Stories My Mother Told Me

Blinding headlights of a sleepy driver

Impact my fragile body

Stealing any feeling of nostalgia

Recollection or remote memory

In the universe of infinite potential

That is my mind



A childhood lost

Like a sailor buried at sea

No way of ever retrieving it

12 years of youth flushed

Down the toilet of forgetfulness

A dead fish in my aquarium of memories



The insensitive men in white lab coats

The same cold hearted ones

Whose icy hands and instruments

Freeze my pale skin that's brutally scarred

Tell me that in fact I'm lucky

Not only to forget but to be alive



Labeled unwanted memories

Are the incessant X-rays

Of a bony leg torn in half

By a compound fracture

MRIs of a brain clotted by pints of blood

The same blood that was loaned

From an anonymous source

After countless amounts escaped my body

Fast like those fleeing a fire



Unwanted memories of the turmoil

My family suffered the day

When a solemn priest read me my last rites

As the doctors told of my near impossible survival

Or at least hardly not ending up a carrot



But what of the memories that I want?

The hopscotch games and silly notes passed

Speaking of my very first crush

Or filled with complaints of a dreaded teacher

Assigning boatloads of homework

On what was supposed to be a weekend

Of immense joy and freedom



Trips to the local corner store

To satisfy my daily requirement of sugar

Or to the beloved zoo

Gazing in awe at the primates

Swinging almost a mile high

At least in my youthful eyes

On the thin but strong tree limbs



Photos say a thousand words

And could be the key to unlocking

The chamber of secrets that is my past

But the door was locked

The keys thrown away

By a Hitler like woman I call Chris



Sleepless nights I spend

In extreme agony of the mind

Trying to dig up my buried past

Not wanting to give into the fact

That all I'll ever know

Are stories my mother told me

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