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	Art of Caring Survivors' Art & Poetry

On this page - remarkable poetry
by & for survivors . . .

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"The Kindness of Strangers"
"Unseen"
"do you?"
"My Children's Eyes"
"Garden Elegy"
"The Attic"
"Choking"
"My Independence"
"The Perfect Child"
"Do You Know What It's Like?"
"An Emergency Call, 1966"
"She Remembers Alleys"
"Red Flags"

"A Leaf Floating Down"
"These are my pieces"
"One Defiant Line"
"The Cycle"
"Goodbye to You"
"House of Cards"
"What Happened in The Blackness"
"Better From Cars"
"Take Back the Night"
"Women Are Taught"
"Taking my power back"
"Hanging out the Wash"
"Broken"

. . . and a gallery of their beautiful artwork

The Kindness of Strangers

Bloodied and broken she rises
Hands clenched, her face pointed up toward the sky;
Tears sting her eyes but she wills them away,
Resolving once more he will not see her cry.

She looks in the eyes of her children,
Knowing her pain has become part of them,
With soft words to offer them comfort,
She gives of herself as she's dying within.

Swiftly she puts things in order,
Washes the blood and gets on with her day.
At least this time not much has been broken,
A small piece of her soul is all she throws away.

But each time is worse than the last time,
And it's getting much harder to mask how she feels;
Some make-up will fix up the outside,
But inside it seems like the wound never heals.

I promise you that she is frightened.
I swear to you she never asked for this pain.
Sometimes when you get dragged down too far,
It just gets so hard to get back up again.

Let us show her the kindness of strangers;
As strangers so often turn out to be friends,
Then, as friends we can guide her to freedom;
And rejoice in the person she becomes –
when the pain finally ends.

Leslie Root
who found freedom with a little help from her friends

________________________________________

Unseen

Trying to be their shining daughter
I polished and lifted saddles
Shoveled out stalls, carried water and feed
Sponged and wrapped bruised flesh
Brushed my bay gelding to a sheen

Handsomely costumed and schooled, my brothers
Bridled massive steeds through their paces
Presenting the judges sleek performances
That masked the boys who taunted
Disrupting my sleep like cobbles in the bed

Shelves of silver cups
Belie cold black hours spent
Stowed under the eaves of our farmhouse attic
Bound by brothers who
Threatened worse if I revealed my terror

Ignoring walls covered with prize ribbons
Mother mended breeches
Father just raised the bar as I
Rode through fields of indifference with a
Wound which has not bled

Sally Gould

________________________________________

do you?

Do you think of us at Easter?
Do you think of us at Christmas?

Are you mad at yourself for going away,
or happy that you have moved on without us?

Do you get upset when you think of us,
     and sad
          because you’re missing out on us?

Do you think of the pain you left us with?
     Well do you?

Do you care about what you did?
Do you feel guilty for how you left things?

I hope you are good
because I am great - we are great.

Does it hurt you to know
     that you had nothing to do
          with our happiness?

Tell me . . .
          does it suck to be you?

Samantha McCormick

________________________________________

My Children’s Eyes

You're the monster under my bed and in my closet
yet I can't seem to let you go.

You creep into my most private moments
and I'm not sure I could lose you in a crowd
if I tried.

I'm helpless to the hurt you've caused me
and the one I love,
as helpless as I am when you appear
in my nightmares.

Someday your memory will leave
the inside of my eyelids
and I promise you will not exist
in my children’s eyes.

Farah

________________________________________

Garden Elegy

I touch the broad leaves of the blue hosta,
inviting her to come with me,
explaining that she needs to escape.
Fennel, fragile and lush, clings to the fence.
Peonies bleed petals.
Hyacinth bulbs hide under dirt.
In an empty pot, I find a snakeskin,
coiled and glistening.

I memorize the contrast of bright and dark,
the rich clumping of flower and leaf.
I want to hold this garden safe inside of me.

We dig every hosta,
scoop loose earth to cover roots,
pile plants into plastic bags.
We work fast to save as many as we can.

I untangle the deep roots
of the rosebush she transplanted as a bride
from her grandmother’s house in Michigan.
We lift smooth stones
that came from the bluffs of Lake Ontario,
carried home on picnic days before
the marriage began to taste bitter.

