Cognitive dissonance
A mismatched set
Of beliefs
I believe there is no way
I could ever be
Enough
For my children.
I know
I am also
Everything they need and
All they have.
Fighting for them, me, us
Inside myself
Every
Day
Cognitive dissonance assumes, maybe,
my morals were gathered
Piece by piece
From various thrift stores and
Dollar Generals
Mismatched. Confused
Gathered together in gray
Areas
So my questions crawl to the corner of my mind and fall back on the patterns
I chose
To create
Tire tracks or trenches?
Regardless, I dug these and know
That the digging brings peace
If it try to
Resist the strident chords it persists
Starts
Screaming at me, spitting
Venom
I wonder, though
If you feel this rattling
As deep as your fragile
calcium constructions
Can you heal
Enough to bring down
Brick walls
Decades old
Generations
Old
Is it a bird?
Or a paper bag in a wind waltz?
Regardless, I will try
Search to see the bird so high
In the sky it's a speck
I will try
To keep my eyes (my heart my brain)
Open
I see what surrounds me
Children in their teens (no more
diapers!)
Turn the gear on those small black
Binoculars and
Focus:
22 years by the blackboard
Wearing orange plastic glasses
Twice as big as my head
Sneaking down alone, to the river so often
it twists
Into trips
for four, or three
Usually 2
All of
You
At times, though! (That's a win)
At the boat launch I'm careful on the algae
Moss lip pf the stone's edge
Never standing
Just
Floating
With you
All. Sometimes
Always, though, the
Reminders
About breathing in deeply
Slowly
Through your nose
Smellll....
Scent is the brain's
Tardis
Transporting you anywhere
any time
I know
KNOW
K. N. O. W.
I will not always
Be here for my children.
They
know it.
That deeply, too.
Since they were 7, 4, and 2.
So I make them
Pay Attention
This year it is
2 to almost 12
And their tears
Were torrential
Hurricanical
A body, my child’s,
Body
Trembling with tears
Born of joy
Yes, joy.
And
Because he's known
Since he was barely born
That joy
Is not
A requirement
Expected
Permanent.
I feel older
Than I am.
A long war
Will do that.
I've been at war
With life
Not death, who comes no matter what
But
Life
Life who is there
Regardless of if you want them
There
Then, at that moment,
Or not
Life
Messy, unfocused, confusing
With pimples and stretch marks
Wrinkles and belly rolls
Warm rain followed by a bright
Silver moon
The smell of the Potomac after dark
Watching bright yellow birds
On house high sunflowers
Because we have choices
We don't have
To see
Any of it
I've been at
War
Since he died. At war
To heal
So we return to what it means...
Cognitive dissonance
Joy and pain
Life and death
Hope and despair
All at once
Deeply felt on a
Structural level
From The Trail Of Tears to
The Nazi Holocaust
From a dislocated elbow
To a Peace Corps rejection
To a backyard pool
A warehouse gymnastics gym parking lot
3 c- sections and a golden retriever
The best way
The only way
For me to show you
Now
That I love you
Is this
Winning the war
With the cacophony
Inside me
So they have something special
To see
A discordant depiction of
A loving cruelty
A universe that gives you
So much
And takes half
Before you find your feet
And beauty, still.
rrow
Was full of learning
The father of my children
My best friend
Had a golf ball in his brain
Programmed to
Kill.
I remember, too , yesterday's tomorrow
When I scooted the couch
As close as possible
To your hospice bed
And a nurse
Woke me up to tell me
You
We're gone.
I
Remember nodding
Thanking her.
And being folded into a fierce fog that
was heavy
And years long
And a wish
To be not much more than
Seen
It's so easy to become
Invisible
So painful to be
Unseen
What a beautiful mosaic mess
Our journey makes
The pain and fear and hope
Become a creation
When you have other eyes
To help you see
Other arms
To curl
Into
But who
Is strong enough
For that?
Can you hold you
And me
And fear
And higher than it all...
Hope.
Can you also
Curl into
Me?
ierce fog that
was heavy
And years long
And a wish
To be not much more than
Seen
It's so easy to become
Invisible
So painful to be
Unseen
What a beautiful mosaic mess
Our journey makes
The pain and fear and hope
Become a creation
When you have other eyes
To help you see
Other arms
To curl
Into
But who
Is strong enough
For that?
Can you hold you
And me
And fear
And higher than it all...
Hope.
Can you also
Curl into
Me?
ierce fog that
was heavy
And years long
And a wish
To be not much more than
Seen
It's so easy to become
Invisible
So painful to be
Unseen
What a beautiful mosaic mess
Our journey makes
The pain and fear and hope
Become a creation
When you have other eyes
To help you see
Other arms
To curl
Into
But who
Is strong enough
For that?
