bug in thuh soup

shit girl, 

ya ain’t nothing

ta no-body

ya ain’t special 

ya ain’t even priority 

fighting’ fuh ya-self

just make ya a 

bug in thuh soup

her eyes were clear and bright

I grew up in a generation

of wear "no all-black" at school 

because it announced a mental state;

but  years prior, we walked 

miles home alone at nine and

arriving to an empty house 

was a parent's concern

always for me

an empty house, 

even when mother didn't work

siblings older

moving out moving on...

when she finally left dad, she left me

from states away he ordered 

things required to live a life

added me to cards and accounts

neither of us thinking 

I existed alone in a house

that once held five

I would finish two years of school

in three, meet a boy, live a life

bury too many too soon

wear all black

there she goes again

fuck me if March isn't approaching

22 years and I still don't understand

how I got there

how I got here

time stopped the year I spent crying

in the shower

doing dishes

in the car driving to work 

I've evolved into a functional human

more or less

some days less

in the deep under

on the wall she walked

heel to toe

balancing arms spread wide

looking out ahead

in the peripheral, a vastness 

swirling 

in the deep under

waiting for the sun of summer

March will mark brother’s passing 

twenty-two years hence 

now it’s Birdie’s gotcha day

one year of sweetness 

April would have been 

sister turning sixty 

if she hadn’t passed at fifty 

now it’s Birdie turning three-years

May would have been 

brother turning fifty-nine

if March hadn’t happened 

now it marks my two-year

leaving 

mulligan please

learning to swim

I sank grasping the sides

in a deep end darkly 

touching forks to sockets

live

in sense searching 

for a sunny space

for all the flowers 

of deep hues hoarded

in the hours

of disassociation

since