Sitting at the table drinking coffee
My small legs dangling off the chair
I coil my fingers through my hair
Watching the words of envy stare
My mother, screaming and stomping on the floor above me, arguing
Asking my Auntie “What was going on? Why was everyone yelling?”
“Grown folks business,” was always her reply, her red ruddy eyes blinking with knowledge and pain
It was never a phrase I ever got,
Never one I could understand or stand to see
It always angered me I was treated disrespectfully, without even knowing
Age, it was a number that mattered with how wise one was to be
It was a number that didn’t ever matter to me
But, it mattered to everyone around me
And the jinx of it now is, I’m sitting here, staring at the smooth polished wood that contains the skin you used to exist in
Thinking of the things you, and everyone else, tried to hide from me
And sometimes, I think of any adult that says that to a child as liars, trying to delay the inevitable manner of things
Delays makes things harder and distrusting, Auntie
Wouldn’t ice make the truth slippery?