You don’t come visit your daughter who lives with her grandmother—who don’t like you no way—with your new wife and eight month old son, just before her bedtime.
You don’t tell your little four-year-old daughter “Daddy will ALWAYS be there.” Then leave her with a picture of you and your new family.
You don’t expect to waltz back into her life and pick up right where you left off after 9 years, 10 months, 7 hours, 46 minutes, and 23 seconds of not being there.  Oh yea, she kept count.
You don’t expect her to still love you after all that. When she had nightmares about you leaving her in the middle of nowhere with a ratty little teddy bear with only one eye. When she couldn’t sleep without listening to that Luther Van Dross song at least five times. When she couldn’t blink without seeing your taillights speeding off into the night. When you joined the army to “take care of her.” ***** you got a degree go get a JOB.
You don’t expect her to still be good, perfect. When all her life she thought, “Maybe if I’m a good girl, maybe if I get all A’s all the time. Maybe he’ll come back. Maybe he’ll come hold me again. Take me out for ice cream and gummy bears. “ Even though she knew none of that would ever happen again.
Don’t expect her to still be an angel, when you’ve put her through Hell.

Tell me where the Sunshine went
And why she won’t come back.
Whatever happened to the sticky little fingers
that would reach through the tree leaves to paint the sky?
The patter of little feet on the linoleum is gone.
The ***** smudges on the walls are all that’s left
of the child the Moonlight once was.
Before she grew tall, and thin, and shapely.
Before she lost herself in yesterday’s storm.
Now she stands above all, cold and untouchable,
as she watches over the stars.
Tell me where the Sunshine went
And why she won’t come back.
Why the night will never cease just like the rain,
as it courses over the Moonlight and masks her tears.
She cries for the Sunshine
that can no longer light the dark
as the stars streak across the sky,
imitating the comets they wish to be.
While the Moonlight stands, faux sunshine, and watches over the stars.
That smudge the walls as they glide across the linoleum.
The pitter-patter of their tiny feet echoing
through the tree leaves they reach through
with pudgy little fingers to paint the sky.
So tell me where the Sunshine went
And why she wont come back.

I was the oldest of four, I'd had friends, a happy family, a warm house to come home to after a long day at school. That was before my parents had started to disagree on things.

Before our home became cold, just a house full of tension, no longer a place I wanted to be. The disagreements, became arguments, that became fights.
My parents became paper tigers, clawing at each other, but never hurting themselves just those around them.
Paper cuts so deep they bled.
I'd patch up my siblings with colorful band aids, the Blue’s Clues ones from the top shelf of the medicine cabinet, I could only reach with the step stool.
I stopped playing with my friends in favor of entertaining my siblings so they didn't have to hear the yelling, so they didn't have to grow up as I had: in a matter of days.
I made up games for them to play in our basement bedroom, catching cave crickets, like dreams, we'd lose sight of more often than not. And some nights, after everyone was supposed to be asleep, I'd creep up the stairs, to the second floor feeling as though I was ascending into hell instead of heaven, to check if my parents were asleep.
They never were, pale light seeping from under the door along with whispered roars, words I wasn't allowed to say. Sometimes I'd sit for hours at the top of the stairs, watching the tiger shadows fight on the carpet.

Time passed, the days filled with Blue’s Clues covered paper cuts, the nights with tiger silhouettes. Nothing really changed except the way my mother smelled. I noticed it when she hugged me before sending me off to school in the mornings. She no longer smelled like home cooked meals and bright smiles, but tears and hollow hate. We left soon after that, my mother, my siblings, and I. She packed only what was necessary and forbade us to tell anyone what we were really doing: Disappearing. Our cousin, helped us get our few things to the bus station, where we waited for what seemed to be just short of eternity.
The big Greyhound bus inched over the hill in slow motion, a giant silver slug, coming to take us away. I helped load our bags into the bottom of the bus, and as I turned back toward the platform, I saw my mother hoist my youngest sister up on her hip, my brother and other sister falling in line behind her, the way she's taught us. I smiled because what I was really seeing was a tiger, no longer made of paper, gathering her cubs and preparing them for the long journey ahead.
Late that night on the bus, my sisters and brother already fast asleep, I asked my mother where we were going. She asked if I trusted her, a thing she did if she couldn't tell us something. I nodded yes and sat back in my seat, soon falling asleep to the breathing of my sister seated beside me.

I dreamed of paper tigers.

