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Unburdening

Too many things lie between us,
quivering, quaking in
darkness
like silence, or a laugh being shoved
back down your throat.
I press my cheek against the top of your head, your hair
burning with the fidgeting fingers of the sun, listening
to words that have no shape, or sound,
or feel,
just words that sit like fat potatoes
between me and you,
words that build up like gum under
school desks and surround you.
Tendrils, thin wispy letters, dig their way through
your skin, overgrown bean plants.
Everytime I try to pull one down, they
rip at your skin and you cry out.
Your silence floats like a feather, suspended
below my mouth; when I speak
it flutters with the fluctuations of my voice.
Too many things hold us at a distance,
two lone figures across each other,
toes at the edge of
a seemingly uncrossable gap.
I heave stones into the darkness, my hand tight
around yours,
placing trust and love and faith and understanding
like stepstones climbing steadily to the surface,
so that I wait until the pathway is completed
until you dissolve the walls of words snaking through your skin
until I hold you close and you finally fit,

reborn in my arms.

For anyone who has read Room by Emma Donoghue, this poem was for an English project where Grandma addresses Ma after Ma has finally escaped

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