Category: abuse

The Department Store Tower

(Warning: Poem makes reference to child abuse)

She taught me how to stay out of sight
the women who worked the candy counter

Dragged my fourteen-year-legs in beside her
as management brushed past, oblivious

Stick to the aisles and passageways, she said
Make sure you are always busy.

She couldn’t say the words that burned on her tongue:
He’ll follow you into darkened corners of the warehouse
He’ll lock the doors and tell you it’s all your fault

No one talked about what this man did,
five floors beneath the department store opulence
While people shopped, and ate, and bought

The wheels of consumerism, well-oiled
stuffing our consciousness with lies and deceit
the vulnerable confined to shadows and margins

But some of us will never forget
Innocent fragments haunting locked corners
Ensuing rage still railing against the injustice
That puts a pedophile in charge.

(Image my own)

Wasps

I didn’t know about the wasps
before I had carried my toddler
across the darkened room
laid her in a bed, crawling

Clutched her sleeping body
close to my chest, turned
to retreat, but the swarm
gathered there at the door

My cousin punched a hole
in a wall, unable to discern
the exit in a smoke-filled room.
The hole remains; she doesn’t

Strangers came to her funeral
drawn by the mystery of the girl
(name unknown) who died
such a tragic death, just 18.

How did this invasion happen
how was I remiss in noticing
that this house of potential
was being consumed by threat?

Unlike my ill-fated kin,
I knew where the door was
braved it to save my child
ignored the prophetic warning

Look back at the ruins now –
hers and mine – the patterns
of abandonment, familial
neglect, disinterest a plague

How we women try to please
carry our children through
the flames, choking on
disappointment… hope

A man lit the flame that killed her,
just as a man suffocated my spirit
threads of sanity carrying me
till my mind escaped the wasps

(Ink and watercolour mine)

Fallen From Grace

The proverbial can has exploded –
transparency of our deceit now lies
like swarms of glass snakes writhing
at our feet – litany of hissing truths

Bent on keeping innocence alive,
I strategically attempt avoidance,
point to wealth, abundance, nurture
focus … the onslaught continues.

Slivers of slime, maggot-like hoards
mobilize – a sea of protestation,
I, overwhelmed by filth and disgust
encroaching on my sanity, helpless.

Familiarity colours the devastation –
have witnessed it before, watched
as my mother bit into the same
serpent-defiled apple…turned away.

There are no barriers to block out
the vile beasts, no refuge for broken
souls, whose lives, twisted in denial,
have mercilessly fallen to betrayal.

(Fallen From Grace was written in January, 2016. Image my own)

(This is an edited version of an earlier poem from 2016. Image my own)

The Photo Album

Adolescence doesn’t wear a smile
in our old photo album –
stares fixated on unseen lint –
distracted, we three sisters,
all reeling from the cold,
unwell, immobilized…

What is absent is the photographer
whose pointed directions critique
each decision – a derisive repetition
that eats at our souls, each girl
wrestling with self-nurture vs
self-annihilation, landing somewhere
in between – mannequin targets
for male abuse…

Oh, I tried to take up arms, rail against
the dominance, the oppression, but
only succeeded in settling for disconnection,
while one sister turned tricks for attention,
the other retreated into full dependency,
her madness, out of date, nevertheless
relevant – despite our tormenter’s death,
the images are permanently recorded
in that old photo album.

Perfect

I’m being a good girl, Dad
Staying out of sight
Keeping my needs to a minimum
Promise I don’t cry, Dad.

I’m being a good wife, Dad
Cooking all his favourites
Letting him walk ahead
Never uttering a peep, Dad

I’m a perfect background wife, Dad
Just like you taught me; just like Mom
Only no one has to hit me to make me
behave, Dad; I learned it good from you.

(Image my own)