Walking With Emmanuel: the Abused Child

I now walk with the young Emmanuel In his gardens of trees and flowers Out of the darkness of my lasting den Where the two monsters kept me without end In the house of horrors and orcs I felt unworthy of love and hugs In the cellar forever kept There living, sometimes fed Female orc called me ‘I love you my dear’ While burning my arms with cigarette butts Male orc told me, ‘My beloved man hear’ While stretching my bones with a baseball bat I was eight when I lost my hope And placed in the darkness of that cellar With my teddy bear unable to cope An empty milk bowl and of fear a dweller I cannot recall night from day It was always cold and hot It was dark and sometimes grey I felt I deserved it, by the fear I was caught My bones were broken and aching My head bleeding everywhere My skin burned as if it were baking My bones coming out of the skin like a flare I could no longer distinguish what was true In constant despair and confusion I could not eat, I could only spew My body was treated by perennial contusion So, one day, Emmanuel came and talked A young boy like me, surrounded by light My pain and despair were blocked He brought me some milk and a dress so white When Emmanuel came again in a white cloud He took me to a garden I never saw The scent of flowers and fruits made me proud Out of that cellar’s ominous law My joy did not please the two orcs They told me, ‘You never learn the lesson’ So an iron substituted the cigs And a metal bar was used to extort my confession Emmanuel came again surrounded by a mist He brought me back to his garden to express a wish I was confused as all my desires were on an empty dish So, I replied, ‘I feel lonely and unwanted, I wish not to exist’ It was one day of a cold December I could hear street children singing their carols I could not talk and walk anymore as I remember On the road, mothers surrounded their children with caring I felt weak, my head constantly bleeding My bones coming out of my flesh with no surprise My teeth lost for decay and no healing The darkness forever taking my eyes […]until my last despair exhaled out of my chest I was again with Emmanuel […] He took me to a golden shelter There was a bowl of fresh milk and an apple He told me I could stay with him forever Singing with other children in an ivory chapel