Juice Boxes and Chips OR The Reasons for Tears

Some of you may recognize pieces of the writing below.  I have wanted to rework several essays I wrote into one, change it a bit, fix it up, and make it relevant for now.  I (finally) did so.  I have been thinking a lot lately about what I want to do after my postdoc ends (not until September 2014...but I have big dreams, people!).  If I'm honest, I know that one day, I want to start some sort of clinic/organization for low income families with children with developmental disabilities, and I have a particularly special place in my heart for parents with intellectual disabilities raising children with special needs.  This isn't work that people want to do, but there is something in my heart that just loves it.  I know, realistically, that I couldn't do it full time...but it's going to happen, one way or another.  People think I'm crazy for loving this, and a conversation I had recently prompted me to revisit these writings and add some new pieces.  If I get up the nerve, I'd like to share it with the person in question (a person who asked me whether I thought a job like that would be a "good use of my degree and intelligence").  As I often do when I am infuriated, I shut down and said nothing in the moment.  That's something I have to work on, no?

Juice Boxes and Chips OR The Reasons for Tears

When I was in 4^th grade, I completed a homeschooling curriculum on World History. I remember reading the chapter on the Roman Empire, and particularly the section on the city-state of Sparta and the culture of the Spartans. When I read about the Spartans leaving babies that seemed weak, and therefore unlikely to succeed as soldiers, on a hillside to die, I went to my mother, sobbing, so distraught that I was unable to explain what I had learned through my tears.

That memory serves to remind me that, perhaps, I am hardwired to be the person I am. I work in a job now where my heart could—and sometimes does--break on a daily basis. I have worked to be able to handle the stories I hear because, just as I was born to cry about Spartan babies dying on hillsides, I was born to hear stories. I hear stories of children born to drug-addicted mothers who spent the first two weeks of their lives detoxing and now engage in almost constant, severe self-injury.  I hear the stories of a mother of a 5 year old with autism who brings her 17 year old daughter to the treatment session to help remember what I say.  We fight a losing battle together as the 17 year old dropped out of school in 9th grade, neither of them can read, neither are ready to remember or even hear what I say, and the 5 year old screams through the entire session. I hear stories of women living in homeless shelters with 3 year olds with Down syndrome, or women with 5 year olds with severe developmental delays living with them in residential drug treatment facilities.  I listen to their stories, and I try to work with them through the behavior problems: let's teach her to communicate for cheerios.  Praise him for being good.  Ignore the screaming.  Try this behavior chart.  Praise her for being good.  Let's try a visual schedule.  Let me show you how to teach her a more appropriate behavior.  More often, though, we spin our wheels in the basics: Praise her when she does something good.  When I say lock up all sharp objects, I mean lock up the knives AND the scissors.  Keep the window shut AND locked.  Praise him for being good.  Don't hit him - and yes, hitting with your hand still counts as hitting.  Praise her for being good.  Talk to him.  Ignore the tantrums. Don't lock her in the closet.  Praise him for being good. 

I say these things again...and again...and again, and after I say it again, sometimes I get responses like, “hey, the other lady we saw, she gave him chips AND a juice box. She always gave him juice AND chips, and she was always real good to him. They’re always real good to us here. You can give him chips AND a juice box, right Doctor?” Something in my chest tightens in frustration as I know she hasn't heard me, she will go home and attend to every problem behavior, forget to praise the good behavior, and she will hit him again.  But I summon all the patience in me to assure her both verbally and nonverbally: Yes.  Yes.  I can be good to you, too.

In those moments, I don’t know how I expect them to be consistent. I don’t know how I can expect them to think about 3-step guided compliance and proper time-out procedures when they can’t read the handouts I gave them. When they don’t have a consistent place to live. When they are worried about how they’re going to feed their kids. When they are worried about their child’s safety. When they have 6 kids under the age of 6 because their sister just moved in with them with her kids, and 6 kids in a 2 bedroom apartment is just too many.  I hide my disappointment in professional language as I write my progress note, and admit to no one that I feel disheartened that I can’t help them.

