A Conversation With My Mother - If She Ever Talked To Me

She never understood.

from the point of sitting in the kitchen on our 

rectangular table, where I told her I was sad.

Everyones sad sometimes, she said.

But I was sad more than sometimes,

and she never understood.

That when she screamed profanities in my face

that they meant nothing for I couldn’t hear her

over the own voice in my head,

screaming worse things at me.

You’re imagining things, you don’t have depression, she said.

How could i have it when she gave me everything I could have 

ever wanted?

When she loved me so hard I couldn’t breathe cause she squeezed too tight.

Now I can't sleep well alone because she’s the reason I have separation anxiety.

I wake up at the wee hours of the night to sit and wonder what happened

to that little girl that left so long ago.

I can't look too deeply in the mirror for I see her in my eyes and hair.

she easily slips into my mind with whispers of empty promises.

It’s not my fault, it never was, she said. 

I can agree with you on that partly, but mom, you could have never known

the damage you caused

because you can’t even look me in the eye when you see me.

You would never know the shell of the girl you loved

is right in front of you

if she hit you across the face like 

she’s been dying to all these years.

And at the same time

all I ever asked for

was a hug.