splitting hairs for continuity

doonesbury

i never read the funnies

but on an abandoned seat so i grabbed

for fun

and doonesbury is about exactly what i was saying

only i didn't have the energy to finish that they only talk to the babies semi-normally

by reading to them but always so dumbing-down

OVER

UNDER

RED

GREEN

it drove me mad because though they were delighted some nights

new material, please

and in doonesbury one brunette and one blond twin and

they need a new book so the words come

i wonder if they threw out all my gifts

the clothes

the books

all the rest

but the babies are always

babies to me

and they're walking and talking beyond me

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