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Self Portrait
I lovingly unpack my viola.
You dismantle my innocense, deceiving your truthful eyes with eager hands. Will I ever escape the colors you have painted my world? A backdrop for every day to follow using only grey, blue, black and red. My eyes open or closed, it doesn't really matter,.. I feel you like a dibilitating illness, inescapable and real. I have scrawled much of my life panicked and illegible. Tear-stained memories are the hand I hold, like a family portrait still hanging long after you have gone. Illusions of hope disappear when the proof of your love spoils my still-green body.
I carefully tighten my bow.
You break me over time, and like one of your horses with blinders, I cannot see outside my own existence. You make me afraid to move on my own, my faults were once my strengths. You cannot let me see too much or I may unveil the disgusting truths you convince me are my fault. I hope a part of you was fighting for the daughter who just wanted to be loved like a daughter. A daughter who wanted a father to protect her, even if only from himself. Tension tight enough to break eachother,..to break ourselves.
I skillfully tune my strings.
You attempt to turn me on, turn me in to something you wish I were. You don't see who I really am, you see me as an item you've put your name on, whose purpose is to take whatever you feel like giving. I have lost everything, as even my body betrays me. Like a fog, you sneak into my room and smother any air left I have to breathe.
I precisely lift my bow and place it on the string, preparing to play.
YOU press me too hard, choking the life, love and hope out of me. Night falls, endlessly playing like a broken record. I wait for the numbing effect to set in, desparate to escape the physical and emotional rollercoaster I am unable to get off of. YOU see right through me, pin-pointing my weaknesses and using them to paralyze me. I'm screaming for help, but nothing comes out. YOU replace my screams with recited lines, striking forbidden words from my vocabulary. Where is this going? When will it end? Kill the anticipation, or maybe just me.
I begin to play, leaving my shackles behind.
I don't feel you now, only a seed of myself. I say what I need to say using no words, and rid myself of the poison YOU have planted inside of me. Am I my instrument? Was I yours? I have been your marionette, YOU controlling my every move. YOU have covered me like bark to a tree. Bark can shield, or imprison. YOU blocked out the light, restricted my growth and hardened my soul, covering whatever beauty I may have once posessed. One by one I will break the ties that bind me to YOU, and shed the bark that holds me captive. I am an instrument of love, not hate,..strength not weakness and I WILL BE OKAY in spite of everything YOU have done to me. I can say I do not hate YOU; but YOU will never deserve the love of a daughter, YOU were NEVER my father. YOU are everything I know love NOT to be. Love is a light when you are surrounded by darkness, a promise you are no longer alone. I am not the abuse,...I am me.
