Tabitha Vohn's Blog - Posts Tagged "hope"

You are the girl
I would have looked up to
in high school
Vintage tees and broomstick
skirts smell of the man who sold
them, the one that was with you
last night
old enough to be your father
and maybe recommended
by him
like good weed
a fix that keeps on giving
Your friend dragged you from
the swimming pool last night
where you--like Echo--unwound
gauze layers like peeling away
their pain when their eyes lick
your skin their charred fingers
raised poisons kept you afloat
a face-down Ophelia with hair
in seaweed tendrils
She would feel the heavy
carelessness of your
confidence that someone would
love you enough
to pull you out of it
It's that dancing that keeps your
ears clear of the symphonies
of phonies you're not trying to
hear
keep swinging
poll center
heart center
spread
dip
roll
find your center
warm chests you press to
it's not so different to close
your eyes under the lights
and feel the love
while they stick another dollar
bill in your g-string
anymore than it was to
free fall into that endless
ocean blue the chlorinated
hue of forgetting
that once
there was a little girl
with dreams of fairy princes
whose white horses
took a detour in middle school
when they realized it was girls
who'd get on their knees
for a hell of a lot less than
diamonds
and you
already knew
the feel of those carpeted
brush-burns
the education they sought
came from you
a fearlessness that was
a comfort to the rest of us
trying so hard to playact at
what we thought we had to be
our feelings fragile as loose
feathers the pluck and bleed
and all our hollowed-out insides
that growing up too fast demanded
you were a phoenix
and we prayed to be like you
even as we called you
slut
whore
home-wrecker
behind your back
our green tongues powdered with
secret love
we never saw the empty rooms
you went home to
or the used needles in the kitchen sink
or your panties mixed in with stranger's
clothing
or the diary you kept that said whether
or not today you want to live
all we saw were the rainbows the scarves
the beaded curtain framing your face
the wild abandon of your laugh
we ignored the urgency
with which you threw yourself
into that swimming pool.

I never want you
to think the
silence on my end
means that I've stopped
caring
have forgotten
or don't miss you
I've been thinking
a lot about King Solomon
and the two women who
came to him
arguing over the same child
both claiming to be its mother
The king orders the baby to be
sawed in two
the first women says Yes, that
will satisfy me
The second cries and pleads
with the king
give the child to
the first women
but let it live
Growing up I was taught the
moral of the story was how wisely
the king solved the problem
but that conclusion misses the
whole point
it misses everything
The second woman loved her son
enough to let him go
rather than see him torn in two
that was the mark of the true mother
That is the mark of true love
For child, friend, brother, parent, or lover
I've spent my whole life
sawing babies in two
Fighting over fractions of hearts I felt were
due ME
hearts I helped to break between choices
they should never have had to make
child vs. spouse
daughter vs. son
I was not whole enough to let go
of my end of the wishbone
of selfish dreams that would never
come true
I have learned enough now
been loved enough now
to know
that I cannot do that to you
So I will never ask you to choose
even if others do
But just so we're clear
never doubt for a second
how much I love you.

You were the first
to interpret me other-worldy
though I have no reason to
claim garments of divinity
For you
my love transcended this plane
of unforgiving ground
and electric sky

For you
I would puncture
my palms to
spare you pain
a winter before you
loved me I understood
why mothers make targets
of bone and back to shield
their sons from shrapnel blasts
I would gladly slip those slivers
that fashion the aftermath
internment camped around
your heart
under my flesh

If I was indeed heavenly
I’d still your demons
with a word
And all your ever afters
would be peaceful slumbers

If you hear nothing else
from me
let this prophecy wash away
your self-loathing
let your doubt be made clean

Your worth is in
–Existing–
I could not love
A blood son or
creation more
Simply because

You ARE

This is not some religious rhetoric
This is a Cypher of holy tongue
You were created Beautiful

Remember
once you told me
“I was never supposed to be here”
but God
defied nature and reason
to fashion you
How much more proof do you
need of how irreplaceable
you are
Your very breath is a love

Believe
that you are meant to be here
Hear
that even though these months
without you have been hell
You
are worth crawling through
all of Dante’s levels and I am
searching you out
offering you my hand
singed hair burned flesh
and flame to light
your way to peace

Know
if it’s still too complicated to
speak to me you can
reach for me across that elastic thread
alchemied between us before I
could even put a name to those eyes
I will hear you
same as I see you in my dreams
Or sense you before I turn a corner

You are always with me

You
have known too many tears
my love
let mine
mingled with prayers
Sail you Home
I am never giving up on you
I’m waiting for you there.

The way I love you
wouldn’t cause any notes
on a scandal

yet every contact I
get from you is a high
it’s true
I drop tears from
missing you

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