reasons to live

i know there are two

but sometimes i make the mistake of thinking

and i can't help crying. jeff thinks

i have time and the determination to get custody

but i worry it will be too late or that the agency doesn't see deaf people as viable adoptive parents

much less foster parents

and sometimes i think it hurts too much to keep trying...

that living just exhausts me because so many people want me to forget them

and i know i don't miss joe, i wish he were someone else

someone safe to be a parent with

i miss them and the way they talked to me

i was struck by how grown-up n was with me and no one else

trying to tell me with his imperfect vocal cords

pointing at the white medical tape squeezing his legs too tight in two places

complaining, oh, either that they were too tight and painful

or just that he didn't like them and wanted them gone, off--

he just wasn't like that with joe or nancy

he knew i knew there was more going on in that head--they just screamed at each other and treated n&e like young, young babies. not being able to talk yet doesn't mean not being able to process information

words

have coherent thoughts

i was signing by 9 months so

i always talked to them in real sentences, real ideas, real questions, admissions that i didn't understand what they wanted, stuff

like that

so n was babbling very seriously about the bandages and i explained

(they understood my deaf voice very well, as evidenced by n's first real word, daredevil)

that i knew he didn't like it, that i was sorry if they hurt, that he'd been picking at mosquito bites and causing bigger and bigger scabs, so we'd had to find a way to heal them instead, and that they'd come off within a few weeks, maybe two weeks. i said to just hang in there.

and i knew he really understood some of that, and loved being respected enough to be talked to and have things explained

because

every time i came over after that before it ended

he crawled/toddled over as soon as i walked in

pointed at his bandages with me sitting there

and went into long, serious diatribes--monologues--about how unhappy he was with them

and not one word made sense or was a word

but

he appreciated my honesty and explanation and treatment of him as someone

who could listen and make sense of what i was saying...

no one else ever talked to them in a normal way

and of course i engaged in baby talk and silliness

but sometimes you have to explain things to babies

why they have to eat this and not that

why the train isn't at the crossing yet

that daddy's mad at me and not playing fair as a result.

they don't remember me. they won't. they may be in danger

sexual abuse or beatings may be their reality now or in the future

and i am just

helpless right now

and this is why i wonder--because i have been fine all these years, since dad died

if it is worth

living

memorization, time immortal

and i've of course won a place in a local poetry contest.

i just did it to show: deaf ain't slouchy.

i've got to get signing it down in just a week and a half, and i wish i knew the crop of interpreters from which to choose. after all, if there's gonna be anyone Deaf in the audience, we gotta stay hip. 'sides, i gotta know my poem is gonna be read right.

it's kinda fun turning an event into a Deaf-oriented thing. and they seem thrilled. they're sure i can filter the terp options. i really want jeff johnson or a steele. but: where are they?

i love this town sometimes.

wondering at wonder

i wonder at the wonder in her eyes when i told her

i worry about joe every day.

the surprise surprises me. i need to ask why. some days are free

but the mornings catch up

smack that bitch up, gotta quit her

david started hitting me to stop having feelings for me.

joe started hitting me because he was terrified i would leave.

this time, well, i'm a little sinister. *

the ministrations are a lot less striated; my bulletproof vest is on half the time, and his is half-off.

it's a little bit of a light fandango, all mine to sing...

and he knows just where he's stuck.

on me.

*another song. belle and sebastian--

in charity, in the chair, i see

i tell marci

how i stopped

stopped living in 2010

zeus/resin/david

smacking me in the mouth

not beating me

but slapping me so hard that sometimes

my lips bled cut on my teeth.

that after marisol toolworks was just more abuse

threatening me for reporting sexual, physical and mental abuse of clients

threatening me 

those poor defenseless, frightened, lashing-out geriatrics who can't see a leading to b

i'm their one line to defense but ambushed in meeting after meeting

threatened

for protecting even those i despise, knowing their first and last line of defense lies within me--

then cutting my teeth on real beatings

joe. like that fat kid at MSSD. the fatso everyone loved so blue and catatonic--

the blue eyes so many years apart--

and jeff, i can't trust, i shouldn't--trust--

david/zeus/resin so terrible at sex, but my first loving experience...my first happiness--

and jeff so wonderfully

there.

i'm going to stop giving so much

and keep taking it all--

he expects as much

but truly

anything goes if it makes me come.

it's like he would miss me

but i would chirp

c'est la vie

antithetical but balanced. still--

"supposively"--

in the throes

from my fearless throne i plead

"i love you"

but who?

field of dreams

the wreckage of yesterday's has me laid up today, and i've spent three days at home since december. fuck.

