My truth lies within the crevasses between my fingers
Reaching slowly into every root of every strand of hair
Of every freckle that once used to dot my face
Truth lies within my throat
Curdling at the sight of any lies
Finds itself trickling its way up to the mouth
Like frothing, it seems I have been choked yet again by the the cyanide they have fed me
My lips zipped closed, suffocating internally,
A plastic bag is placed over my face,
The light switches off
Like a horror movie, I have been inflicted in odd torture
I flinch at the sight of an arm raised,
But ironically am not moved by it
When people shout, I laugh
Curse words don’t curse my bitter skin,
These cursives that you speak in don’t line my ears in musk
They do not trigger a reaction,
I blink in astonishment of them trying,
My ears pierced closed at the sound of wailing children
I fall ill to the sound of danger
Any scream, any abhorrent noise I will fight,
Flight or fight, has now become a default fight
My shoulders raised, ready for any attack,
I have a skeleton that cannot support it’s own body weight
For so long I was told to lie,
To cover up the molestation of my lonely mind
My truth lies between the crevasses between my fingers
On each finger lies etched deep into a map
My eyes have seen too much yet too little
Too much torture the anguish of weeping orphans
I am an orphan who has raised herself into a cold selfish world
A world where I am already disavantaged
An Orphan, a Brown lady, A woman,
I am already weighted down by an ocean of terror
Every time I speak now, I feel as though I am releasing a bird
I used to call myself a paralysed Phoenix
Used to want to destroy myself over to begin again
Used to weep at the sound of God, in churches, mosques and temples
Found myself at my knees in a way of a Gift to the One Above
But even He has left me,
He too has left me
Or maybe I left him
Maybe I have this all confused
Maybe I wasn’t made for this world
Maybe at my Birth,
I didn’t cry, already knowing I was predisposed to calamity
But here I stand today.
In this fight, I stand today
With a burning soul I fight.