[we are in a car headed towards no-where with broken seatbelts and fractured hearts]

every morning i wake up with a headache, pop two tylenol with a handful of tap water [like daddy showed me how], and pretend like dying is something i can avoid.

in the evenings we'd sit and watch television; you in the brown corduroy recliner [that mother hated], me in your lap, against your stomach. because i used to fit.

i used to be a small thing. just a girl. and we would sit and you'd rub your fingers back and forth across the wales and they would purr.

i miss the sound and smell of winter. i miss climbing the yellowwood tree in the backyard [before you cut off all the branches] and learning to whistle with my fingers.

i look for the nails we used as footholds. when we were small and needed help [we still need help]. but they are gone, swallowed by the years.

we longed to be 16. we couldn't wait to drive and laugh and control the radio. now we're just a couple of kids in a beatup truck, driving fast towards nowhere- broken seatbelts and fractured hearts.