I
just
might
be
the
angriest
person
you
know

It was summer, about a hundred years ago, and
I was 13, sitting next to my mother over the Atlantic.
Inside  the darkened plane the piolet's voice
interrupted sleep.

   "Folks, I know it's late, but if you look out your windows
     you will see something amazing."

I opened  the shade and found we had flown into
dazzling lights, shimmering colors - dancing, gliding,
whirling to the music we could not hear.

And then it was over. My mother slipped back into sleep
while I watched the  stars, listened to the hum
of the engines, as we headed home.

Sometimes I perch you
       on my shoulder.

I ask you to read
        my newest poem

look inside my soul
        and tell me

        everything

Since I heard you died,
I have been brittle.
Angry at the wrong people.
Afraid of things that aren't really scary.
Fighting the biggest battles
with the smallest guns.

Now I know you are gone,
tears come at unexpected times.
I grieve the woods you once walked in.
My arms thick as branches,
and frozen as the icicles
hanging from my fingers.

You were sad my whole life.
Angry too, though you didn't show it
until the bone pain wore you down.
Then you opened fire.
      "You stupid girl, never could do things right. Look at you,
        fat as a **** pig, no one will ever want you."
I knelt down next to you,
inside the stench of cancer.
It had eaten you down
to the size of a six-year-old, still
wearing your eighty-year-old face.
You didn't understand
that you didn't understand
I have been sad my whole life too.