…but the next week they come back. And the week after that they come back.  As long as they keep coming back, I know I must be doing something right.  As long as they keep coming, we have another opportunity, and potentially, that's all we need: just a few more opportunities for me to scratch at the darkness and let in some light.  I swallow my frustration and sense of incompetence, and we try, and we try, and we try again.

The thing that gets me is that they do try. They are trying. They are giving this life their all, and it’s just too damn hard for any one person to navigate this life with the hand they’ve been dealt. So they try, and I try, and if we’re lucky, something will happen. I give their kids chips AND a juice box. I give them picture schedules and session notes in the simplest words I can manage. I praise them for trying. I give them bus tokens. I show them and tell them and practice with them, and have them show me, and tell me, and practice with me. 

As I climb up the hierarchy from pre-doc to post-doc to 2nd year post-doc, the people around me say, "don't you want to work at our other locations?  Don't you want to move out of the city and work with the families you can ACTUALLY make a difference with?  Don't you want to work with our families that have it more together so you can actually use your degree?"

And I tell them no.  We compromise, and I work only part time in the city, and something in my heart misses the chaos and the challenge of trying to establish trust, and love, and change with some of society's most vulnerable citizens.  This week, I told a young mother I will have to transfer her to a new therapist.  This mother has an intellectual disability, several children with behavior problems, and it took us 4 months for her to tell me something other than, "Hey doctor, I don't beat my kids.  I don't beat my kids, doc.  I don't.  I'm good to them, you know?  I know beating them is wrong."  After a year and a half of working together, she cried when I told her I was leaving, and cried harder when I told her how proud I am of her work and dedication.  This mother, who came to me angry, defensive, untrusting, and scared gave me a hug and a smile and said, "I just know things gonna get better.  I just gotta keep coming to my appointments, and praising him and, you know, telling him good job and talking to him and giving him toys to play with."  She cried again, and when I asked the reason for her tears, she told me it was because she was proud of herself.  There are so many reasons for tears. 

Really, who among us doesn't live at times feeling angry, defensive, untrusting, and scared?  Who among us has the courage to push through that, even if just for one relationship with someone who exemplifies so many things we are not -- things, even, that we have learned to fear and distrust?  Perhaps this life is really only a process of trusting the world enough to re-engage.  It takes courage to wake up every day and walk out into this world ready to try it again.  This willingness to continue engaging and trusting and trying is a way of saying to the world "I'll give you one more shot," on those days when even the sun seems to have forsaken you.  On the days when my job seems hard, I remind myself that this is my way of engaging in an active, intimate, and interpersonal willingness to show my hope for humanity.  Even on the bad days, I know this is a gift.

Acts of courage and compassion and bravery leave battle wounds and scars that change our perceptions of the world.  I believe that bravery in life comes from admitting that you are living in spite of the wounds and scars, rather than from continuing to live life as though you are unshaken.  The courage that I live is simply the ability to hear it all, and to love the world again. The wounds I carry are sometimes physical, but more often and more substantially lie in the intimate knowledge I hold of the pain in others’ hearts. My eyes are battle scarred as the lenses with which I view the world become scratched with knowledge I sometimes feel I would rather not have.   And yet, I listen. I open my heart to the breaking and healing. And I continue to love the world.

Retail Therapy

Sometimes, I write poems that I don't understand. I'm pretty sure this is one of them. It is also odd...really odd...and really not my typical poem. But this is what I wrote today, and it was freaking hard to write and took me forever to feel like I had it "right" enough to be shared. I'm also sure this is going to be edited and changed in the near future...but here is its current incarnation.

Current working title is "Retail Therapy"

As I walk out of the department store dressing room,
the poreless, skinless mannequins mock me with their necks.
Their toothpick thighs and kneeless legs spring into cellulite-free life and kick,
adding injury to insult as their handless arms block my path:
this, I think, is my zombie apocalypse.

