i could invite you in
but for that i have to open the door
which i can't, pardon me
fear is in here
it became comfortable
and settled in somewhere
i look out the window now
the rain's not pelting down
when it should be September soon
to wash my July bruises away
July is the dark month of bleeding days
and his lost bets and un-payment ways
perhaps that is why my mother pulls
a bed sheet over her, not that it saves.
i step out the house and look for pennies
in the gutters
for my wishes to come true
i heard i can make a wish down the road to the resting statue of a God
i wish for my father to go away
i don't find the pennies though
he won't listen then, they say
so i return my way
back to watching my mother
opening her mouth wide
to put on another lipstick
she wants to stay, she lies
doesn't she
all she does is lie
returing to taking shade
under the tree
and then she folds the bed sheet
for yet another day.
YOU ARE READING
Aruni
Poetryher name is Aruni. and like the sun, she will rise after the dark and let every sunrise find her different. ・✫・゜・。. poetry tellings of a fictional character that span across the random times of her life. [Readers' discretio...
