Enter, Return, Delete

I am a town you have never heard of, near- but not next to the sea. I am houses sprung up from bygone farm fields and leftover chicken coops. I am Quik Piks and furniture stores. I am roads without sidewalks that cars fall off of in the rain. I am new houses that feel old. I am enough rooms for each person to be alone.
I am fathers who sit in their studies with blaring televisions and dog-eared magazines. I am peanut butter and bacon sandwiches because there is nothing in the fridge. I am hearing aides and long drives. I am twisted hands and painted trees that turn to blobs at my touch. I am gin and tonics after work. I am fumbled words, imaginary conversations and a love I cannot express.
I am mothers who haunt dusty attics, stealing time. I am paper cups full of brown water dead cigarettes. I am vodka straight, vodka with seltzer, vodka with juice, vodka with everyone thinks I am doing all right. I am news programs about abducted little girls and I am ridiculous tears. I am gym bags filled with bottles. I am mean words I don’t remember and I am happy laughter I do. I am love with out limits that often trips over boundaries.
I am little sisters who stay in their pink rooms. I am diaries that bleed worry. I am all the other perfect families. I am Clorox bleach and vacuum cleaners and I can’t stop. I am boxes of old boyfriends. I am virgin blood on the sheets. I am hospital rooms and I am pumped stomachs. I am the need to overtake every atom of my self in order to create beauty. I am lonely a thought and a hope for all of the love that will never fill the holes.
Me? I am the girl who left.

5/13/2008