Mary E.W. Stephenson | + Follow Poet |
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Another Dawn Pt I

Pt.1
     Another dawn, another beginning of filling the hours of the day with despair and mundane longing to forget my troubled past.  Each day my mind is pulverized with agonizing memories of days long past.  My body is entombed in a small unadorned room with a tiny window and a steel door
     There are no mirrors in my tomb, in which I am glad.  I do not wish to remember how I look.  I  remember  being told enough of my plainness. 
      Why not stop me from growing in the womb?  I have thought to tell them.
      Why not stuff my body into a burlap bag, like an unwanted kitten, and throw me into the James?
       I am a coward, always have been.  Never had the courage to speak up for me, or fight against the abuse that hammered me down to a pitiful pulp of worthlessness.
     And now, I lay here each day as still as possible, dreading the dramatic spasmodic flashbacks.
    I can smell the sweat on my body, and I am intensely aware of my nerves pinching at the surface of my skin.  I have inherited a strange obsession that is a perfect diversion.
     I have no desire for a human touch or any desire of substance, as I spend my boundless days envious of death.
                                           *********

  There you are, as always in the same place each day. my chocolate doll with the nappy hair and orange eyes stares back at me with perplexity.  It is a safe place for us here with the spring coils overhead.
   I hear the  rustle of clothing, and wild exchanges of concerns outside our secluded place. A worn out face with white straw growing out from the 
top of her head intruded and spoke to me.
     "What are you doing there?" , she said.
     "But I am always here", I said.  "Each day I wake up here."
     "You must take your medicine", she said.
     "But I am not sick", I said.
     "Look at it this way", she said. "It is smart to take your medicine so you don't get sick".
      It was a daily reprise game between us.
      She placed the pill under my tongue and force water down my throat.
      I threw her a weak smile because she knew nothing of the sublime secret between dolly and me. I freed the pill from under my tongue and placed it into dolly's dress pocket.
     I was glad when this intrusive person was eaten by other duties that didn't involve me. When she vanish, bright light and vociferous sounds pierced through the steel portal. A woman as black as me bound through the disturbance, bringing

Copyright © Mary E.W. Stephenson | Year Posted 2016

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