Young Writers Society

When I shut my eyes,

I can see the fuzzy film of our past,

Blurred shadows accented by the warmth

That you had poured into my empty ears when

Mother lashed me with armfuls of words,

While I stepped further back in fear.

I ran to curl into the shadows of my room,

Tears streaming and wishing that I had never,

Let childish jealousy allow my mother to find me

With my sister’s stolen doll.

Later when my parents bought a new phone,

Before crying myself into short stuttering breaths,

Trapped in the shadow of my monster mother,

I would tiptoe down and phone you.

Or when my dad undressed my competence

With his powerful hands, until I was left,

A nameless human imprisoned by numbers.

I tried to cry numbers and formulas,

But all that came was lost words.

I opened my hands but all I held,

Were the answers I couldn’t understand.

You wrote the mystery of love to me,

Their love is a magic charm,

A promise made from the wrong choices.

It is my parents’ promise of hope that:

My hands, brain and body will one day

Weave the magic spell, to join

In unveiling the secrets of life

For the dying, sick and elderly,

“What greater sacrifice is there?

Than to sacrifice a life for a life?”

You had asked. “So we can continue living,

Without the fear of wasting, so we

Can enjoy the fruits of Earth,

And be for evermore?”

Dearest, when I faded away to ripen,

Freed by the dying of my innocence,

You faded away imprisoned, a broken circuit.

My hippocampus swelled,

Newfound knowledge nourished by greening salt.

But no matter how hard you tried,

They could not always reach yours.

The myelin bridge that brought me to the end of growth,

Trapped toxic amyloid beta fibrils in yours,

Who stole from your plaque of joy,

And filled it with a new tale of deceit

It whispered in your ear, that I

Was mistress to multiple identities.

I was my cousin, I was my sister,

I was a stranger, I am incongruous.

I tried to draw our symmetries

Sketches, spider diagrams, essays

Plans, drafts overlapped, we are

A flickering circle of fire, the cycle of life,

Wedding rings exchanged in matrimony.

I will rewrite the mystery of life for you,

My fingers fumbling over yours when you

Forget how to eat, dress, talk, live.

In those momentary interludes,

When the cells blow life out of your death,

I will shelter you from the world

Who hid under the dark space of your bed,

Stole money from your drawer,

Broke your TV, lost the remote.

The world blended into one cold hearted person

Who plotted to harm and kill you daily,

And one day I will return home,

Numb to the empty desert in my stomach,

That screamed the cold hard truth:

Because you have faded into memory film,

The past you and I shared no longer exists.