Goodbye Mom

When people ask me

If I’ve lost a mother

I say no,

And yes. 

My mother is alive as a rose

In the summer

Soaking up the sun and warmth,

The pinnacle of life. 

But to me,

Who sees underneath the rotted ground,

She’s long gone. 

Times on weekday afternoons

Coming home,

Walking home,

To see her happy. 

Playing games,

Tickling the soft pink lump of flesh

That is and was my brother. 

She is happy,

Until I want to play. 

“Go play outside”

She, stretched out on a cool cotton couch

AC on,

Magazine in hand, like a judges book.

It’s 102 degrees outside

I listen to my mommy.

Maybe I can seek salvation

From the oppressive heat

Under the shade of the bush,

The green haven I have named myself

Shelly and Daniel play. 

They don’t want me,

So I watch. 

Watch as the ball,

Illegal under the constitution of mother,

Bounces out of control. 

Toys scatter

A mess rings the lying sounds of destruction. 

“Carly!  What did you do?!”

No one listens,

No one defends

The innocent prisoner

Bound by eight more years until adulthood

My prison sentence. 

“Tell Me!  I have a right to know!” 

Anger, frustration,

Can I not be smart AND thirteen?

What does age have to do with personage?

“You have no rights. 

You are mine and I own you

Until you are eighteen.” 

Crushing blows

I am a slave. 

So is my mother dead?

No, not dead

All too alive. 

Slinging words like darts

Knowing, just where to throw

I lost my mother long ago

Or maybe,

I just ran away.