Sweat blesses our necks, our breasts, our silence.
We pull plants from the earth, one by one.
The sage. The daphne. The bleeding heart.

Sometimes the safest
gardens are the ones we tend in our dreams.

I know these ferns
have heard her cry.

Janine DeBaise

________________________________________

The Attic

In the attic I hide,
Fearing the rage that keeps
banging on the door,
Knowing that outside the storm
gathers its strength.

Sweat mingles with tears.
I taste the dust in the air
as it falls upon me.
My face now covered with
darkened streaks of fear.

There is no shelter to slip away to.
With reddened face and glaring eyes
you pace before your prey.
I must face your wrath.

She arises within me to open the door.
You greet her with your fists of power
hitting, slapping, kicking,
And choking your punishment upon her.

There now on the floor, curled up in a ball,
Lies the little girl lost within my soul,
Bruised, broken and shattered.

Once again we have survived,
Only to be told, “get up, go wash your face”.
Bruises don’t wash away.

________________________________________

Choking

Back and forth
Choking
Heels dug in
This tug of war
Denies me
Fear pulls my breath
As the fur of his chest
I so long to tangle fingers in
Comes on me
This isn't how it's supposed to be
Choking

Game between yanking sides
Choking
Me
Him
Crushing violence
So gentle, tows me
Close, yet under
No, no it's the game
Choking

Ropes of back and forth
Choking
Wrap around me
I'm down. He's up
Defeated, I retreat
Heel loose
Separate from what's tied down
Still masked, his gentle
Malevolence hides my truth
Never even sees me
Choking

Crystal Collette

________________________________________

My Independence

I'm going to do well, I'll definitely succeed.
Doesn't bother me now
what life wants to throw at me.
I'm going to tackle it, no matter how hard it'll be.
I know deep down inside somewhere,
is a strength I've yet to find.

I have the strength to continue
along this stubborn path.
No bitterness will deter me,
no spitefulness will be heard.
Above all, NO pain shall ever be felt again -
only a BRIGHTER and BETTER LIFE
shall be had by me.

Ady Ajay . Gillingham, England

________________________________________

The Perfect Child

A cheerful cherub,
observer of life
from a heavenly perch,

the only safe place to be
in our household!

I conversed with angels
and danced on the stars.

As my father's hard anger
tore at soft, child's flesh,

I floated blithely on clouds
waiting for terror to subside.

My spirit hovered
in dark corners,
watched vigilantly
for signs
of attack.

I claimed no body for my own.
"That" belonged to the other little girl,

the shameful one who was
dirty, unlovable and
caused her father to hurt her.

I, though
I was pure and untouched.

The perfect child
who conversed with angels
and danced on the stars.

Evelyn Ayers-Marsh

________________________________________

Do You Know What It's Like?

Do you know what it’s like
to grow up too fast...
to have different feelings because
of your past?

once so innocent, so young...then
in the beat of your heart
your childhood’s...done

deprived of the memories
you shared with your friends...wishing
your life would just come to an end

Do you know what it’s like
to have life taken away...then
have to hold it inside...
because you’re dead if you say?

Do you know what it’s like
to go day by day...to survive on
each breath
     and slowly
               softly
                    drift
                        away?

________________________________________

A Survivor Triptych
for Vera House

One: An Emergency Call, 1966
Before they changed the law

They stood, hands on their Billy clubs,
watching,
while he kicked her in the face
and stomach,
kicked
until her teeth broke
and her lips bled. They stood and watched
and said nothing. Then turned and left.

Before that, they had spoken.
"M'am," they asked her,
though she didn't know they meant her
at first.
She still thought of herself as a girl,
as a child.
"M'am, is this your husband?"
He'd been slugging her then, in the face,
in the breasts, and he stopped,
to let her answer.
"Yes," she had said. What else
could she say

but the truth, hard as it was?
And they stood, their eyes wide and dark
and somehow wounded. As if it was they
who were being beaten,
as if it were their baby who might die
from those kicks.
"M'am," they said, voices cracking,
"We can't help you."
"What kind of law . . ."
she'd started to ask, before
he mashed his knuckles into her face
and she went down
backwards.