Blue.
That’s all I can see everywhere I look.
Beautiful dangerous blue.
I feel like I’m suspended in air, light, free, but sinking.
I’m running out of air! I think as my lungs start constricting themselves.
My feet finally touch the black and blue-white tile; my hair comes down around my face, soft, like feathers.
I look up and I can see the lights on the ceiling, and beyond that the fluffy white clouds in the baby blue sky.
I feel so heavy. I don’t think I can make it back up again. I push feebly at the floor, but I don’t get anywhere.
My vision starts to dim, and as I sink limply to my knees, I sigh.
What’s the point of even trying anymore?   I watch the bubbles dance their way back to the surface.
I know I should try again, but I’m just too tired.
Another parade of bubbles escape my parted lips, my drowsy lids slowly close, the thudding heartbeat in my ears lulling me to sleep, and setting the tempo for the tiny  air dancers as they float toward the sky.
In the darkness I feel an immense weight lift from my shoulders, and my eyes fly open.
What’s going on?!
I look to the left and right, everything is still blue. I realize I’m still at the bottom, but I feel weightless.
The pain in my chest is gone and the thumping in my ears. I turn around and look directly into my own face. Understanding hits me like a runaway whale, but I don’t want to believe it’s true. I want to feel sad, yet there’s no emotion trying to overtake me; nothing to fight. I reach out and touch my cold cheek.
Why?  Is the only thing running through my cotton stuffed head. Again I look over my sleeping face, my hand traveling over my features.
I have to be sure.  I gently lift one lid.
The brown eye I look into is dull, empty… lifeless. I expect a train wreck of emotion to come crashing down on me, but I feel nothing.
A flurry of movement above me catches my eye, and I look up to see Mr.Jones jetting down towards me. He reaches my body, quickly wrapping an arm around my stomach.
He kicks off the bottom paddling his way to the surface, my useless arms and legs trailing after him like limp seaweed. I follow him, walking through the smooth blue. Mr.Jones breaks the surface, clenching me to his side as he tows me to the wall.
A waterfall of chlorinated water gushed from my mouth, and I am yanked, like a shard of metal to a magnet, back into my body. I cough and spit, riding my lungs of the foreign substance. Mr.Jones boosts me up on the wall and pats my back until I can breathe again.
My grandmother rushes over and hugs me to her despite the fact that I’m sopping wet. She brushes my hair away from my face and asks if I’m alright.
I do my best to nod, but I don’t think I’m very successful; seeing as I’m shaking so hard. I try to get up, but my legs are like silly string. Gram helps me up and half supports half carries me to the locker rooms.
I stand under the shower in my swimsuit, hot water pelting the top of my head; masking the silent tears that are streaming down my face. Despite the water’s heat, I’m still shivering and my whole body is cold; inside and out.
I get out, towel off, and put on a pair of blue jeans and a plain red shirt. The bright red a comforting change from the cold, clear blue.
I stand in front of the mirror and brush the tangles from my hair, but I won’t look into the mirror. I cant. I’m afraid of what will be staring back at me.
I don’t know how long I stand in front of the mirror trying to make myself look up. It feels like hours. I feel a hand come down on my shoulder and I jump. I look up warily and sigh with relief.
Oh good, it’s just Gram. She says its time to leave and she goes to get my bag. I take a deep breath, cough a few times, and force myself  to face the mirror. Staring back at me is a girl- me yet its not me somehow. Something is different, my hair is the same, my face is the same, but wait!
I lean over the sink, nearly pressing my nose against the glass. Now I see whats so different, what changes everything. I step back from the mirror and stare into the strangely cold, older looking eyes, and think...
*That's me...

I was the oldest of four; I'd had friends, a happy family, and a warm house to come home to after a long day at school. That was before my parents had started to disagree on things.

Before our home became cold, just a house full of tension, no longer a place I wanted to be. The disagreements became arguments that became fights.
My parents became paper tigers, ethereal imitations of the ones in the zoo; clawing at each other, but never hurting themselves just those around them.
Paper cuts so deep they bled.
I'd patch up my siblings with colorful band aids, the Blue’s Clues ones from the top shelf of the medicine cabinet, only I could reach with the step stool.
I stopped playing with my friends in favor of entertaining my siblings so they didn't have to hear the yelling, so they didn't have to grow up as I had: in a matter of days.
I made up games for them to play in our basement bedroom, catching cave crickets, like dreams, that we'd lose sight of more often than not. And some nights, after everyone was supposed to be asleep, I'd creep up the stairs, to the second floor feeling as though I was ascending into hell instead of heaven, to check if my parents were asleep.
They never were, pale light seeping from under the door along with whispered roars, words I wasn't allowed to say. Sometimes I'd sit for hours at the top of the stairs, watching the tiger shadows fight on the carpet.

