We speak through closed doors
and are muffled by white walls.


Avoiding eye contact
we briskly walk to the kitchen
to grab our plates in silence
only to retreat to our sanctuary.

Muted shouting always seeps through,
but I tell my brothers to ignore it
while we stare down
at our bleak hamburger helper.

Daddy is getting louder
and I hear mom crying again,
so I turn up the volume
and we try to focus on Spongebob.

After pushing my food around my plate
through a couple episodes of this,
I tell my brothers to stay in our room
while I go figure out why it's quiet again.

Mom is talking on the phone to someone
telling them what dad was wearing,
and she keeps looking out the window.

I sneaked onto the couch and saw
dad walking down the street;
a policeman stopped him
and took him away for a few days.

Mom starts walking over to me
and tells me to go to my room,
to play with my brothers.


They were too young to remember
how bad it really was.
Only now do I, myself, realize
these were not things
I should have had to see.





*CVT