Mary Stebbins Taitt

Two: She Remembers Alleys

the crazy way they tilted,
the way they threatened to tip
and spill her
under his feet. She was fast,
but he was faster,
her head shrinking, doorways
refusing to open, no refuge anywhere.
Not even women's rest rooms
a haven any longer. She remembers
the knife

he held over her
while women in the next stalls trembled,
the length of the thick blade,
the way the thin light caught
on the edge and brightened there.
She remembers thorn bushes,
where she crawled
shredding her skin to escape him.
Or try.

She never succeeded. Not for long.
His arms stretched through the city, ballooning
with fists to find her. Fists with eyes.
Feet with black wings.
"Have you seen my wife?" he kept asking.
Someone always pointed the way.
And he
                just
                           kept
                                      coming.

Mary Stebbins Taitt

Three: Red Flags

She was afraid to come home from work.
Afraid as she walked from the bus, her steps
slowing. Afraid to open the door and go inside.
The air in the house congealed, stiffened
and trapped her.
It was full of thunder, lightning,
dense with crackling anger
and rage. She never knew how to reflect it.
She tried to be nice,
she tried to be good, but she couldn't
be good enough. Niceness, he said,
was a crime or plot.
And it was her fault

if the basketball team lost
or if his boss wanted him to go in early
or if his dog messed the floor. That dog mess
was always her fault, even if she was at work
and he was home.
She made him angry by simply existing,
by breathing his air. At the shelter,
they spoke of red flags.
Of calling for help. But when he took her back,
everything he said and did was red,
and he ripped
the phone from the wall.

Mary Stebbins Taitt

________________________________________

A Leaf Floating Down

A leaf floating down,
The only fall color falling in a green canopy
My first awareness of healing
I marked it, the rhythm of nature
As a moment in time.

A seagull, keeping pace with me on the ferry -
Soaring, lifted by the wind -
Not struggling to keep up, effortlessly gliding
Trusting me enough to take a cookie from
My fingers
I marked it, this silent dialogue with nature
As a moment in time.

I've been able to notice the stars,
To obsess about the color of my hair,
To laugh with women I admire and adore.

Marking this Valentine's Day, as a moment in time.

_________________________________________

These are my pieces

These are my pieces, but not my whole.
I am more than this flesh and blood.
My skin does not portray who/what lies beneath.
My smile does not really show how I feel
and my eyes do not allow you to see my depth.

I am no longer an object of someone else’s will,
but a prisoner to my own body.
My body does not feel like it belongs to me.
For so long it was not given a say
and was forcibly maneuvered by another.

Even my mind seems to be dictated
by my own body's sensations.
A simple touch of my arm can trigger a memory.
My hand hesitates to make contact
with even ones I love.

All of these pieces while built together, feel disjointed.
My lips long for a long compassionate kiss,
but my hand will freely push it away.
My arms cry out to be wrapped in another’s,
but my body quickly tightens
responding to a perceived attack.
My body while flaunted is self-conscious
of how it will be judged.
It is a vessel of unknown.

Each touch is a switch
that triggers a new or old memory.
A personal home theater of years past,
many showing reruns that had long been forgotten
or simply waiting for the right time.
My home movies are nightmares
that give understanding to my body's reactions.
Unlike nightmares, I can not wake up
and say it was just a dream.

I have tried to rationalize
with both my mind and body, but it yields to the past.
They are a great puzzle
that I am slowly piecing together.
The picture of who I am
becomes clearer with each piece,
and like most children’s toys, the result is often
not as spectacular as you had hoped.

Can I see who I am becoming
without finishing the puzzle?
The pieces have slowly come together
to create a gruesome picture of who I was.
The pieces cannot be reconfigured
to change the ultimate image;
my picture of my past will always be the same.

The only difference now lies
in how I choose to view it in the future.

________________________________________

One Defiant Line

I will remember.

The thin white scar,
this one defiant line
where pain once raged,

will not recede.

No scowl,
No harsh words,
No hard hand

can wipe it from my soul.

It is a badge worn proudly,
spoken boldly in words
unwilling to compromise.

I will remember.
I will always remember.

Every wrinkle, every convolution
in this angry skin has a tale
to tell and is ready to confess.

My heart knows its betrayals,
my womb remembers invasions,
my tongue holds many stories.

