Being drunk doesn't excuse it.  
"You didn't know what you were doing."
"I love him, he's my son."  
You don't remember what you did.
Do you know he still does?

The purple in his cheeks.
Lips split.
Eyes scared.

Look at what you have done.
Harmed your own son.  

It hurts when he laughs.
His cheeks sting as he cries.
Back jolts up as it touches the back of his chair.

Is it fair?
The boy scared of wearing a belt.

It reminds him of his father.
The way he cornered him, till he was a pleading and crying mess.  

The smell of alcohol lingering in the air.
It makes him sick.
He remembers.

He runs his hands up his left arm.
Cigarette burned holes scattered.

He couldn't take one more beating.
He didn't know how.

He tried his hardest.
As he closed his eyes.

He tried suicide.
He tried it all, the pills, the windows.

He couldn't do it.
Leave his mother and brothers behind.

I am the salmon
that struggled all the way up to the bear.

The way that I let you shatter my chest
like a piece of glass.
or the way I would let you
do it all over again.

all day long
my eyelids are doors
that want nothing more than to close,
my mind is a light
dimmed and flickering just before it goes out,
and my body is wind on a summer day,
slow, calm, dissolved.

but the second night falls,
everything awakens.

Like bubbles racing to the top of an opened soda can,
all my thoughts
and dreams
and ideas
and worries
and doubts
and excitements
and fears
come surging up from the depths of my being
and begin to bounce and fizzle within my mind.

How can I sleep now?

found a boy who makes love feel like speeding through a red light at an intersection
who reminds me of racing down the highway
windows down, hair blowing across my vision.
he and i could be a car crash
or a parking spot
he and i are 90mph on the freeway
yet when he holds my hand or brushes the hair out of my eyes
i swear the brakes hit themselves
and speed and light and time don't matter