I leap away, too late,
as the mannequin modeling a polka-dotted bathing suit holds me still
and the paste-toned head-and-torso shirt model
rips open my chest
pulls out my feminist heart,
raises it to her toneless lips
and devours it before I can breathe.

In a second, it is gone,
the juicy crunch and slurp turn my stomach sour
as I watch my intellect drip,
blood-like,
from her perfect chin.

They stare with pupil-less, judging eyes,
watch me attempt to wash away the mess with overflowing shame
and return to their posts atop the poppy red, nectarine, and grayed jade displays
of playful summer prints.

The perky sales clerk walks by unfazed
acknowledges the bloody puddle of feminism, intellect, and humiliation,
stands a yellow cone in front of the mess,
calls Rhonda on the loudspeaker for a "clean up in women's"
pretends not to smell the shame seeping from my pores
and has the audacity to ask me, smiling, if there is something she can help me find.

I consider ordering, as if from a menu,
the self-esteem platter with an extra side of self worth,
a confidence biscuit, a self-love salad,
and whatever is the antidote for shame.
When the meal comes, I'll spread out shirts like picnic blankets,
dim the lights, light some candles,
sit between the racks of skinny jeans and bikinis
and invite the mannequins to join me,
ready to dine with the skeletons from my closet.

They arrive, angry, and hungry for answers,
silent, staring, waiting:
they want my flesh.
Want me to remember the memories they wear branded on their skin
want me to release them from my histories
wrap my arms around them
bow our heads in prayer
and find an absolution.
They want meetings with folding chairs in basements;
want tokens to earn for 1 day, 5 days, 30 days clean;
want me to introduce myself as someone with a first name only
who can't manage to love
the only body she's known.

We sit in silence, as stories soak into the humid summer air.
I fold up the shirts, turn on the lights,
the mannequins return to their posts and I leave,
holding nothing in my hands.

Ten Things I Should Have Learned By Now

Part 2 of the exercise discussed yesterday is to write a list of 10 things you should have learned by now.  Here is my list:

10 Things I Should Have Learned By Now

(1) Dishes never wash themselves.  Particularly if you don't have a dishwasher.

(2) Trust your gut.  It doesn't have a reason to lie to you.  If other people don't trust your gut, trust it anyway.  If you're on the fence as to whether or not to trust it, trust it.  If you're not sure if you want to trust it, or you're not sure why it's telling you something, just go with it.  I don't know why, and I don't know how it works, but you've got to trust it.  End of story.

(3) When people show you who they truly are, believe them the first time around.

(4)  A few deep breaths can move you further than you think. 

(5) Perfectionism is too much work.

(6) From a book I use with my clients: worries are like tomatoes.  The more you tend to them, the more they grow. 

(7) Self care.  Learn it.  Live it.  Love it.

(8) Anxiety is just a big bully.  You can stand up to it, set limits with it, and teach it not to push you around.

(9) Weird things happen to me with statistically significant frequency.

(10) I am so much stronger than I believe.

                                                                           (This is #11)

What about you?  What should you have learned by now?

Ten Things I Know to be True

Last year, I wrote a post entitled "10 Things," which you can read here.  In this post (which you should go and read), I posted a TED talk by spoken word poet Sarah Kay in which she discusses an exercise where she has students write 2 lists.  The first list is "10 things I know to be true" and the second list is "10 things I should have learned by now." 

I like lists.  Lists and I...we're friends, on many levels.  I write lists for myself: to-do lists, to write lists, books to read lists, goals lists, topics to research lists, research to conduct lists, lists turned into poems...  I write lots of lists at work with clients: lists of problem behaviors, lists of goals, lists of fears, lists of alternative and appropriate behaviors, and recently, a list of all the reasons my teenage client hates coming to see me.  Some lists are more reinforcing than others.

