For years I would return home to you
Heartful, Open, Mistakenly Empathetic
When you brought
Hostility, Obsession, Manic Envy.

I was in stability
With your instability.
That became my routine—
Wake up and wonder,
Who will you be?

The woman popping peace signs
With tie-dye shawls
Or my security guard
Securing me from ever
Feeling secure in my own skin.

Asking you “what’s for dinner”
Is a grave sin.
I should be ashamed.
I’m the devil you named.
I’m spoiled.
I’m a brat.
All for relying on my mother’s duty to act.

For years I would return home to you
Bound by a social contract
You think is daughterly love
But is actually a custody agreement
Created before I had conscious memory
But I do remember this
I remember you calling me bitch downstairs
I remember you putting chicken broth in my vegan
Meal and asking your husband
Not to tell.
I remember how you liked your food so hot
My mouth burned with every bite.
I learned to blow on my fork.

You once followed me to the tennis courts,
Yelling at me afterward for not being there
No matter how much
I swear I was only sitting down to
take a break,


You never laid off the brakes.
Stop growing up.
Stop fucking up.
Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop—
Whiplash
from your mix
Of love and unpredictable hate.

For years I would return home to you.
Straight to my room,
My bubble of tranquility.
To get me through your insanity,
So I can remain in sanity.

In what you would call vanity,
I left.
To be the woman living authentically
With confidence and all
And securing a future I want.

Please return any letters to sender.
I have a change of address.