It has been fifteen years. Sometimes I wonder

If when I cry you shed tears, too, and I wonder

Will I go deaf soon? I try to drown out your shouting matches.

The percussion leads your voice. The great wave crashes

At the beach, but I can't be distracted.

Divorce was just a word to me back then, and Mommy was going on vacation.

Now I wonder if the reason poetry flows so well

Is because I was raised by confusion, paranoia, isolation.

All my books were my friends because with real friends I was bored.

I had time to become well-versed, I heard you use all the adult-words.

It wasn't for over a decade- twelve years of gloom,

That I would see Mom more than once or twice a week.

When that was the case, it was so only because of when we reuinited in the courtroom.

You made my whole summer bleak,

That year.

In the Xanax I stole from her, and the synthetic LSD, the lean, the caps, every fucking strain of weed, I would never find the relationship I seek

And missed out on; and I wonder when is the next time we'll smile when our eyes meet?

Things really weren't all that bad, but I'm sensitive as fuck. Still, you fed me dinner and tucked me in every night.

I know you love me. You suck at parenting, but everyone does. And well, when everyone does, I guess you're alright.

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