Écrire, C’est Ça ou Mourir / Write or Die
J’ai écrit ce (trop long) poème il y a 29 ans, étant encore en amnésie traumatique, confusion, déni… Aujourd’hui, je le dédie à tou(te)s les ami(e)s en 12 Etapes (toutes Fraternités confondues) qui s’y reconnaîtront, eux(elles)-mêmes et leur souffrance...
Questions Utiles à Mon Rétablissement
Faux-SelfQuand j’ai découvert la notion de faux-self, j’ai immédiatement pensé à ce clown qu’une personne de ma famille avait dessiné étant enfant. Maintenant je m’exerce, surtout quand mes idées sont embrouillées, à me poser ces toi questions : « Qu’est-ce que je...
I am a Piano
Photo and poem by Julie N.
Guilty No More
Original photograph by Julie N.
Our Father
This poem contains content that some may find offensive. I don’t want to be your hero. I was a child.I took a dozen lashes.Then stood up and said, “Fuck you.” I don’t want to be your hero. A heavy wet blanket of pain was draped over this boy’s body.From the outside he...
Don’t Talk. Don’t Feel.
I feel it and I am going to talk about it. Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn - “Bed Stuy” Bed Stuy is beating up your mother and asking you, “What are you going to do about it, punk?” Bed Stuy is looking outside onto the street and in between patches of icy, crunching...
I Don’t Remember
Trigger warning. This poem contains a traumatic event. I don’t rememberthe first three years of my life.But my gut remembers.My heart knows the truth. Frozen terror within.Terrified of daddy-Monster,the volcano in my home.I must hide from him, but I can’t. One simple...
Petty Retaliation
I was fourteenand sick of daddy-Monster’s violence.I did not know who I was.I had heard too many lies. Too many beatings.Too many slaps across the face.Too many unpredictable eruptions.Too much terror. Too much ridicule.Too many disparaging comments.Too many hostile...
Bridge of Light
The space between “Me” and “I am”Is the place where wrong meets don’t belong.Self and identity, privileges deniedI struggle to breathe and learn to hide. Here on the shore of a foreign seaBuried treasure revealed at low tide sweepStarving gull pecks at scraps and...
How Ironic
Mother: “I would have had an abortion if I had known.” (You are not supposed to be here.) Father (after saying I will come home if he promises not to hit me): “I will not be blackmailed.” (Do not forget. You are not supposed to be here.) Husband: “No one wants to hear...