December 10, 2004

• As I learn more about this saucy little world we call blogging, I feel free to post even my most draft-est of works. Thanks to the members of the audiobiographical blogring, I am inspired to do just that.

  The following poem was a flourish of words that emerged after an outing with my mentee (I mentor at a local community organization). The experince was so painful and sad that I couldn’t formulate complete sentences, or construct a essay or narrative form that is more typical of my writing.

  So, you must understand, I am not a poet. All the more reason for me to post and get the feedback of my indulgent readers. So, please, critique your heart out, spare me nothing, and most importantly reader, enjoy yourself.

  Two girls waiting

  This is a poem
  For all the never-there-fathers
  And the stupid mothers
  who somehow,
  always come back
  to belive in them.

  Together, in a tangle
  of late night growling fights,
  afternoon rampages
  divorces and
  yet still…

  SHOCKED
  when daddy fucks up again.

  Together–
  they make the “eager-to-please”
  girls, the
  girls who wait in the dark
  uncomfortable, hungry, tired,
  cold
  waiting for a ride
  from their daddy
  who never arrives.
  “Twenty minutes”
  grows into hours
  Two
  Please-Love-Me
  Never-Complain girls
  wait
  as the night stretches on without his presence
  as the dark sky rumbles
  and rain falls
  down past tall city buildings
  and onto the faces of
  Two
  Always-Patient Girls

  The world hinges on us
  Never-Expect-Much girls
  us
  Please-And-Thank-You girls
  us
  girls
  who say
  “It’s no big deal,”
  when they stand worried,
  finally calling someone else for a ride.

  A man with bugging eyes
  and coifed hair like a plaster Jesus
  stands close.
  He tells us that a man named Freddy and him
  were sodimized by Satan himself.
  He and Freddy used to speak english
  but they’ve been talkin’ in tounges ever since.

  Two frightened girls watch him as
  the last bus rolls by
  They wonder
  what kind of judgement they have
  that would get them here
  waiting on a man called dad.

  “Nobody loves me,”
  the younger Forgive-And-Forget girl says.
  I am quiet when I hug her.

  Why can’t I just tell her,
  “He might not. And that ass hole is missing out!”
  What is that hole in your heart
  feeling
  that comes from such a brutal truth?

  What is that powerr of patriarchy,
  that need to be help up by Him–
  that makes us wait, stone faced and afraid
  as jittery junkies and
  pretty prostitutes
  pass our expectant gaze,
  towards every car that passes,

  hoping each set of headlights
  belongs to you.

  • 7:04 pm
  • 2 Comments