Sunday Sorrow

I miss you, 
especially on Sundays - 
your favorite day of the week. 

I hope you're in a better place 
and proud of me. 

I carry your words every day, 
but sometimes 
it just isn't enough. 

Sometimes 
I need more - 
a second helping of love - 
but there isn't any left. 

We just have this one life 
and today 
it isn't enough.

The Anneslee Poems: War Badges

Our mothers

were best friends

and

relationship

arsonists.

There should have been

a warning:

Bridges Burned

After Crossing. 

But we crossed

after them anyway,

following their steps

and dropping lit matches

behind us,

never learning to stay

where the good is.

They're professionals

at leaving

messes

wherever they go.

We never thought

the fire would touch us,

but here we stand,

holding burned hands

and watching

them run off

without us. 

We're lucky - 

not everyone

who touches

their fire

survives.

We wear our scars

 like war badges.

It's all we have.

The Anneslee Poems: The Girl on the Page

I read the words

on the page

and I am the girl

living among

the syllables.

I am she,

she is me

but she is also you.

We are all the same

in print.

The Anneslee Poems: Savior Without a Saint

I’ll be the one

you can

hang your hat on,

throw under the bus

and blame.

I’m the perfect

scape goat –

I won’t go anywhere

fast,

so you can get away.

I’ll be your whipping boy,

I’ll carry your heavy load.

I’ll draw the shortest straw,

I’ll cover you and take the blows.

Give me your sentence

and I’ll serve it without a word.

I’ll forget everything I could’ve had,

let my life be lived deferred.

No one has to know

that it was really your fault.

I’ll shoulder all the blame,

I’ll be guilty by default.

But don’t think for a minute

that I will ever forget

this burden is yours I carry. 

The Anneslee Poems: Relativity

Your smile snakes

across your face,

eager to prove

there’s something more

that binds us

than blood.

But I know better.

I know your secrets –

the ones you only tell

yourself,

hold close to the chest,

pray to Jesus

no one else

finds you out.

But I did.

I saw you

flat on your back

on my bed

like you owned the place,

smashing your face

and body against his –

a man too short

with hair too dark

to be the same man

who gave you that ring

on your finger.

These things

are hard to understand,

you say.

Adults make strange

choices under circumstances

I could never imagine,

you claim.

I hear you.

I’m listening.

But what you’re saying

is nothing new.

Your words cannot skew

the images burned in my mind.

I’ve seen you –

undressed,

savage,

waiting to be ravaged

and this is what

I understand:

you are not innocent.

I know your secrets

and no amount of blood

between us

will make me forget it.

The Anneslee Poems: Free Speech

You part your lips

for the cigarette

and inhale all the words

you should’ve said.

The smoke comes out

bitter and stale

like all the feelings

you keep stuffed in.

If you’d had your wits

about you,

you’d said so much.

But you couldn’t think,

couldn’t speak,

couldn’t make the hate

come off your tongue,

so you brought it home

to stay

like a bad cold

that turns

into the bubonic plague –

killing everyone

with one single blow

of your nose.

Let the hate roll out

of your mouth

instead of down

your throat

and maybe,

just maybe

we’ll make it

until morning.

The Anneslee Poems: Who's Laughing Now?

Your words start to slur

as you take another sip

and tip-toe across

the kitchen, trying not to

trip over your own feet.

When will you see

you’re too old for this?

You pour another

and another

and another,

never once wondering

if one more

is one more too many.

First, it was only at dinners

and parties and lunches

with clients.

Then came the Happy Hours

with swerving drives home

avoiding ditches.

And last comes now, at home,

where you sit alone

trying to remember

the daughter you drowned

in neglect;

your hate-filled hand erected

like a stone statue at my face.

One,

two,

three

hits to the back of the head

where the hair hides

your hand print.

Genius… even when you drink.

You sway so close

I can smell the stink

of all your demons

on your breath

and I just want to disappear,

leave this place

full of hate and fear

until it doesn’t exist,

until I don’t exist

and my name cannot

pass through your sour lips

ever again.

Sleep finds you quick

as I sit and wonder

how I ended up

with a mother

like you.

All I can think of –

the only truth in this world –

is God must have

a sick sense of humor, too.