Words to the Wind

I didn't even pay attention to the time,I didn't realize what this AM marked.Your birthday.1961,grandma birth you,her first son of three,but the only father that God gave to me.Gave seems so informal,more like blessing,I don' remember that many words said but Grandma always said that I looked just like you&as I got older I acted like you,I was you if you were a little girl.Quiet,withdrawn&loved books too much for other people around me.Maybe you should have withdrawn that day.Maybe you should have taken your place behind the door where we would have followed you.But that would be like asking a lion to withdraw from defending his pride.That's what you were doing.The last thing you would ever do.One shot.Still standing.2,3,4,you're on one your knees,5,6,I don't see you anymore,I see the vessel of what was everything to me, being relieved of the beautiful soul with in.7.I'm an orphan.July 4,1996.Survived the heat wave,woke up from a comma from shots before.This time there is no next time.You only exist in the pictures that I can take from mamas drawer when she's passed out now,strung out now,eight kids too many,nine on the way.You never got to see him born just five months later.13 years later&I still hold on.Doctors say it's not healthy becasue too much trauma before that was enough but now the letters meet PTS&D say that I should have just turned away,that I should have forced it out of mind.'Let those sleeping dogs lie'.Irrelevant1This is more than memories,more than the past.It's you.No,it is wrong,it's YOU!A part of me that I couldn't have fathomed would have such an impact.Dad.Yes one of the best I can say even in such short time.Some one on death row would say that's a long time,but that day I was sentenced to a death while alive.When I closed my eyes for years on end I saw you each time,shots in a line from barrels that I couldn't plug,I even dreamt of taking the bullets for you,holding you but still you got carried away.That day I gave up on humanity when I didn't even know what that word was.I knew of savagery.After all,it was all that surrounded me.I was a little girl then,only 5.Thirteen years later,that little girl grew into me.This college woman,this gives back to her community,works most of the time woman,this poetic&passionate woman.That day took away anything that I later thought I could dream&gave me my everything.Poetry.Empathy,Resilience.My identity.It took you from me physically&gave you to me completely.What you were made of still lives in me.Every year,three times a year,as long as it wills,I'm going to write to you&I'm going to send these words to you.