Marrow

by Tarryn Fisher

My mother is beautiful in the same way that a storm is beautiful. She is wild and destructive, and in the middle of her fury you feel her God given right to destroy.

I always thought her faith was flimsy—like paper—useful until you get it wet.

“I don’t want a bike,” I say. What I want is my mother.

I want her back. I want to know what changed her so that I have somewhere to lay my blame. If there was a cause, I could stop blaming myself. I trace my memories, over and over, searching for the root—

She’s slowly dying, and I’m not sure she knows it.

Somewhere in between her smelling like the outdoors, and her smelling like an ashtray, I stopped wanting to be her.

from my experience, the only things children get in this neighborhood are drunk parents and partially full stomachs. You’re alive, you’ll survive. That’s what my mother used to tell me.

My mother doesn’t have to say anything to punish me. She’s not verbally abusive. She turns back around and shuts her door. The message is clear. I disgust her.

I don’t ask for one, because I’ve been taught to believe it’s wrong to ask for things. You suffer quietly so no one has the right to call you a pussy.

“The Bone is in our marrow. It’s complacency and fear handed down from generation to generation.”

I want my words to be what he’s thirsty for.

“I’ll save you, if you save me.”

Sadness is an emotion you can trust. It is stronger than all of the other emotions. It makes happiness look fickle and untrustworthy. It pervades, lasts longer, and replaces the good feelings with such an eloquent ease you don’t even feel the shift until you are suddenly wrapped in its chains.

Darkness is all I’ll ever know; maybe the key is to make poetry out of it.

There is no comfort for the broken.

Dreams are plans; they get your heart moving, and once your heart gets moving, your brain will follow.”

I’ve never. And it’s my own fault. The things that we never do because someone makes us fearful of them, or makes us believe we don’t deserve them. I want to do all my nevers—alone or with someone who matters. I don’t care. I just want to live.

they are so broken they don’t even know that most of what they do reflects that brokenness.

Pain makes humans selfish. Blocked off. Focused inward instead of outward.

Weak people let their pain choke them to a slow, emotional death. Strong people use that pain, Margo. They use it as fuel.”

“You have to be willing to be happy. Despite the mess of your life—just accept what’s happened, throw away your ideals, and create a new map of happiness to follow.”

I hate that nothing can be done about the suffering of children, and that most of the world blocks out their suffering to cope with their own inability to help. The few who carry the burden, like social workers and teachers, become weary, burning out after only a few short years, forced to carry the weight that should be shared by a society. Children are vastly overlooked. Their importance underestimated by their size.

people will ignore every warning sign when blinded by their thirst for something. It’s better to not be thirsty.

Sometimes, by saving someone else, you save yourself a little as well. By loving someone else and expecting nothing in return, we learn to love ourselves and expect nothing in return. Perhaps it is the simple act of doing for others that makes us feel more valuable in our own skin. I want to implore you not to hurt yourselves. Not to cut your skin, or swallow pills, or drink to drown pain. Not to hand yourselves over so easily to men for validation. Stop feeling useless and worthless. Stop drowning in regret. Stop listening to the persistent voice of your past failures. You were that child once, who Margo would have killed for. Fight for yourselves. You have a right to live, and to live well. You’ll inherit flaws; you’ll develop new ones. And that’s okay. Wear them, own them, use them to survive. Don’t kill others; don’t kill yourselves. Be bold about your right to be loved. And most importantly, don’t be ashamed of where you’ve come from, or the mistakes you’ve made. In blindness, love will exhume you.