Tag Archives: Conditions and Diseases

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A Midnight Violation

Bathed in an ethereal light
this child has no skin in the game
yet her trust holds demands
she cannot bear.

The creak of her bedroom door
snatches the sleep from her eyes
and in the darkness, horror descends;
her pillow, once soft and warm,
betrays her and once under, now over,
muffles her surprise.

Beneath his weight, she dissipates -
her cries muffled in the night.
Her fright smothers  – she gasps for air
and he’s still there, grinding her
fragile hips into dust.

God looks on, and in His fashion
does nothing to intervene;
a celestial voyeur.

Stuffed animals bolt to the floor
one after the other, and with them
descends lost innocence;
her face laced in spittle, and she’s so little.                               

He rolls over, spent and condemned
as blackness descends to fill her.
Nothing is as it seems, but not a dream.
Tears wash away the vision of
this violation.

He rises as she plummets;
this child painted with the smell of
cigarettes and cheap liquor.
Morning filters through frosted panes
but she finds no warmth in the rising sun.

They’ll be no accounting for this sin
and no childhood left within this shattered
shell of a child.  A darkness, deeper than sleep,
envelopes her lost innocence, as the
morning’s breeze carries the cry of angels.

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A Dark and Distant Star

 My sleep is bathed in fearful sweat; each night a
pitched battle between all that I’ve loved and all
that I’ve lost.

My dreams betray me. Treasonous vignettes spinning
through the night like mismatched pieces of a puzzle:
no matter how desperately I press one vision into another,
it will not lock and the picture remains incoherent.

When morning breaks, I arise once more into the cool,
grey fog of isolation. Cold and shivering, aching and
empty. Unfocused and confused, eyes pasted shut with
broken sleep and a mouth of stale cotton.
.
Each day is spent in a stumbling stupor of regret and
indecision. Like a bird on broken wings, my thoughts fall
dangerously about me. I am tired and disillusioned. I am
conscious but cannot see. I exist in a pale light descending
and tomorrow’s hope is a dark and distant star.

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I Live Here All Alone

I will not die for lack of love,
though greater seems the fate,
Nor shall I pray for tenderness,
or seek my soul to mate.

No kiss for me do lips desire,
nor arms round me entwine;
A soft caress or heart possessed,
I am not so inclined.

This rhapsody that others seek
I will look for in tomorrow.
With so much pain, I’m now within
A great and binding sorrow.

The emptiness I live within
has always been my home -
So do not seek my company,
I live here all alone.

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Broken Smiles

Behold, such sadness in her eyes;
sweet longing for bygone days.
A single tear descends, etching
a rivulet through her powdered face.
Betrayal writ in broken smile.
She wears defeat with noble grace.
Alone within her cruel vexation,
Her despair drifts upon the air.
I am entranced by this cheap perfume;
I cannot look away.

Her emptiness devours me;
I am lost within her reverie.
A thousand questions knit into one:
What tragedy before unfolds?
Has deathly illness laid low
a precious kinship?
Perhaps a lover, forever foresworn,
now departed?
Promises shattered like broken glass;
cutting her dreams into ribbons?

She rises slowly and partly turns;
her glazed eyes lock onto mine
as I offer nothing more of comfort
than my own broken smile.
Tears well within my eyes
and I look away:
My empathy is my undoing
and shame rises as a blush.

I turn again and she is gone!

Years have passed and still my heart
beats in imperfect rhythm.
Was she set before my vision
or concocted from my own revision?
Did she find her peace once more;
perhaps some comfort in our communion?
Even now I feel her sorrow
Like a midnight fog rolling
over me.
My tears have long since dried,
but my cry is eternal.