Saturday, May 28, 2016

It never leaves you

Fifty years ago today
our young lives changed 
forever 
I was twelve

That morning my older brother knocked on my bedroom door and said
c’mon Ker, we’ve gotta go over to the neighbor’s  
I didn’t ask why 

As I walked out of my bedroom 
a policeman walked out of my mother’s 
and closed the door 
I thought, what’s she done this time

My younger brother and I went to the neighbor’s 
The only people who had befriended my mother 
and seemed to enjoy her company 
she could be the life of the party
and tolerated her alcoholism 

Later that morning I spoke to a friend on the phone 
she said she’d seen them take my mother away on a stretcher 
and that there was blood on the pillow 

Eventually I was told 

she was dead 

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