The Songs of The Gullible Wiseman: The Early Poems of Maddy Kobar 2008-2013

Reconciliation is Never Easy

I'd die if she could never forgive me.

What then would I be?

A branch without a tree?

Something so small

That you could not see.

This story is not a sad one,

Let me assure you.

She never stopped loving me,

I was never rejected.

Mostly, she was just confused,

Which was perfectly fair

For at the time so was I.

I was viscously defensive,

She told me to cool down.

She also told me

To make an impossible choice.

Then I felt betrayed.

How did she expect me

To tell her everything,

When she wasn't

Going to understand anything?

She never asked for any of this,

Neither did I.

I am who I am,

That is a fact that cannot be changed.

As I am her daughter,

As she is my mother,

That cannot be changed,

Nor would I want it to be.

I am sure that it could always be worse,

Tragically worse,

But never too much better.

I could have lost so much,

But instead I gained an ally.

It was not immediate,

She needed time to adjust.

She never thought

That her daughter

Could possibly be

Anything but straight.

It's really not her fault,

Society has tried so damn hard

To hide all those people like me.

But they aren't having it,

They were done hiding.

I wasn't having it,

I was done lying.

Though it was more like

An omission of words,

Than outright lies.

I was seventeen then,

How could I truly know?

But somehow I just knew.

She came right out

And asked me in the car,

Point-blank: nowhere to run and hide.

Even though I didn't know it then,

It was the perfect time.

Now I am glad she knows,

It was odd not telling her.

Normally, I told her absolutely everything.

And I admit that I was mad,

When she didn't get excited for me,

When I told her,

"Mom, I think I am bisexual."

But how could she be thrilled,

When she knew bisexuals as no good,

Being proudly confused and forever indecisive,

Being too greedy to pick a partner and stick with them?

What a pile of nonsense,

All of it garbage!

But from her, my mother,

I almost believed it.

Maybe, I was wrong after all.

Questioning described me,

In multiple stages following.

And In some ways,

It still all applies to me now.

You can't lose your past,

No matter how much you may want to.

You won't lose those that truly love you,

No matter what happens.

Because if they truly love you,

Forever with you they shall stay. 

Author's Note: 

This poem is about my coming out to my Mom as bisexual when I was 17. She wasn't the first person I came out to though, but I'm glad that we're pretty cool now. 

I must have written this in college because it feels like there was a time difference between when this poem was written and when the events it talks about happen. I'm guessing that this is either a 2012 or 2013 poem.