Friday, May 15, 2009

Not Born a Bastard

[Voices unheard]

17 July 2007 © Judith A. Boggess

You
from
infant to
age three
beaten,
abused,
arm broken,
small back fused
to pelvis from too many
spankings before you could
walk or talk . . .
too violent to be believed.

See
belt crack bare skin,
find whipping willow
branch snapped,
See
fists pummel,
toddler who could not run
or know to shout for help.

You
slammed to floor,
thrown to wall,
kicked by the sadist’s
steel toe construction boot,
all
before
age four.

Hugged?
Never.

Wanted?
Never.

Loved?
Never.

Oh, victim son of father’s hate.

You,
not favored one,
punished for playing
not protecting sibling
from a natural fall
You,
hit with bat for that
at age eight.

You,
by “trusted” friend
raped,
12 to 13,

Plied with alcohol,
lured with free drugs.

LSD, marijuana, speed,
failed to erase,
life corroding dreams
from hell and rapid
decent from grace.

“Don’t look at me,”

you cried, and in
drunken teenage rage
take chair to table
a crashing blow, and

fist to wall with
bone-breaking force.

“Don’t look at me,”
you cried at 17,
in shame and despair as
sodomy’s victim
reveals his pain.

Years of fears and tears slip by,
booze, cocaine and barroom fights
at 30 cannot black out fearsome,
fermenting rage fed by instant replays
of horror scenes left unshared,
No, no, no . . .go away . . . night terrors
all denied by light of day.

You,
having to be near death’s split hair—
as when father with pillow
placed over your crying infant face,
in attempt to take your life
turn off your air—
You,
in search of tender embrace,
not trusting love of God or man
in any shape or form,
substitute leather belt noose,
and
You
for three glorious seconds
can feel caressed and
maybe blessed
as body and senses thrill
alone to one last ecstatic release,
to climax,
to pass out,
dangle from belted bliss,
behind closed door,
death sneaks in,
steals your breath,
leaves . . .

You,
dangling
rag doll,
Midwest motel,
back of bathroom door
naked as you were born,
found,
next day,
to housekeeper’s fright,
and shriek: O, horrific sight!

Mortified
you would be
for family, friends to see,
simplest pleasure,
for you denied
unless reliving
suffocating,
afraid,
being ready to die.

Dead and gone
your memory tainted,
colored by untimely sad end.
No one cares to remember
the toddler always smiling,
the man always a helping friend.

Not even in death,
as unconscionable as it may seem,
can love and forgiveness be granted
to the tortured man who had dreams.

The living are an unloving, unforgiving lot.
It chills me to the core,
that even in death
You
are
reviled,
blackguarded

called Bastard, and more.

1 comment:

  1. It feels as if you have been there. It is real poetry. Wonderfully written but I am afraid that understood by too few. Those who have not experienced such horror feel disgust and stop reading. The real victims do not waste time with poetry. For them it is usually a mild tea of life (except in your rare cases) and they have just swallowed something making the entire world spin around in wobbly fiery ball surrounding them with high pitch sounds they can hardly bare. ANY poetry vanishes in the droplets or dust particles somewhere at the edges of distant background. I just received an email from a person who looked at my 142 slides Slide show saying that to walk or run through hell hundreds of times just fractions of an inch close to the empty space left by the freshly shot bullet and still keep smiling and keep loving life and people in it has been remarkable. He asked for the recipe by noticing that there are better ways out of misery than a hotel bathroom towel hook …
    Admirer of your poetry and your art student tibor
    (My recently updated MSPPS Slide show: http://b-inet/com/TIBOR )

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