I will remember.
I will always remember...

Evelyn Ayers- Marsh

________________________________________

The Cycle

I curl up in my bed
my eyes are puffy, sore and red

my throat aches from crying
inside, my soul is dying

My chest is heavy, both arms throb
I cannot let him hear me sob

I now get up and look in the mirror
it evokes a new sense of fear

I stare at myself until my face is a blur
that tangled mess of hair is mine, I am sure

The reflection in the mirror makes it so real -
How long will these bruises take to heal?

I need to be so careful when I walk out the door
the wrong look could upset him all the more

Without even looking, I can feel him stare
right now he hates me, I shouldn’t breathe his air

But a few hours later he’ll be comforting me
saying he loves me and that he’s sorry

It’s up to him, when to end this game
the outcome so far is always the same

And until then, my heart will beat fast
soon, this again, will be part of the past

________________________________________

Goodbye to You

I really loved you - cared for you, too.
Why did you do it all over again?
I know I was a fool to be blinded by love -
the mask which covered the beast inside.

When you swore that you wouldn't
you know that you did
How much more of this pain must I keep taking
before I find what I must gain?

You say you're sorry - why should I believe?
How many beatings and lies before I should leave?
All the bruises and pain that I hid -
that was back then - I was only a kid.

You've made me see you for all that you are.
I know I'm better and I can go far.
Don't bother shouting - I'm on my way and how!
You won't stop me - I'm too strong for that now.

I want to be free from all my misery.
I've got to move fast, to escape from my past.
If all of you know of the life I have led
then you too can follow, and leave him in bed.

Ady Ajay . Gillingham, England

________________________________________

House of Cards

syllables sting
glances weaken
shrink from contact, cumbersome child

hold breath, clench fists, avert eyes,
wince imperceptibly
longing, aching, touching, forgetting . . . forgotten

bloated belly, hollow face, feet of clay,
heart of stone, pillar of salt
     keep the plates spinning
     sleep with the lights on
     eat in the dark
     press the creases
     count the pills

conceal the scars
     lovers' wounds
     snake bites
     cigarette burns

arid breasts, brittle brain,
painted roses on eggshell cheeks, glassy stare
empty hands . . . play solitaire
extend no welcome

recoil, resist, restrain, refuse, endure,
dispel, diminish, disappear . . .

no sirens
no fanfares
no lullabies
     no admittance
          to my
               house of cards

Crystal LaPoint

________________________________________

What Happened in the Blackness
Was Hopefully Just Blackness
(Or, Why I Don’t Think Ruffies Jokes Are Funny)

It didn’t occur to me until
fifteen years later when I saw someone explaining
them to a soap opera teen,
how they “take away your ability to resist”
that I didn’t drink enough beers that night
to be quite that drunk. Sitting in a circle of
golden beer mugs
playing quarters
snaggle-tooth Jim asks
Which one of us are you gonna f***
I told him I’d had enough for one night
Some of them were drinking Cisco
and I was proud to know what that means.
They asked me again who I’d f***
there were so many of them
that it seemed inevitable so I chose
the best looking, the one who had a girlfriend
Hoped for his protection.

He sent her home.
He took all my clothes off, very thorough.
I was a f***ing machine.
I tried to do my robot screams
but he held his hand over my mouth
whether for cruelty or quiet.
He did it businesslike, a transaction.
He left the door open while I dressed,
I could see the party down the hall.

Then came the vomiting
beige as that housing development,
and as copious. Threw up on the bed and the floor
in the bedroom of snaggle-tooth Jim.

When I came to it was all blackness
though it must’ve been nearing morning.
They were all hitting me, the whole party
scolding voices, hitting me with something hard.
It was because I puked in Jim’s room, they said.
I screamed that I was sorry and to please stop.
They were calling me the same names
my father called me
the ones he calls all women in his stand-up jokes.

When the police came
one of the faceless took me into the bathroom to
wipe the blood from my forehead,
though it had permanently splattered my shirt.
Gentle version
of the voice she’d used for screaming,
this member of the unseeable mob
she cleaned off my forehead,
come on sweetie, it’s okay.