Here, though is part 1 of my updated list.  I'll post part 2 tomorrow.

Ten Things I Know to be True

(1) Working with children with developmental disabilities is the most rewarding and fulfilling job I could possibly have.  My heart is touched, stretched, melted, torn apart, and squeezed on a daily basis.  Having the privilege of working with these children and their families is an honor.  The moment I stop seeing that is the day I need to find something new.

(2) Starting a practice of mindful, daily, gratitude is the best gift I could have given myself.  I have to make myself start again on a daily basis, and some days, I still come up empty.  Those days, however, are increasingly less frequent, and the smaller moments of gratitude have come to mean so much more.

(3) Fresh strawberries taste like god's laughter. 

(4) I am abnormally, deeply, strangely sensitive.  I feel nearly every aspect of life from the core of my body all the way out to my skin.  One day, I hope to be able to (a) harness it and (b) appreciate it.  This is a blessing and not a curse.  It is a strength and not a weakness.  One day, I hope to believe this.

(5) Living is complicated.

(6) Writing is the best way I know how to make sense of life.  I should be writing more often.

(7) All oppression is connected.

(8) We need other people.  We need trust.  We need connection.  We need love.  I will probably spend the rest of my life trying to figure out how to make that work.

(9) Anger can be beautiful.  It's scary, but done right, it's necessary and powerful and righteous.

(10) One day, I will remember that I am worthy of love, without reminders.

What about you?  What is something you know to be true?

 

                                                                 (This truth is # 11)

 

 

To the Ohio Lawmakers...

I wrote half of this post when I woke up at 6:15 this morning, purely because I was so immediately outraged that I had to do something about it.  Are you aware of this?

Are you ANGRY about this?  I'm angry.  I quite angry, actually.  I'm angry, and I'm hurt, and it literally makes me feel sick.  I'm tired of reading things like this.  Here's my list of why:

(1) Because it could have been me.  I could have been the woman who was raped, alone, and seeking an abortion.  Because the last thing I would have needed would have been a white, male legislator telling me what I can or can't do with my body.

(2) Because one day, I want to have a daughter, and I want to raise her such that she knows with unequivocal certainty that her glorious body belongs to her.  Always.  Every inch of it.  I want her to know that every single choice she makes regarding what she does with it, who she shares it with, what medical procedure she has done to it, is her own choice.  Always. 

(3) Because I want to raise a daughter in a culture that does not perpetuate rape.  If that isn't possible, I want to at least be able to teach her that if some asshole boyfriend, or husband, or date, or stranger violates her precious flesh, that the legislators of her state and her nation have her back.  I want her to know that, when she is feeling raw, and vulnerable, and violated, and like every inch of her soul has been stepped on and exposed...I want her to know that at the very least the lawmakers in our country respect her body, her integrity, her autonomy, and her right to choose. 

(4) Because rape crisis centers are vital, and not just for the information they provide about access to abortion and women's right to choose.  When a person is raped -- whether it was yesterday or 20 years ago -- a rape crisis center can provide the absolutely vital therapy that is needed to deal with the crisis.  They provide support like hospital accompaniment and a friendly, supportive face when facing an abuser in court.  They provide education.  Most importantly, these services are free.  Can a survivor seek therapy and other supportive services elsewhere?  Sometimes.  But frankly, it's hard without insurance.  Even with insurance, or with the ability to pay, or with access to low-cost/sliding scale clinics, there is absolutely no assurance that the survivor will get what she needs.  As a savvy student without decent healthcare, I was able to find therapy services when I needed them...but it wasn't helpful.  It wasn't helpful because the therapist I saw, in spite of her website and supposed credentials, was NOT competent in working with young women dealing with trauma.  As a result?  I was further hurt, and traumatized, and I decided to stop going and not to seek help.  It wasn't until I attended therapy at a rape crisis center almost 2 years later that I received the support I so desperately needed.  The people there -- they get it.  There is no judgment, there is no shame, no surprise--just support, and assistance, and kindness.  And now, because a handful of old white men in suits have decided that they know what's best for people with vaginas in the state of Ohio, they want to cut funding.  Because a handful of old white men in suits have decided that they don't want women in crisis to receive education regarding their choices, they want to take that funding away.  I fully believe that one of the best things we can do for people who have been raped is provide them with 6 months of free therapy. 

