I am on the tips of my toes,

balancing on the edge of forever,

staring down into a cloud of greatness.

I teeter on the thin line of have

and have not,

a bundle of nerves and a strung out lie,

unaware of but turning towards

what seems to be

the future.

Had I a choice I would freeze,

spin, 180 on my delicate perch,

relive with wide eyes what I have

come to take for granted.

My ears are deaf to the sound of my father's boots,

clanking in the kitchen and

richocheting into the sound of home.

Impervioius I stand,

yet astonishingly blind to the love of my mother,

her beautiful wisdom and grace.

Baffled endlessly, infuriatingly, by 

the innocence of my brother,

for somewhere in my heart

I realize I too must have been as small,

as unassuming and content.

Undeniably, I remain unable still

to grasp the significance of the word

family,

even at the age I have impossibly and surprisingly

lived to reach.

The string I stand on slices my skin,

bloodies the soles of my feet,

ruins the tenderness and 

turns me to stone.

No longer am I who I am,

and no further does the me I knew travel.

Who I wish I was is a refleciton,

staring through a cracked mirror,

shattered by the truth

and the laws of what must be.

So I linger on, suspended,

not stunned, but subdued into silence,

and silence soon will me

all that is left of me.