Streamers

It's been so long since I've been home. I've been gone..I've been gone for way too long..

Streamers
by sofiadventure

Today I have all the blinds angled open
In the hope
That the wonder outside
Will shine its light
Into the cracks of my heart
That just can't close today

I guess that my dreams
Broke all the stitches
As it swelled to this mound in my chest
Full of hope
And it's so hard to convince myself to keep eating
When my insides are facing the wide open seams
Of this muscle

Like the dishes in the kitchen
Fill my sink with the stink
Of being left to wait too long
And I'm listening hard to know I'm still breathing
Through the cracks in my heart
That drape my lungs like the streamers
Of my fourth grade birthday party
Where I said I wouldn't play
Because I knew that I would lose
Because my heart was hanging heavy and loose
The words which set the pace for every game
I haven't played since that day
I have been trying to tell myself
It's not too late
To learn that I don't want to race
Because I can't bear the tears
In my heart strings
That come
From leaving somebody behind

And I remember when I was 5 years old
Standing on a chair to reach the kitchen stove
And burning the skin of my elbow
As I tried to fry
Breakfast for my mother
While she lay sick in bed with
The voices in her head
Telling her she wasn't enough

And I remember filling that cup
With cordial straight from the bottle
Because I didn't know that we could be too sweet
unless we watered down what we gave

And I didn't know that the foundation of my faith
Was based
On my mother watching Jesus
Helping her to dry the dishes
And that when I measured the weight of that diagnosis
My prayers would turn to wishes
Floating like dried up dandelions
Away from me

And I was eight years old when I realized
that maybe my friends didn't fear
the same look
in their mothers eyes
when they went behind themselves and shined
with the reflection of the tears
of fear in my eyes
because I knew that she could hear
all of her own voices
But not mine.