I feel tall sometimes,
Standing in the shower,
Though my head won't break the water
Even when I stand up straight…
When I awake
From a dream—
A memory—
I've survived
Again.
I am clean as I rinse off the feeling
You wanted me to suffer
Out of cruelty or demonic shame.
I stand tall as I take a breath,
Alive in the darkness of the present,
Safely in the future
Where you're long dead.
But before I leave the prison
Of that comforting heat,
Where I am safe
before the day begins,
I wonder if you were trying to teach me to stand tall.
The world's disgusting
after all.
I remember you spent forty grand,
Just to have it stolen.
We never went home after that.
It wasn't safe?
It wasn't safe for your money.
You were just trying to make a home for us there—
A second home.
Was that so wrong?
When I remember all the colors
Of the brush you used to paint,
I shrink back