Daughter

It registered when I was young. The oddness of him dwelling in the shadows. But I had come to expect him there. The darkness suited him, but I trialed and executed him for it. In his absence, I was crutched by other diseases. The brief, destructive violence of longing. In slow acculturation, I swayed to the rhythm of the scourge, my feet pit-a-pat to white, sandy music only I could hear. I danced and faded. Twirling as pieces of me were carried on strong winds until I was wholly nothing. The desolate still lasted years. Unaffected, my mind rinsed and tumbled thoughts that in my most sober state, I could never accomplish. Paralyzed by the idea that I would never be able to escape this place on my own. This grim emptiness outrun by the notion that if I did escape, I would never fully do so. To cycle back to the void hoping that there is something in the abyss that I can collect to fill the cracks in my person. Something that would last. Something that would replace the light only my body remembers. I am in the darkness too. I am judged for it and will soon die from it. Still, I can't leave.