Cycle

Here I am again
on the edge of that cliff,
needle in my hand.
After all this time
I’m not surprised—
No matter what I do,
I’ll always end up
Here.

I can still hear them—

Mother and Father screaming
My siblings drowning in their own blood
Guards storm the house

Me, hiding under a bed
Trying not to throw up
As the blood pools and touches my hand
Soaking through my clothes
Staining me…

The voice comes again
Offering me vengeance…justice

We have a deal; their souls are forfeit.
You’re only delaying the inevitable.

The needle feels heavy in my shaking hand.
The only sound is the roar
of the blood in my ears
and my shallow breathing.
This is the only way

And I give in.

Big Impact

The alarm blares, snatching me away from whatever

dream I was having.

I roll out of bed and stumble to the closet.

I pick through my clothes, still half asleep.

High heels or ballet flats?

Later in the kitchen I squint

at the contents of my fridge

silently willing the coffee pot to brew faster

Omelet or over easy?

I scroll through the news

as I sip my coffee and shovel food in my mouth.

I read about how the desire to save money

has resulted in the hospitalizations of thousands

in Flint, Michigan.

Michael Brown, Emmett Till,

and Matthew Shepard,

chained up to that fence and left to die by two homophobes;

Crispus Attucks, and Archduke Ferdinand starting wars with their deaths…

The first Wall Street executive

who brought up the idea of

Sub-prime lending.

Dreams of dollar bills danced in their heads,

with no thought yet of “too big to fail”

A young, scrappy, and hungry Alexander Hamilton

sending a poem he wrote about the hurricane that destroyed his home

to a local newspaper for publication.

I rinse my dishes,

grab my things,

and walk out the door.

As I go, I reflect

upon the ripples

we all leave in our wake.