(5) Because violence against women is perpetuated by the belief that my body is not my own.  If a group of men in an office can sign off on a bill telling me what I can and can't do with my body, then it isn't really such a far jump for the man I'm dating to tell me what I should do with it, is it?  If a bunch of men I will never meet can make a law taking away my right to choose, then is it really unreasonable to believe that my husband or boyfriend will never question my right to say yes, or no, or maybe later, or never do that again?  Is it really unbelievable that, if a group of men makes decisions on matters affecting only women, and regulates our ability to decide what is right and good and appropriate for OUR BODIES...is it REALLY unbelievable that a guy I have just met will not have the implicit sense that touching me when I say stop is wrong? 

(6) Also, Planned Parenthood.  Taking away Planned Parenthood so that women don't get abortions is like shutting down all fitness centers because you want people to be healthy.  It doesn't make any sense.  Build the gyms, people will exercise, people will be healthy (more frequently).  Fund Planned Parenthood, people have access to necessary services and health care, people won't need to seek abortions (as frequently).  Okay, so maybe that analogy isn't quite as smooth as I would like it to be, but you get my point.

(7) "But Autodidact," you say, "this is in Ohio.  You don't live in Ohio."  You're right.  But I used to live in Ohio.  I have friends that I love in Ohio.  And even if this was taking place in Oklahoma or Kansas or Montana, or someplace where neither you nor I have lived, it doesn't matter.  It shouldn't matter.  Violations of autonomy and choice that are occurring anywhere are violations for all of us.  Things won't change until we are ALL experiencing the right to choose and the right to safety, dignity, and autonomy.  Today it's Ohio.  Yesterday it was Texas, tomorrow it's somewhere else.  Unless we stop it.  I don't know how that happens.  The only thing I know how to do is write angry poems and ramble angrily on a blog nobody will read.  But dammit, if that's all I can do, that's what I will do. 

(8) Because people are able to distance themselves and think that things like this aren't personal.  But it is personal.  The more I talk to women about my own experience, the more I hear women say, "me too."  I'm tired of hearing "me too."  I'm tired of saying "me too."  I'm tired of news stories that tell me that things aren't changing.  I'm tired of knowing that I am one of 3 daughters, and I'm tired of trying to educate my sisters louder than society can undo my teaching.  I'm tired of wondering how I will ever be able to raise a daughter in this world.  I'm tired of wondering how we can teach our sons to be different when the position of the men in power doesn't change. 

(9) Because I even have to write this post.  Because I have to wrestle with these words and the ways to explain what is seething inside me, and because some people just won't get it. 

Luckily, there are awesome people like the poet Lauren Zuniga who do.  Her poem, "Personhood," is amazing:  Personhood

As is To The Oklahoma Lawmakers 

(These are both pretty intense poems.  Beautiful, and strong, and powerful, and true, but intense.  Just fair warning).

Also, you can read my friend's post about this issue here: Reticulated Writer

Where I am starting: Summer in Maryland

Okay, so here's the deal.  I need to start writing again.  It has to happen.  So for the month of July, I'm going to post something every day.  I'm not going to promise anything earth shattering.  I'm not promising anything beautiful and profound.  I'm not even promising anything good.  But I'm going to write.

I tried this once before, and it didn't go so well...but it will this time, even if only because it has to.  I need to be writing something other than treatment plans and progress notes. 

