ruby

the month of march.

i have spent my entire life
running,
tirelessly crawling away from
my face and fate
blending into my father's
how dare you judge my character,
this love that burns brighter
than anything i've ever cared to keep lit,
how dare you attribute my father's sins to my own?
how dare you mercilessly state in a self-crafted lie of "goodwill"
what my existence means,
my signficance to others.
tell me,
where you there when i wanted to lose myself more than anything
body heaving and soul emptying on the floor of a unkept bathroom
ruining a painfully tacky star clad purple shirt
with tears a 12 year old should never have had to shed
sprinting away from things she was meant to have
and staying for the things she was never meant to be in company with.
i can tell you for a fact
you were not there
when i had to become my own lawyer
and prove my own worth to myself and anybody that would listen,
looking for any sign or proof
that i was even worth another breath,
another thought,
another glimpse or touch
all of this after the first thing i have ever loved and claimed as my own
didn't tell me
s h o w e d me
in the cruelest of ways
that i was nothing more than entertainment and security to her
where you there
are you here
when i have to crawl,
nails crusted with the dirt of my mind,
out of myself
it is a b a t t l e to be with anyone but myself
and my blinks and breaths constantly fight for bodily frequency
with my thoughts of
"god,
i can't even live with myself,
so who else ever would?"
even without you
and this situation,
i have gone through hell and back so many times,
i have trailblazed my own path
and the terrain is frequented by my trail markers and footprints.
to heap this on top of me,
this disapproval,
this rashness,
these judgments,
i am collapsing underneath the weight
of making it to tomorrow.
always,
always
trudging to tomorrow.
everything will hurt less tomorrow.
i will be better tomorrow.
this will be better tomorrow.
i am not the one for him?
i am not the one in the cards for him?
you
are a STRAIGHTJACKET to him,
clenching him tighter and tighter
any time he tries to stretch, move, grow,
your goal is communication and contact,
but your results are atrophy.
a paralysis
of will and individuality.
he is the purest thing
i have ever had the privilege of holding and harboring.

he is light when i am nothing but a void. 

he is hope when such a concept is foreign to me. 

maybe i am not the one for him,
maybe exactly how i have handled this only proves your predictions,
but what i know for sure
is that
none of this was deserved.
and your name is forever ingrained
on the list of people
who have unrightfully stolen a piece of my being,
of my potential to fully love.
when i think of the milestones i have conquered,
it will go,
father.
first love.
thoughts.
you.

and now, 

even now,

you are not here

when i am faced with the entirety of a night, of 5 months, in front of me

cross-legged on a couch

empty glaze, eyes glued on the nothing ahead 

heart heavy with the nothing and the all.