Jane Cassady

________________________________________

Better from Cars
or
You Already Know the Bad Story
but What Happened After Was More Complicated

I was going to say there was a day
when my mom thought I’d been inside too long
and she said
“Someday you’ll be so trapped
that you won’t be able to go for a walk
so take advantage of it now.”
So I did go.
I walked out of town till Canton Street
turned into the rural road
and I picked flowers, pinching them
gently but insistently from the tangle
of roadside foliage; sweet peas and daylilies,
queen Anne’s lace with their tiny blood droplets.

The fingers around these stems felt innocent.
I saw myself from the point of view
of passing cars:
a girl in bright summer clothes
and plain white sneakers
with a big bouquet.
Outside the town’s speed limit they wouldn’t notice
my hair like a choked mermaid’s
the grey tinge where she bleached out
my purple hair with Clorox
while I hacked and teared with fumes,
cheek hard against the tub.

Driving by you wouldn’t see
the bruises under my eyes from strangers,
the bruises on my shoulders from dad.
The lexicon of filthy names
I would probably always be called, or so it seemed.

Walking along the shoulder
just a sixteen year old girl
still good enough to pick flowers
wise enough to keep walking
the interstate only a few miles away
the evening getting cooler.

Jane Cassady

________________________________________

Take Back the Night

Take back the lives
we naively gave to those
who would use, and abuse
ones they profess to love.
Keep the promises we long
ago made to ourselves.

Take back the wombs,
empty from birthing babies
who now bear their own seed.
Fill the void with joy's
glowing desires.

Take back the arms that cradled
cries, the hands that wiped tears.
Fill them with supple earth.
Pound the yielding clay
into power's form.

Take back our thoughts.
Make them our own.
Color them with
simplicity's brilliance,
let them soar like eagles
on air swells.

Take back the dawn,
her golden light glowing
on dream's wildflower fields,
red, yellow and purple passion
swirling softly on breezes caress.

Take back the night, its blackness
echoing ancient fear.
Shine wisdom's luminous light
into its dark corners.

Dance on moonbeams.
Swing wildly from the stars.

Take back the night!

Evelyn Ayers-Marsh

________________________________________

Women Are Taught

I'm convinced it’s a man’s smell that pulls us in -
faux leather and spiced soap, splashes of lemon
and Old Spice, the odd oil tingeing his sweat.
As women, we were designed to wither beneath
the mingled stench of them. As a woman, I was

yo, yo, baby work that big ass, you must want
designed
what I got
to wither
c'mon honey just let daddy stick it in a little bit
beneath
bitch of course i love you i give you money
don't i

Why else would i cage myself in glorious raiment
of spandex and lace, paint my panting the hues
of burn, twist my voice from madam to smoke?
Why else, once he has left me, do I bury my face
in the place his sex has pressed, inhale
what he has left, and pray to die there?

On the day I married, I was such porcelain,
delicate and poised to shatter. I was unflinching,
sure of my practiced vows,
already addicted to the sanctity of bondage.
I was an unfurled ballad in a scoop-necked
sheath carved of sugar. And him on my arm,
grinning like a bear, all sinew and swagger.
Bibles were everywhere. Dizzied by rote,
I stared at the gold rope around my finger.
He owned me.
And that felt nice.
That felt right.

the first time i hit her
I thought the loose tooth a temporary nightmare
the second time i hit her
He cried himself to sleep, and that was nice,
that was right
the third time i hit her
He counted my scars and whispered never again
baby never again

When i'd die without you
turned to i'll kill you if you ever leave me
I bristled like a hound in heat, I didn't
understand the not being aroused, when
let's get away
turned to
you'll never get away
such heat rippled my
belly such crave in me screeching walk run run run

run
i etched a thin line into the throat of her running
run
i stalked streets just a breath behind her
run
i shattered our son's skull with a shotgun
run
i wanted her dead.

My first thought as he jammed the
still smoking barrel into my breastbone
her first thought
as the blade mapped my chest, the
hammer sliced the air toward my hair
the bullet pushed me through a plate glass window
my last thought you won't believe this
my last thought
you really won't believe this
my last thought
was
he must really

love me

Patricia Smith

_________________________________________

Taking my power back

I am holding my head high
And I am taking my power back

he stripped me of my dignity
he denied me of my first kiss
he stole my trust in others
he took away my voice