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.
Mother’s feet scream – agony of her miserable condition, underlying disease eating her. My feet, free of calluses, paddles slightly bent and fallen, carry on with forgiving kindness.
Husband’s knees are red-hot pokers shooting knife-sharp volts with every rickety step. Mine are knots in spindly trunks that bear movement graciously, allot me flexibility.
Father’s back grew weak faltering in the end, hunched, as if he’d born a cumbersome burden. My back, not without its moaning, carries me proudly erect – like the spring sapling, winter endured.
Uncle’s heart beats erratically, ceasing despite its mechanical support, his life a testimony to modern science. My heart flutters with expectancy, aches with disappointment, and soars with each new birdsong.
Sister’s tension rises, the stiffness in her neck suffocating, headaches blinding her vision. My neck, slung now like a rooster’s, puffs around my face like an old friend, allows me the comfort of perspective.
Brother’s mind has seized, lost somewhere between today and yesteryear – never certain of either. Mine, a constant churning cog, gathers information, spews ideas and bends in the face of creativity.
My eyes have seen suffering, my hands throbbed with desire to help; yet each bears their cross stoically, and so I watch with compassion and gratitude for the life I might have lived, had my own vessel not been so blessed.
Wish I could converse – one harmonic voice blended in a symphony of birdsong – but my tongue stumbles reveals me as interloper
As much as I tread softly over forest floor my missteps crackle alert the denizens danger is about – no imploring can reverse the impression
Nature’s sensitivity is finely tuned and I am urban-scented, barely tolerated, seldom trusted – must bear my reverence for this sacred space more deliberately.
One Woman's Quest 