My Secret, Didja Get It?
I’ve been a fan of the PostSecret blog since its inception. In case you’ve never visited the site, here’s a link: http://postsecret.com/. New postcards are posted every Sunday morning and I visit the site, faithfully, to read the secrets. About a year ago, I wrote my own secret and mailed it in. It was never posted to the site. I’ve posted it here as well as a poem to go along with it.
Waiting in Vain
I’ve grown accustomed
to being the lady in waiting.
The role of a lifetime. Always
waiting in vain, while bowing
my head in shame. Thinking,
always thinking, I’ve changed
the course of the crooked path
laid out for me to travel, only
to find the more things change,
the more they remain the same.
And I wait.
You’ll never catch me
waiting in the same spot as before;
that’s the one thing that always
keeps changing. But I’ll always be
that little girl who watches from
the shadows, the broken train
of men who traipsed through our
living room to the bedroom, wiping
their trashy ass feet across my mother’s
heart and face. Her tears drowning in
the bottom of a glass. Her pain too
palpable for me to get pass. Always
looking for a way out, a way to move
past a life that seems destined not to
last or amount to anything worth living.
And I wait.
That little girl
trembling in the dark corners of
my heart is ravenous for a love, but
she just spends all her time waiting.
I see her head pressed against the pane
of the rickety screen door, the door that
never could keep out all the hurt. Still
her eyes shine with innocent hope.
She’s hopeful and her hope causes me
to cry, for how can I tell her nothing will
ever change for her? That she’ll always be the
fucking lady in waiting. Waiting for
shit to change. It never will though.
She’s waiting in vain.
And I wait.
People will blame her,
point the finger of shame,
tell her there’s no real power
in the name she’s inherited. The
name she was called by her mother
or by all of her past lovers. (There has
to be another name for them cause
none of them ever really loved her.
Did they?) You have the power to
change they tell her with an insane
haughtiness. And like the scared
little girl she is, she cowers in the
corner wishing for change ‘cuz
she’s tired of staying the same.
And I wait.
The plan seemed
reasonable, a simple exchange
of her pain for mine. I would
go to that little girl and lift her
up in my arms. When I did pick
her up and hold her close, all
I did was cry though. Her sadness
seeped into me and I wanted to
die because I knew I wouldn’t
be able to change things for her.
No matter how I tried to convince
her she wasn’t the blame, she
stayed the same. Just a little
sad girl waiting in vain. Hoping
things will change. Just waiting
in vain.
Peace & Love,
Rosalind
