Tag: dysfunction

Family Portrait

Did you know that life would come to this?
Flattened memories pressed between wax
the essence of our efforts forgotten,
the dreams, so carefully construed, lost.

You leaned toward the conventional,
and I was ever the sentimentalist,
and yet we ended up in the same place –
shadow selves standing at the banks
of our dishevelled lives…

Survivors, nonetheless, tokens
of a a past riddled with so many lies,
so much heartbreak…

We are ghost sisters
haunted, hunting,
unable to step away –

Drawn in,
pulling apart –
all that remains.

(Family Portrait first appeared here February, 2019. Edited here. Image my own)

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Where Ignorance Leads

Quest for independence
born of familial dysfunction
led me down a path of dissent

Compromise, I believed
was toxic, swore against
the brutality of submission

Need no one,
depend on no one
have nothing to lose

Overlooked the joy
of interdependence –
an alien concept

Chose a lonely path,
a straggler destined
never to belong…

(Image my own)

Sisterly Love

It’s just a moth, I offered
that blue moon night
rattling windows
chafing nerves

We’d chosen exile –
sister and I – refuge
from family demons,
not ours to claim

Innocence borrows
responsibility – I bore
it like a badge;
she shattered

Could not discriminate
darkness from her own
inner light – sought
to end the fury

I’ll carry us both,
I murmured, too young
to recognize the magnitude –
altruism destined to fail.

She’s buried now
beneath the madness
her mind the moth
slamming against my pain.

(Image my own.)

Spotlights Burn

She amassed children while
he pursued accolades

Family photos display
northern shorelines
tanned faces, white-toothed grins
parents not represented

Lost her childhood
at the bottom of a ravine
laid beaten and shattered
no one came to rescue her.

Guess that’s what drew her
the his light; money, she hoped
would not abandon her.

But muck tracks the same
and children need feeding
and absent a co-parent
she sleeps most days.

Offspring learn independence
a product of adults’ disarray
outlasting the fickleness of fame.

(For Reena’s Exploration Challenge:  prompt is the last line of the poem.  Image my own.)

Chasing Snakes

Who ghosts desire?
I long for a kiss,
my glass belly ice
& concrete clouding
our porcelain peace.

A good woman lingers,
then after voices joy

I, marble angel,
let men like father,
with grass on their hand,
pat eternity,
the door sheer,
timely,

Life!

(Disclaimer:  Fridays I play around online with Magnetic Poetry.  The words are not mine, and therefore; I cannot be held responsible for the outcome…right?! Lol.)

 

Missing

Have you seen her –
the child we lost,
the one who lost herself?

born to a sister
breasts not yet ripe
for motherhood’s call

a passenger
on a perilous ride,
sweetness eclipsed

by a cacophony
of raised voices
the wails of women

helplessly trapped
a smothering drama;
how easily she escaped

slipped from our clutches
found comfort in the streets
preferred coldness of strangers

to the raging fires at home;
lost her to the lure of parties,
an elixir for the empty places,

found her once amongst
the debris of discarded needles
and the haze of sexual reek

the golden halo of youth
now matted clumps of shame
her beauty sunken in shadows

we’d taught her well, it seems –
the art of submission, how to
betray the self, embrace defeat

tried to pick her up, create
a milieu of normalcy, establish
homelike roots, but shams

do not last and she ran again
the echo of her absence a hole
ringing in our hearts, we are

guilt-ridden, apologetic, fear
the power of our inadequacy;
try to forget, justify, cringe

for the child we lost,
the one that got away,
the one that lost herself.

(Submitting this for Ragtag Community’s daily prompt: needle.  Computer is going into the shop so I may be MIA for bit.  Missing was first penned in October of 2017.

Family Portrait

Did you know that life would come to this?
Flattened memories pressed between wax,
the essence of our efforts forgotten, the dreams,
so carefully construed, lost.  You leaned toward
the conventional, and I was ever the sentimentalist
and yet we ended up in the same place – shadow
selves standing at the banks of our disheveled lives,
survivors, nonetheless, tokens of a past riddled
with so many lies, so much heartbreak, we are
ghost sisters, haunted, hunting, unable to step
away – drawn in, pulling apart – all that remains.

Two-Storied

A two-story, red brick
set on the edge of town
was our castle, tall cedars,
like a moat, separating us
from unwanted onlookers

Strategically placed intercoms
tracked our movements, and
walls that moved revealed
forbidden spaces – passageways
that led to covert rooms

Our King was not benevolent,
and nor was our mother his queen –
for the woman he worshipped,
who held his heart’s throne,
dwelt in the shadows, and reigned.

Elizabeth, she was, regal
and bejeweled, long white gloves
brandishing a silver holder,
red lips blowing rings of seduction,
her presence a disquieting menace

She would not stir from our fortress
and none of us would speak of her
lest our kingdom might crumble
Our castle was two-storied: one
a man’s the other his alter ego.

(Written for Laura’s Manic Mondays 3-way prompt:  castle)