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cerulean-kingsnake · 2 years

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Imagined Slights

I leave the door open, but I prohibit its use.

I don't remember when that rule was made, but I've been conditioned to follow it since childhood and I can't stop it now.

You're free to leave whenever you'd like, but the moment you do you've unknowingly betrayed me and everything I hold dear.

You're dead to me then, regardless of any promises of return you offer while you remain oblivious to the old battlescars inside me that begin to burn.

Upon your inevitable resurrection I hesitantly invite you in for pleasant chatter, and you don't notice that I close the door behind you - just a little - as you step inside with me.

The door is still open, but somewhere in my soul I regret leaving it that way as you cross the threshold once again and leave me with yet another intangible promise of your return from the world outside.

The next time you visit me with new stories to tell, I find it hard to listen.

The half-closed door commands most of my attention as I sit dreading its use, and now you comment that I'm quieter than usual and ask what ails me.

I answer that nothing's wrong and paint a smile too crooked to be convincing on my face when I mistake the concern in your voice and the furrow of your brow for judgement that I will never be prepared to hear.

Our visit feels colder than ones prior, and you are the one to cut it short with a less-enthusiastic mention of our next talk as you flee back outside into the warmth offered by the sun.

Oh, how it makes my scars ache to see history repeat itself; but I don't argue or demand you abide by my secret rule.

The door is only left open a small sliver after you enter the next time.

This visit is delayed, and you don't remove your light coat and sit to enjoy the peace and comfort like you used to. This visit is quick, temporary, an obligation to you now more than anything as I retreat into the safety of one-word answers and physical distance.

I can't find it in myself to play a perfect host to someone who I know won't stay, and your attempt to pry in past the hard ice that is building on my exposed skin is met with resistance, then wrath.

You don't have the opportunity to leave again, this time I throw you out the door with a gust of frozen wind that spews from my mouth studded in fractals of sharp words and I don't see the wounds they leave on your skin as the door slams shut between us.

Now it's quiet.

You're not here anymore, nobody is - I'm left alone with my thoughts and my hurt and only now do I start to see that you always came back, you always meant to come back.

I finally feel the cold around me, the bitter cold I allowed to join me here that no person wants to stay in. It's no wonder you didn't want to spend time enjoying my warm hospitality, I'd stopped offering it to you long ago without giving you any reasons why.

It's too quiet.

The only sound left is the haunting rhythm of passing time mocking me from the indifferent face of the clock on the wall while I wither in this tundra of my own creation.

Tick tock, tick tock, tick knock knock knock.

I look to the door, still firmly closed and overrun with frost. The knocks are more insistent now. I shuffle slowly to the door - I've stopped shivering, but I am stiff and numb and want nothing more than to sleep my pain away.

The door won't open for me and I don't have the strength to force it, but I don't have to.

The wood is splintered by an incoming shoulder and I'm surprised to see you on my doorstep. There's worry in your eyes as they follow the patterns of frozen scales that have formed upon me, and for the first time I can see that worry for what it is.

You want me to join you outside in the sun, but I argue I don't belong there, this freezer is my home.

You don't want to accept that answer.

You pull me into an embrace and the awkward discomfort I feel melts away as I remember how nice a sensation it is to be warm. How nice it is to not be alone.

I finally tell you my rule about the door. Maybe someday I can bring myself to tell you what I recall about why the rule was made.

For now, your presence alone helps me see the obsolesence of such a thing; and the longer we spend outside enjoying the sunshine and making new friends, the easier it becomes to forget I ever lived that way.

#cerulean kingsnake #mental health #poetry #my poem

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cerulean-kingsnake · 2 years

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PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE

I see a high stripe of passionate Red

And my ears tune in to the strong beat led

By all the bleeding hearts in the chests of soldiers

That have banded together in incredible numbers

To fight for equality and move progress ahead

Regardless of their risks of turning up dead

The Orange line up next serves as a witness

To the courage and honor of all who join with us

To cast decades of silence and caution to the wind

So we can buck the status quo and the way things have been

And no matter how hard they try to shut down or end this

It won't ever be over until we see some real justice

As rough as it will be while we keep moving on

We have to keep up this movement for ones already gone

So our Yellow stripe shines bright to keep us reminded

Of the happiness and light waiting for us to find it

All those threats of grey clouds they send all day long

Will never rain out our parades while we march strong

Hope for new growth along barren fields of thought

Kept empty and war-torn by bigotted ignorant rot

Is what I feel so strongly from our line of Green

More people rising up to spur change than we've ever seen

As facts prevail and harsh rhetoric's forgot

We'll keep celebrating June if they like it or not

'Cause our deep Blue stripe is ever-present, ever-mournful

Of all the well-loved people we have lost in this battle

They paid the steepest price for each brick laid

On this path we've worked so hard to steadily pave

For the next generations to love strong without being fearful

That society will shun them if a priest or grandma get tearful

Then our calming Violet line speaks of soul-deep healing

Through mindfulness, community, and compassionate feeling

It's a small but potent glimpse of a future so joyous

Where pains of the past lack the strength to destroy us

That euphoric vision is enough to leave us reeling

Yet they won't be satisfied 'til they have us all kneeling

Our flag still calls on us to support each other

It motivates our humanity with its flying colors

That battle-scarred fabric represents our life and liberty

Not unlike another flag displayed everwhere in this country

What happened to "pursuit of happiness" and "love thy brother"?

Why can it be tied to one banner but not the other?

Our colors and the societal struggle they represent

Should resonate more than anything with these men

Who make it well-known just how much they idolize

The founders of our country who would have given their lives

To use their influence to voice the people's discontent

With the needless oppression faced wherever they went

But the prejudiced refuse to understand when

It's easier for them to just point and cry 'sin!'

We hold no malice or ill-will in our hearts

But that can't matter to these people who from the start

Have been mixing up hateful ichor to drown this country in

So when everyone else is down they can claim that they win

As if it's all a game without consequence or toll

As if without an enemy they find their lives too dull

They want to see children from elementary school on

To pledge a flag that can't support the colors its worn

Since the day church and state separation lulled

And religious makers of our laws got a little too bold

Human love is not standardized or in limited quantity

But they won't listen to this fact because they just want to be

Praised for fighting off the 'evil' they seeded themselves

Then turned around and blamed on somebody else

But evil has never been born inside a truly caring heart

It spawns in hateful souls that pretend they're not dark

If they really want an end to moral depreciation

They should turn off their propaganda and look within

The only way to kill a weed is to take out the root

Otherwise is grows on to bear toxic fruit

If we as a country are to actually win,

We must promote love instead of condemning what they called 'sin'

#pride month #pride #happy pride 🌈#my poem #poetry #lgbtq #cerulean-kingsnake

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