his lying shadow

fear is tangible
it permeates the skin
it pricks the soul

my heart has been bleeding
since i was a baby
i have memories
that shouldn't make sense
to remember

my father 
screaming 
while i am stranded
in some orange plastic
play thing

not even old enough
to walk y​et
when a beer bottle
is thrown at my mother

i am invisible in the corner

over the years 
i watch my mother cry
while i hold things in
then i watch her go numb
her eyes floating in the distance
when spoken to

my weekend visits 
with my dad
were random and didn't last long
he smelled like cheap whiskey
and he lied
i knew it then as a child

and still today
i know when someone is lying
i thought i could beat my past
this history of abuse

the father of my child 
lies with the same ease
but he wears khakis
and doesn't have needle marks
on his arms

so he will probably get away with it
and like me
my daughter won't realize the truth
until she is in her twenties
and she will blame me like i 
blamed my mother

in the meantime
the spirits of dead women
and children
haunt my home
they keep me up at night
telling me their stories

because they don't want
things to end like it did for them

it is a lie
that there is this light
for the victim's of abuse
when they die

i see the dead
and they are still suffering
trying to save those like them
they are here with me
while i suffer

watching my daughter
in a stranger's home
while her father
casts his lying shadow
over the lives of all those
he has encountered