Its like suddenly
I'm crying
I'm crying for the girl
who gave all her love
out on a platter
to her brothers
to her parents
to her friends
but they never gave it back to me.

suddenly I'm four again
and I'm sitting on my floor
eyes wide open with amusement
staring at the mold cracks in my walls
and ceiling
at the green peeling paint
and the lady bugs crawling through
one lands on me as  I squeal in delight
in so much joy
I think that was one moment of joy in my childhood
that I can recall amongst a few.

I seem to be remembering
so many things
and not how I wanted to remember them,
in sugar coated ways.

To try to numb out the deep pain
but to actually remember
the pain,
as it hits me like knives in the back.

Maybe that's why till this day
my back and my entire body
aches with pain,

as if remembering all of the times
she was left,
alone abandoned
rejected hurt
cast aside
abused and mutilated
just for trying to be alive.

Remembering the times
that playtime
was used as torture and pain
and seemingly innocent things
were twisted feteshized
and sexualized,

for so long
I wanted to be a boy
but it wasn't because I wanted to be one,
I was very happy and content in my girly ways and things
it was because of living under so much oppression
garnered by so many men and abusive women
who also garnered oppression and misogyny
was so deep ,
that the self that I was,
wanted to be dead
rather than live alive.

But now I am choosing
to slowly and painfully,
choose to love myself even
if its a tiny tiny sliver of love,
admist the shrouds of pain.

I am trying gasping
Admist my addictions,
to love myself,
and not shame myself any longer
just for being me.