Time passed, the days filled with Blue’s Clues covered paper cuts, the nights with tiger silhouettes. Nothing really changed except the way my mother smelled. I noticed it when she hugged me before sending me off to school in the mornings. She no longer smelled like home cooked meals and bright smiles, but tears and hollow hate. We left soon after that, my mother, my siblings, and I. She packed only what was necessary and forbade us to tell anyone what we were really doing: Disappearing. Our cousin, helped us get our few things to the bus station, where we waited for what seemed to be just short of eternity.
The big Greyhound bus inched over the hill in slow motion, a giant silver slug, coming to take us away. I helped load our bags into the bottom of the bus, and as I turned back toward the platform, I saw my mother hoist my youngest sister up on her hip, my brother and other sister falling in line behind her, the way she's taught us. I smiled because what I was really seeing was a tiger, no longer made of paper, gathering her cubs and preparing them for the long journey ahead.
Late that night on the bus, my sisters and brother already fast asleep, I asked my mother where we were going. She asked if I trusted her, a thing she did if she couldn't tell us something. I nodded yes and sat back in my seat, soon falling asleep to the breathing of my sister seated beside me and the promise of troubled imaginings.

I dreamed of paper tigers.

Everybody calls me Front Porch. It might be ‘cause I’m always in front of the house or maybe it’s just a pet name. Either way I answer to it. I hop down off the railing of our front porch and walk around the big oaks all over the yard. I like the way they turn me all green and how the grass tickles the bottoms of my bare feet. I wonder what I’m gonna play today.
“Hey look, it’s the clown!” a kid yells from the gate, “You know the circus left weeks ago right?”
“Yup!” I yell back, my hands on my hips, “Why didn’t you go with ‘em, Archie?”
“Dang! You look like paper!” another kid, Patrick I think, shouts as he joins Archie at the gate.
“Like you look any better.” I say, turning my nose up at them the way Granma said to when people tease me.
“Hey don’t get mad us at us ‘cause you’re a mutant.” Archie says.
Despite my intentions to ignore them, he’d quipped my interest, “Whadyou mean?”  
“Don’t you know?” Patrick asks, snickering.
“Apparently not, ******.” I say. He glares flamin’ arrows at me, but I ignore him.
“Bein’ albino is a mutation, you know.” Archie says, and gives me a superior look.
I roll my eyes, but make a mental note to ask Momma about it later. I take a few steps back toward the porch to go play soldier and a rock bounces off the grass near my foot. I turn around and one hits me on the arm. It’s gonna leave a bruise.
“The confederates are coming! Protect the flag!” I shout and duck behind an oak. I know Mississippi was part of the confederates, but I’ve always liked the unions. Besides the Civil War was 147 years ago.
“******!” Patrick yells and throws more rocks, but they become confederate bullets in my imagination.  I let loose some fire of my own, the rocks that have landed near me, and I peg Archie right in his pug nose.
“Score!” I shout and pump my fists in the air.
“Alright, that’s enough.” Daniel says, shooing the boys away. “So Momma finally let you dye your hair? Looks nice on you Front Porch.” He says, ruffling my now fire engine red mop.
“I’m not speakin’ to you.” I say, turning around and crossing my arms across my chest.
“Why not?” he asks, scooping me up in a hug.
“A good brother would stop aging and wait for his little sister to catch up. You’re eighteen today, that’s eight years I gotta catch up.” I say, frowning because he’s laughing.
“I’d stop if I could.” He says, setting me on my feet.
“Well I got you a present anyway.”
“What is it?”
“I can’t tell you or it wouldn’t be a surprise.”
He sighs and looks disappointed, but I know he’s faking it.
“Does Momma know you’re out here?” he asks, as we walk up on the porch.
“Nope. She doesn’t ever want me outside, so I had to sneak out.” I say, moving in front of the box with the frog I caught in the creek behind the house in it, “She thinks I’m upstairs.”
“How’d you get down here then?”
“I climbed out the window.”
“Frontia Ann Porch, if you don’t get yourself in this house, you’re gonna get sunburn again!” Momma yells from inside.
“Busted.” Daniel whispers, with a smile.
“Alright Momma, I’m comin’!” I yell back, givin’ Daniel the evil eye. I pick up his amphibious birthday present and hope it doesn’t croak.
It does.