So here is where I am starting: I'm laying on the floor in my living room.  My dog is happily eating a paper towel tube next to me -- it's his favorite toy so I let him have it, even if it means I step on wads of wet, chewed cardboard.  There's a fan running in every room, working overtime against the heat and humidity outside.  We're lucky: there's a breeze outside today disrupting the humid stillness. 

I've just unloaded my groceries and I'm still warm and sticky.  My elderly Deaf neighbor is outside in her pajamas calling her cat: "ommmmm eeeeee," she calls.  "Ommmm eeeeee!"  Come in, she's saying.  Come in!  My hair feels frizzy and out of control, so I pulled it up into a knot on top of my head, just to get it out of the way.  There's a dog barking outside, which makes Marshall raise his head.  He barks, softly.  "Marsh..." I warn him.  He puts his head down with a groan, then spies a piece of half chewed cardboard, puts it between his paws, and resumes chewing.  I wish I understood the appeal of this.

My thoughts are busy, and my body feels tight in all the wrong places.  It's been one of those days when my skin just doesn't seem to fit right on my body.  One of those weeks, rather -- or months, or years, perhaps.  The pressure from the atmosphere seems to want to hold my breath captive in my chest, but I force it in and out, wondering if soon, this act of breathing will begin an accordion-like sound.  My busy mind follows that thought and briefly wonders what song my breathing would play.  This will require more thought.  What about for you?

We're supposed to get thunderstorms tonight.  The sky is already overcast, the air is heavy, and the pressure in my head indicates the weathermen are likely right on this one.  A storm is definitely coming.  I take a sip of my barely cold water and a bite of cantaloupe.  It's summer in Maryland. 

Summer in Maryland is different than summer in Ohio.  Summer in Maryland has a history that tastes like crab cakes, and sun tea, and corn on the cob.  It's deep red tomatoes with mayonnaise and pepper at my grandmother's house.  It's swimming in dirty lakes, going down the shore, and games of Capture the Flag.  Summer in Maryland is wild blackberries deep in the woods, straight off the plant.  It's a history of crayfish catching and butterfly nets; mason jars with fireflies; pool water stinging my nose.  It sounds like my grandmother's laugh and cicadas.  Summer is a visceral experience.

It's been a long time since I've inhabited my body this fully.  There's a gratitude I experience for life these days that I had forgotten.  I notice the smallest things, and they amaze me: the taste of yogurt and fresh blueberries.  The smell of fresh cut grass.  Lightning bugs making a Christmas light display of the dark.  The feel of rain on my skin.  Finding this space in my body and mind for gratitude is like falling in love with the world.  It's like being present for my life for the first time in a long, long while.  I have a theory about this.  This is what I do while walking, cleaning, driving, showering, sleeping...I make theories, then revisit them later.  My mind is a veritable textbook of half-baked theories, waiting for me to prove them right.

There's so much I've missed while my mind was busy doing other things.  I'm ready to re-learn summer.  Cantaloupe and thunderstorms seem like good places to start. 

Baby Powder

It's been a long time since I've written a poem as hard to write as this one.  It came to me pretty much fully formed, so it only took me about 45 minutes to get from idea to the form you see it in now...but emotionally, it is a little more difficult.  It's one of those poems that just had to be written this way, even though I'm not 100% sure I understand why it is the way it is.  I'm vacillating on the title.  Part of me wants to call it "Baby Powder," and another part of me wants to title it "Forgiveness."  I'm not sure yet.

Anyway, this is a poem about many things, really, but was "inspired" (poor word choice, but it's the best I can come up with), by something that happened Thursday evening.  I'll just copy and paste what I posted on Facebook: 

"So....I just had 2 valuable lessons emphasized to me. 1. Always trust your gut. 2. Always lock the doors of your car after you get in. I went to the grocery store this evening to pick up a few things, and came out of the store around 9. Walking to my car, there were 2 young guys on cell phones walking to their car. For some reason, they made me uncomfortable, so I walked quickly to my car, unlocked it, and got in the drivers seat with my bags because I didn't want to take the time to put them in the back. I locked the doors as soon as I sat down. Less than two seconds later, the guys got to my car and tried to open the passenger side door and the rear door behind the drivers seat. Finding it locked, they knocked, laughed, and ran away. I'm sure I'll stop shaking at some point."