Can you hold you
And me
And fear
And higher than it all...
Hope.
Can you also
Curl into
Me?
Tenses
and time
Are funny things
Wishes and thoughts
Dreams and what you
Think
Will be
I always wanted to be a
Mother
And
Never wanted to
Without their
Father
Beside me
It's not a game
Mating and growing old
You have what you've
Always had
You've got me
Broken and mad
And weaker than any strong woman
Stronger than you ever
Could've dreamed
I have children now
But they don't know
Me
Not like I ever
Thought I'd be
When you spend a
Decade
Carrying death and the future and
Judgement
Aloneness and unrequited passion
Fear and frustration
It bends
Your back
Parts of you grow strong
You never knew existed
Other parts
Change
You have what you've always had
Me
I hear you
In the dark of breaking corners
Inside my mind
Broken? Tenses are hard
Will break unless
You remember
To love all the broken bits
You don't have to say it
Think it
Feel it
See
It in your heart
It's hard
Except foe in the soft spots
Where you cannot stand
But for a moment
I had you
And it hurts
That our kids cannot see
A me that wasn't quite
So
Breaking? Broken?
I will not break
Until I do
You have what you have
Always had
Sexy. Messy. Weak. Confused.
Strong. Smart. Lost.
Buy I am here.
And you have what you
Have always had
My children
His
Ours
You have not just mine
Me
But our
His
Love
Time bubbles
Confusion and clarity float
On the same space
Inside
And ability collides with
Struggle
Judgement
Time
Is faster than a breath
Slower than every hope you are waiting
For, walking along with no
Control over
It rained
And seemed to burn
My skin...there were rainbows
Once
Still are, somewhere
The taste in my mouth
Bitter and dry as unsweetened
Cacao, what could have been
A candy bar
A kiss
Is dust
Burned flesh and chunks
Of bone
The clarity leaves
Me blind
Do I burn myself
Cause this damage of my
Own
Free will?
I can't find it
Inside
Anymore
Hope
Or joy
I'm bitter
Angry
Tired of trusting
And trying
I see people with cancer
Doing well and should
Cheer, rejoice
But it makes me more
Bitter
His battle was lost
Before it begun
Our family shredded
Leaving me, bleeding
Smoking, poisoned
Behind
I see people finding love
Connections
And should feel so grateful
They don't have to go to bed
3,000 nights (and counting) with no
One to
Touch
I don't. I feel bitter and
Jealous and mostly
Hopeless
Make goals, even small ones
Find spirituality
Do something you love
Find community
I have
And I dropped them
All
And they scattered and I can't
Seem
To find them
Or the energy to keep
Looking
Such a strange, Shameful thing
To be so full of love
Walking on the cooling coals
That once burned a determination fire
So bright
To never give up, to try, to heal, to give and
Grow
So full of love, Jealousy, bitterness, anger,
Exhaustion, and fear.
None of that
Mixes well inside me
It burns my throat
My voice
My hope
a heart going blind from
The inside, a star
Imploding
Walking along on heavy legs
With bad knees and an
Aching murmur along every
Nerve
I can't find it
Anymore
Hope
Words
To never say again
As real as
Ice cream cones
Bright red remote control cars
And tiny fake Christmas trees
The silence
Screams inside filthy
Windows striped
With rain
Pain
Death and medicine
Words
You will not offer
Again
Fight you
A warrior in doctor's scrubs
A doctor wielding a gun?
They fight you like
White blood cells inside
A dying body
No matter how much you wish
To say them
Or how often you do
They melt inside you
Burning things that never
Saw
The sun
Words
You wish you could say
Again
Break you
After years
A decade like a century
Heavier than even
A mother's love
Frozen
Dead before they begin
An
I
Love
You
That has no
You
And with an
I
That's
Dying
I've done
It
Sort of...
I made a home
Here
It might have a
Capital
H
In one world
I know what that could
Mean
But I wear glasses
I cannot take off
That color
My universe
It's a
Kaleidoscope
In here
Barking dogs
Dr. Who
Unfolded laundry up to the knees
And you don't want to see
The bathrooms
Kaleidoscopes
Can make you dizzy
So can trauma
Blurring
Even the good bits when you won't
Face it
All
And really
I have no skills as a carpenter
I don't know how
To build a home
And if I
I am the foundation
Alone
That does not
Feel safe
I'm living out
My worst fear
Alone
In front of my kids
Which magnifies
It all
A funhouse mirror
Distorting what happens
So I don't know reality
From fantasy
The fantasy of
Nightmare
The one where you are
Naked
Seen
Judged
But this isn't the halls of my high school
It's my life
And I've no
Clue
Where my steps
Should go
And I don't think
I'm dancing
And I'm worried
My capital H
Is a version of
hell