and he's pledged to call and wedge in an appointment for me but i'm declining, reclining in the only hot bath i've got. i've switched from cranberry juice to quench the blood to cranberry liquor:  malbec. we braised a pound of boneless ribs in the stuff yesterday, and the depth--oh, the rest we did in beer, and not a nuance can be traced!

this is wreckage from front to back, hips to toes. and i realize

marinating

not in the throng i was getting dressed to swallow into

i really started this to forget joe, but the more "you know how them are"

"her and me" but worst! oh, duds: "supposively"

then, a gasp of a glance at me, and, trying, trying: "supposibly"--

and i am just shuttered.

then

he tells me a dream: it's me laughing as he beats others after a clear walking dead heroism.

and i hate it; i think it's because i was snide about his wife's aversion to certain foodstuffs.

but

i can't handle

i miss

joe. not the stinky deaf one, mind.

i worry

but the safety

is in the distance

accoutrements of the lashed tongue: tongue-lashings

it can't matter now; i'm hundreds of miles away. thousands of smiles dead aweigh, and silent space.

when bianca messaged me about ty's wedding a friend whipped me senseful: "can't you tell, she did this to hurt you? never mind that you don't even give a fuck, think: what happened between you, and thonk!--why now, why is this her one attempt to contact you?"

i'm no longer her dead weight; she's deaf to me anyway. why i hate my vacation to her and perils, hehe, is the difference it all made. but, like:

she's old enough to hold her own without a set of balls. and anyway, she's such a good liar and perils such a selective liver that it won't matter, i'll just be labeled a bitter old liar, and they can walk their forked tongues a path.

we were working on reconciliation. but anyway, one night i'd said, sitting at the table, my back to the living room, to her TV in his entertainment center: "you know, one of the reasons i don't want to be friends with jenny is because one day she tried to drop this bomb: 'delusional, &c, not raped, &c, unable to face reality, &c, i'm your friend and will force you to, &c! we're close but you're not my best friend! bianca is! and i'm hers! not you! we've known each other longer! we've been through more together! &c! DEAL WITH THE TRUTH! you don't matter as much to us as we do to each other, so just move on!"

which was funny; it had been us three until i started to really think floyd had been integral to my life but was being raped a lot trying to date and be friends with guys. perils was all, "but i hang out with guys i've just met! they don't try to fuck me! THEREFORE YOU ARE LYING. bianca doesn't get assaulted either; THEREFORE YOU'RE LYING BECAUSE SINCE WE BOTH TEACH ASL YOU FEEL LEFT OUT. you want attention, but here's the truth: bianca and i are closer to each other. Deal with it!"

and bianca was always like, "GOD, would jenny just leave it alone? you know i trust you more, tell you more, am closer to you. ignore it; it fucks us up! ILYILYILYILY!" a few someone elses were like, "you know why jenny doesn't get hit on. don't EVEN go there!" which was really kinda unnecessary, but necessary because it's true--i have something guys see and want right off the bat, different things in different situations, and she has her own set of attributes. as for bianca, well, she has an elegant serenity that's a façade but makes guys just see her as "future breeder; treat her right until she agrees to marry me!"

AND THOSE ASSESSMENTS ARE EXACTLY LIKE THE ONE OF ME BY SAID GUYS! fuck-all to do with who we are, what we want, even our physical traits above the neckline.

but i dealt...until bianca finally got me to talk with perils. then THAT. AGAIN. and anyway, i had made the decision that perils wasn't my friend or anyone in my grand scheme of the 30s or beyond. so asserting me as second best was really just an abuser tactic. always had been.

and bianca at the table said "...you KNOW why i won't tell her! you really are my best friend, you know it in your heart. you know i fight with you less, you don't judge me, you don't get pissed like she does! overboard. i'm afraid of jenny! she's SCARY. she scares EVERYBODY. you know!"

"yes, and that's why i had to put things straight. that's why nobody's friends with her. that's why it's important for you to be the one to tell her--as her best friend. as someone who won't let jenny control her anymore. you're the only one she has left, and she clings to you because you won't tell her what she doesn't want to hear. lemme tell you: coming from you--you're the only one she can handle it from. besides, you get to choose your hierarchy of friends, not her, not me. why are you so scared to do what i have? my life is still here."

"yes, but you know i hate confrontation!"

"it's not confrontation to tell her who you really are, or to save her from herself. her future is miserable if she doesn't listen to the truth now."

and then. the FIGHTS. and admittances: "i'm not mad at you."

"jenny really pisses me off! she's always trying to control me, judge me!"

i'm not next in that food chain. i love them but i love fulfilling my goals instead of filling with fear and doubt.

so. anchors aweigh, then

as it is missaid but

so

apt today

anchors away!