This was difficult on several levels, for several reasons, and it's left me in a difficult place for a few days.  I'm hoping the writing of this moves me forward. 

Baby Powder

If I see them again, I will not scream.

I will not walk quickly to my car, lock the doors, and sit there shaking,

I will not let myself be frozen.

Will not sit there idling with clammy hands,

will not beat unholy war chants into my steering wheel,

will not call out profanities as I drive away.

If I see them again,

I will not punch or kick.

I will not decapitate or castrate,

will not make violent threats of persecution or incarceration,

will not draw hidden weapons from purses, pockets, socks,

I will not cry.

If I see them again, undressing me with x-ray eyes,

if I walk through the parking lot, the alley, the bar

with crawling skin, I will not hide.

Will not turn my fear into shame,

will not question my right to safety,

will not think about the time, my clothing, the level of light.

If I see them again, I will not drown in emotion,

will not convince myself that "dirty"

 is a parasite under my skin.

 will not turn my anger inward

I will not own their ugly.

If I see them again,

groceries or drink or keys in hand,

I will turn to look them in the eyes.

I will take a breath,

and tell them a Buddhist nun once told me

the best way to keep ants out of my kitchen

is to spread baby powder wherever they come in,

so I have baby powder lining the wall in my kitchen

because I believe in this life too much

to be responsible for pain.

If I see them again,

I will ask them where in their body their privilege swells.

I will ask them if the beat in their ears is their heartbeat or mine.

I will remind them

that when we hold seashells to our ears, we call our heartbeat the sea

and perhaps, the air surrounding us is a giant shell

to let us listen to the heartbeats of those we would never stop to hear.

I will ask them if they have felt the noose of fear around their neck.

I will ask them if they have heard the breaking of their own soul

felt it oozing from their chest, like grape jelly seeping from a cracked jar,

slow, sticky, and cold as death;

 I will ask them if they felt this life leaving them,

and if they wondered how they could possibly stand, broken,

knowing the people who broke them breathe the same air,

feel the same sun,

count the same stars in the same damn summer sky.

If I see them again,

I will ask them if some days,

sharing a galaxy with hatred

suffocates them, too.

I will ask them quietly if they have a sister.

I will ask them again, louder, if they have a

mother, a grandmother, a great-grandmother, an aunt, a daughter,

a girlfriend, if they dream of having a wife or a daughter,

and if they do,

I will ask them to picture their girlfriend, their mother as me.

I will ask them to picture their someday daughter,

to see her, pure and beautiful,

and to picture her with my face.

If I see them again, I will ask them if they have heard

the sound of their own head cracking against a wall.

If they have heard the sound of whispered hate masquerading as shabbily dressed love and attention,

I will ask them if they have felt the shroud of ugliness covering their bodies

I will ask them to describe the texture, color, and smell of shame,

and when they cannot, I will want to introduce them, intimately,

just so they can feel her weight. 

If I see them again, I will yell random facts

until I find the one that strikes a chord on the strings of their hearts:

I will ask them if they, too, have double jointed thumbs,

if celery also makes their mouth numb

if they make wishes on hay trucks, lady bugs, stars,

I'll tell them I wish on the 3 stars in the belt of Orion,

just because they're the ones I can always find,

that I'm allergic to bees, that I love trees and swings and

praying to things I don't believe in and cannot see...

and when I find the one thing in common between him and me,

I'll make my voice quiet

like lightning under the thunder of my heart.

I'll back up slowly - return to the start -

Did you know, I'll ask them, that I have baby powder on the floor of my kitchen?
A Buddhist nun told me it's the best way of keeping ants away
without killing them.