It wasn’t always this way.
I remember sitting on the park bench,
Waiting for you to drive up,
So you could take me away from the place I hated.
It wasn’t always this way.
I remember you had just bought me a bead making kit
And we made hundreds
Of those little play-dough beads.
We were going to make necklaces.
It wasn’t always this way.
I can remember those times,
The good times,
When you were the one I looked up to
Beautiful
Smart
Kind.
It wasn’t always this way.
I wasn’t always this way.
I wasn’t always the one that my sister cried to;
I wasn’t always the one that she told when she and her boyfriend fought;
I wasn’t the one she would have called
At six at night on spring break
Because she had taken a handful of pills
And she wanted to die but she was scared she would.
It should have been you.
It should have been you that got that call.
It should have been you that drove an hour to make sure she wasn’t dying;
It should have been you that saw she was slitting her wrists open every night;
It should have been you that held her while she was screaming your name
In her night mares
Every night.
It wasn’t always this way.
We weren’t always screaming,
Yelling,
Crying,
Trying to drown out the other
So we could pretend just for a moment we weren’t alone;
Trying to claw each other’s voices out of the air
So we could bottle it up
And when all was said and done
We would listen to it
At night when we were in our beds
So alone
And so scared.
Mommy’
It wasn’t always this way.
Don’t you remember
When you were my rock?
When you were my best friend;
All the family I had.
All the family I needed.
Mommy’
It wasn’t always this way,
But now it is,
And now I don’t call you mommy anymore.