Glassy gold eyes, perfect porcelain face, ruby red lips, a raven spill of tresses.
Slender white arms, lengthy legs, miniature black shoes, a golden buckle.
Knee length black ruffles, puffed sleeves, a sparkly gold sash snug around my middle.
Round teeny cheeks, a tiny gold bracelet, dainty gold studs punctuate my ears.
A little rouge gives my eyes some life.
Master smiles.
I am a doll.
He checks his pocket watch; my new family is almost here.
He poses me high on a shelf in a pitch black room, my face and limbs giving off an unnatural luminosity.
The ****** of the shop’s bell tells me they’ve arrived; they’ve come to take me home.
An impatient child squeals.
A mother reprimands.
The anxious child gives a quiet complaint.
The mother inquires.
Master answers and comes for me.
The darkness floods with light.
Master’s hands gently encircle my waist.
He whispers caution and presents me to my owner.
The excited child snatches me from his hands, jerking my head back awkwardly.
The daughter of Queen Elizabeth I’s fourth cousin, twice removed.
“The most spoiled brat in all of England,” my Master might say.
She stares into my eyes.
She greets me with joy and a flicker of fear at how lifelike I stare back.
Her mother pays and I am cuddled and cradled.
Over her shoulder I pull back my ruby lips, my sharp grin flashes privately for my Master.
We leave the shop and stroll into the night.
The sound of his laughter echoes triumphantly in our ears.
In the sitting room, the dying embers in the fireplace cast a red glow on their lifeless features.
The door in the foyer creaks, opening.
A smile lights my face.
They have paid the highest price and Master has come to collect his favorite toy.

My place, my secret haven is the forest.
I love it because it’s an escape from the torture of reality that plagues me each and everyday.  
It’s where I can go when I’m close to breaking down and losing my mind.
Where heaven meets Earth, if just for a little while.
Where the wind blows gently through the tree’s shimmering green leaves.
Where the moonlit air warms everything and the nightingale sings the songs of blessed night.
The grass is thick, a carpet of living emerald that’s softer than feathers against travel weary feet.
Flowers the colors of precious jewels cluster in pools of the moon’s love; delighting the eye with their sprightly smiles.
Gaia’s forest children fly through her many wooden arms on light paws and hooves.
Deep within this holy sanctuary lies a waterfall that cascades into a pool and runs off in a waist deep stream. The water is of the clearest blue with fish of brilliant colors and gleaming scales.
The air smells forever fresh, like after a storm, and the heady aroma of pine drifts on soft breezes.
Moonlight plays on the dappled spots of wide-eyed fawns as they romp in the grass under the watchful eyes of their mothers. A lone wolf laps up cool water from the pool after a long run through the trees, and then lies in a bed of grass near a cluster of does in amiable silence.
The chirp of crickets hidden in the brush accompanies the trickling of the waterfall, and the whisper of the wind through the trees.
The faint hooting of a dwarf owl barely disturbs the orchestra of midnight sounds.
The earth sighs in contentment caressing her children in the featherlike grass, as she and they prepare for sleep.
A family of thrushes snuggle in their nest, lulled by the nightingale’s lullaby.
A little ways away silken chrysalis split and Tearful Underwing take their first flight on newborn wings.

The burning sun sets on the horizon.

The fires die away.

Everything black and crumbling.

What were once great buildings float away on the wind, dust.

And night falls upon the charred wasteland of empty dreams.

The city is on fire and what a beautiful display.
Flames lapping at charred bodies.
Buildings already just crumbled heaps of stone and steel.
The soft tinkling of glass on the cracked and broken sidewalk,
Screeching police sirens already too late to save them.
The sweet sound of a death scream pierces the smoky night.

I wish she was still here
That girl I let drown
Oh so long ago
Before the hurricanes came
The ones that took the rest of her
Away
Oh so far away
Past the horizon where heat lightning
Strikes the smudge line things
I assume are people or better yet
That I hope are
Me
Finally coming back to the empty
Turtle shell-like thing left
After the rains came
The rains that left me hollow
Like chocolate Easter bunny
Lies
Told to little children
Children who will believe everything
Is gonna be alright just because
Momma said so
Because everything is even though she is
Gone
Forever lost to our growing hands
Always reaching for more
Even when there’s nothing left
To fill our empty hearts
Longing for something other than ever-present
Rain
Angel’s tears turned to searing silver
Bullets trying to pierce me
Though there’s nothing remaining
But a healthy 5.11 skeleton
Living through life just waiting to
Crumble
Like old walls or old cake
Even though it was frozen
In our memories for eternity
Our version of heaven
When we gave up on the everlasting
Life
Was promised us, but people break
Promises, bones, hearts, things
Never to be fixed again
Even when we used Elmer’s glue
The strongest thing we had besides
Love
Which I can never give
Though I’ve tried to
Keep the double edged blade away
So I wouldn’t get hurt
So I wouldn’t have to experience
Death
Something so complete so final
The empty darkness weighing a ton
Though there’s nothing left to hold
No friends or family no lover’s last
Kiss upon soft lips meant only for
Nevermore.