Fear Flows Within The Umbilical Cord

My mother is a gracious one, healing smile and tender hands. Her skin was soft and smooth before she had me.

With the memory of every injustice she’s been handed sinking deeper and deeper beneath her cracked skin, betrayal and pain ache in her bones.

I can never fall asleep well for I fear she gently settles on my bed every night, hovering over me with a knife against my throat. No drink of water nor bite of food will go past my mouth without the look of desperation in my eyes, “Please, please have not poisoned this.”

And if I were my mother, I would want to kill my child too. It is with every one of my careless errors that she realises time and time again. “I do not deserve this.” Raised with the promise of love and care, every hand on her must feel like pulling open a fresh wound with claws. Every word must sound like a corkscrew twirling into her neck. And for a woman with enough pent up rage and horror in her to burn the world to ashes; I think it is fair for her to tighten her hands around my throat with each disintegrating thought.

“You are a curse to this house.”

“I know, ma.”

And as afraid as I am that you will finally cross the line, take a leap off the cliff and stain your cooking knife with my blood; finally receiving a violently deserved catharsis, you never will, will you?

Because after every time you tell me I’m why you’ll never be happy, you fold my clothes for me.

And for every bruise you leave on my body, you make my favourite dinner.

And though you’ll never say it, your eyes always search for forgiveness in mine. My crooked smile tells you everything it needs to.

“It’s okay ma, you just don’t know who else to blame.”