I was taught by my parents how to see the world

Mama says please when she asks for something and I say please too

Mama hides in plain sight and so do 

We are like small china dolls in a forgotten wardrobe

I try to always do what Mama and Daddy say but they are such different promises to keep

It comes down to who has the most to take away

It is years forward and my hair had been cut short and I am many inches taller

The bones in my face are starting to rise towards womanhood

I want them to stay quiet

Stay small and obedient

When I visit Daddy’s house he is the king

I liked him being the king because I knew what to do 

I think I know how to be his little girl

I think Daddy feels dead inside but sometimes the liquor makes him feel like he’s flying

It’s not really flying but I don’t tell him that

Between me and you, it’s more like falling 

Quickly towards the earth

A great big catastrophic bomb on my already mess of a life

I think of this while we drive

The party was full of loud men and quiet women

Outside it was October cold

I go to sit near Daddy while he drinks his falling potion 

I wait

He starts to smile like he is silly

Like there is a joke I didn’t hear but once he tells me I will smile too

On the drive over he tells us not to speak of our sister 

The one that never sees him

She is all I want to talk about

He is sitting there with a fools grin

His other ex wife is there because even in separation, they like to play house

I stare at the bonfire

I am like the little girl dancing in the flame

I am his lil-bug

His angel

His sweetheart

His joy

Isn’t it funny how fathers turn you into metaphors to control you?

Isn’t it funny how men do that?

How I started to do that?

So the anger comes out in jabs 

I do not know how to fight

With my little words I watch the crimson flush rise till the silly has turned to storm

We begin to drive to his home and it is darker than I thought possible

Time slows

The road gets longer

The sky gets darker

My world is shrinking turning smaller

I think about the unlocked car door and how I could roll out of and avoid the coming horror

The rage fuming off of him is making the small space stink like cheap cologne

I feel sick on the smell of it

My little sister is terrified in the back seat 

I know this because she simply stares out the window at nothing

She is always afraid of him

We are counting seconds in unison

I think If he hits something while driving like this I will throw myself over her so she will not die

I am not capable of thinking of anything else but this meager gift of survival I can bestow upon her

We arrive to his sad broken house full of things my stepmother hated 

His scream at the back sounds like fireworks and I hear the voice

The voice of the king who locks away the princess in the tower for a million years

It is the voice of a monster

I go outside and sit in a chair in the middle of the cement porch

I shrink so much I feel like nothing

He walks around the chair and I wonder if it is a little like dancing

I want to ask

Are we dancing Daddy?

Is this the waltz?

How long have we been doing this dance?

The people have gone home

The violins have stopped

The lights are long gone

But he still dances around me 

Scattering his hate like little rose buds

I contemplate how long this music can go on for

I notice a dry leaf decaying on the ground

He asks if I am on the same level as him

He is asking if I am as good as him

I almost want to laugh

I want to say I am as good as you have made me

I am as much a reflection of you as I am the dead leaf for we are all dying

I am standing and dancing with him now

The leaves are screaming and we are all a dizzying masterpiece of destruction

I want to say Daddy, how did you get so broken that you decided to break me too

But I say nothing

Years later I remember the lessons he gave me

Daddy taught me how to cry and now I sob

Daddy taught me how to hate and I am full of resentment

Daddy taught me to be angry and I cannot stop screaming

Daddy taught me how to kiss death and the waltz never ends and I never come up for air

I am still dancing in this twilight hour

My feet are so tired and my arms so weak from keeping up the disguise

I hear Daddy in the corner telling me to keep going

He is laughing and boasting of how proud he is

How proud of me for keeping his secrets

I am tired of this dirty nothingness

I am so tired

I stop and turn to him 

Father

I worshipped you

I would have done anything to feel like you heard me

I gave you the purest form of love I had

How beautiful of me

Do you hear the audience clapping for my dance?

I did this

These roses scattered on my stage are proof of my efforts

I lived in a world more real than you could have imagined

I saved myself

I am not scared of you anymore

I don’t stay up all night wondering if you will die blaming me for your own hand

I am so sad for you

I know

I know what happened to you and I am sorry

It isn’t alright that you did it to me

Once you told me this story of when you were five

How you gazed out at the African horizon for hours

Watching the clouds drift by

I did the same thing in our backyard

How much our paths were the same yet how much they have diverted

Come count the clouds with me before I leave you

Years later I will look at the sky

The sky that looked at you

And I will remember