I can almost recall
as I lay, blacked-out on the pavement
outside an unfamiliar, college-town chapel,
the outline of my bedroom ceiling
from my twin sized bed on Sunday Mornings.
My sister lay not four feet away,
strawberry-blonde curls strewn on the pillow,
hand limp and lingering,
still outstretched from grasping mine to drift asleep.
The ache in my ribcage that is left
from the nights my mother was nowhere to be found
pangs as it is flooded
with the same liquid lover she (so graciously)
abandoned us for.
We are better without her.
The people are sat in neat rows,
each pew shaking their heads in unison.
They could hear, in my voice,
the reeking, smoky sin I (so thoughtlessly)
indulged in.
In the purple sky painted on my knees
from falling and gasping for forgiveness,
I can almost recall
the sound of the voice of the man
who bathed and bore me purity.
I can almost recall,
from the front of the room,
his damning and condemnation of a little girl
in a puffy white dress.
The tune of a hymn in her morning croon
escapes my unholy lips and floats around me,
spinning.
