Residuals

At birth life handed me options 

To come out with significance or an expiration date

At three life again gave me an option

To live with decay or throw it away

With heaven aide it seems like the past played with the strings of destiny 

Destroying everything that made me 

From my cousin in the closet

About being a compulsive fire starter 

Until she started a fire in the closet she hid in

To my eldest brother walking out on my mother when my father beat her

Leaving a feeble girl as our family protector

God then developed a sense of humor

Because the same man that constantly threatened to kill her

if she leaves him;

developed symptoms that told him his time would soon expire 

The effective aide, AIDS have 

A family cured of a monster while it spread one amongst us

This irony killed the hierarchy 

Time passed and so did everything around me 

I was standing still and witnessed everyone fall about me 

Then someone woke me and spoke one day I'd live to rule

As long as I paid attention to rules

Though nothing comes easy 

I traveled from orphanage to home 

And back numerous times

Ridiculed for belonging to no one

I fostered a hatred as a foster child

Self-control created an uncommunicative mind state 

a cynical self-absorbed hate  

My self-hatred inflated 

Preservation deflated 

I learn to run 

And hide

I learn to live outside,

And inside my mind

I became the ruler of my world 

And broke all the rules I was forced to follow

I took to the night 

Because light was to heavy to swallow

I tried to drown the sorrow

I guess the water was to shallow

……

Then a blessing was born in fallow 

emotions swarmed me;

To much to bottle.

I now speak with a different tune

however at times revert to the old melody 

… my cup of tea, this is what keeps me until morning, writing.