She Deserved Better
I imagine a world for my daughter that never existed.
I fantasize about a childhood for her that didn't have pain, at such a young age.
A world where her father had been a better man.
In my mind, I erase the days he took her to his mistress when she was five, convincing her to lie, and I pretend, instead, he took her to the park and pushed her on the swings. The nights when he was out drinking and running in the streets, never happened because he was at home with her, helping to pick out her pajamas and her favorite stuffed animal, and reading her stories until she fell asleep in his arms, feeling safe and loved.
The times when he taught her love comes with a price, become erased and replaced with a loving father teaching her that his love is unconditional, that she is beautiful, and valued, and enough just by being who she is.
I replace his cold, harsh words with warmth, his womanizing ways with empowerment, his lies with truth.
The hidden bottles, the smell of liquor on his breath, the seething hatred and contempt,
vanish as quickly as his memory after a long night at the bar.
I fantasize he chooses to prioritize her, over everything else,
days when she would sit and wait to see his car arrive outside end with him arriving on time, sober and of sound-mind. Excuses and blame become lessons in accountability, responsibility, and growth.
He calls her and asks about her day,
He shows up at her games,
He takes care of her if she is sick,
He protects her from harm against all else.
I see what he could have been, what she deserved. If only I had one wish upon a star, I'd rewrite the story to fill in the broken pieces of her heart.
You knew me as a Pansy
he was in the circus. smarter than a pressed suit, but in baggy cargo shorts.
my toxic trait? possessing the personality of a low-fat snack.
he got struck by lighting, could see my aura. the death of an electric current never felt so exquisitely personal.
walking to feel something. my first and only manic episode. sometimes we must cry on our dorm room floors, lights dimming and glowing orange.
that was my aura. like benzodiazepines withdrawal, I craved the emotionally unavailable receptors of fate.
I wished for romantic Facebook relationship status updates. the magnitude of which can’t be measured because it’s only the internet.
I wander in disease. I wish neurons contained the multitudes that Whitman promised us. psychology is purely metaphorical.
he’s now thirty-two. I wonder if my aura still catches his eye. I wish for a different color, new and not bruised.
freedom is midnight quiet in a planter box. may I end up somewhere similar. in the dirt of my ancestors. I wish for my memory of him to be buried where the lightning hit.
starlight, star bright first star I see tonight -
I wish I may, I wish I might, have this wish I wish tonight.
Social stains
I
Like cigarettes cause cancer
and burn your lungs, we disintegrate
when presented with our favorite vice.
A cancer and a plea for life combined.
II
My stains have coated
hospital gowns. It’s funny how much
your place in people’s minds
matters so much.
III
A facial tic that
made her powerful.
Something she couldn’t
control
A butterfly escaping
the cage.
IV
The people in
psychiatric wards
haven’t given up
they’ve
talked to ghosts
heard voices
been beaten
down by expectations
V
our past is
a canvas
splattered with
stains
a work of art
we never asked
to be displayed
Aflame
Fire.
If I had to describe life it would be the color of fire.
Because really, don’t we all have that little flame inside of us, waiting to go ablaze?
Remember when you were young, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, alight with that electric confidence of youth, the world at your feet?
Or the first time you fell in love. That pink kiss. The blush in your cheeks. That giddy feeling, of embers burning, crackling, deep in your chest, threatening to burst.
How about the last time you burned with secret shame, or smoldered in anger, or cried so hard your eyes turned crimson? Or the time you shone, so bright, at your peak, after you worked so hard to get there, knowing that in the doleful years that follow, there might be loss, the slow decline of a flame dying.
Yes, if I had to describe life as a color, it would be fire. Wouldn’t you?
My head is so full of plans that it seems aflame. ~ Marie Curie
Expiry Date
My name is Harper and in six months I am going to die.
I know this because I paid for the privilege. You can do testing for anything nowadays, and apparently your expiration date is one of them.
I had money to spare, I was bored, and yes, I foolishly thought the test would tell me some distant faraway age like eighty-two or maybe even one hundred and two. When I found out my expiry date was in six months, I began to have a really, really bad case of buyer’s remorse.
I went through quite a lengthy denial period, where I thought I could go through the rest of my life pretending that if I just do things exactly the same way and not change anything I would conveniently forget and everything would be fine and dandy. (This was by far my favorite coping mechanism. But it didn’t last. Eventually my anxiety bubbled up and exploded like a shaken champagne bottle.)
Next came an obsessive, defiant, planning phase. Everyday I would think of elaborate plans to avoid death like I could somehow scheme my way out of it. I mean, theoretically, it seems doable. Plane crash? Don’t go on a plane. Car accident? Just stay home all week. Heck, heart attack? Pop three baby aspirins and hang out in the hospital lobby, right next to the crash cart ready to wave a big sign that says “I’m having a heart attack.” Unfortunately the test didn’t provide the cause of death, just the exact time, so I couldn’t really plan in specifics.
Eventually all the planning became incredibly exhausting and I settled into a kind of defeated acceptance. My plan was still not to actively put myself in a situation where I could die, I was not quite ready to submit to my annihilation, but if I somehow still find myself in that situation anyway, I figured I should really work on trying to be okay with that.
So then I commenced on a hedonistic three months where I blew half of my life savings and did literally anything I could think of. I ziplined through the forests of Peru, skydived over the French countryside, drank the best wines and indulged in rich Italian food, snorkeled off the shores of Bali, shopped with abandon while perusing the streets of Tokyo, London, Dubai…
You get the idea.
The most pathetic part of this whole thing was that I didn’t have a family to spend my last few days with. Or close friends, really. My impending death would not be filled with earnest mourning and last minute tearful proclamations of love and reminiscing. Oh sure, my funeral would be packed, but nobody would miss me, not really. As an orphaned twenty-two year old who inherited too much money at an early age, not only was I kind of an entitled asshole, I also haven’t really lived yet. I haven’t fallen in love or had kids, wrote that great American novel, won a Pulitzer, or experienced any of that syrupy sweet stuff life is supposedly made of.
Anyway, that’s why I’m hanging out in the hospice ward.
My friend here is Lucas. He is twenty-nine and has end stage heart failure from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. He described it as his heart being too big - literally but I suspect it's also an accurate description of him figuratively. I befriended him five months ago when I found out I was going to die. And no, surprisingly, he does not have any wisdom to impart about acceptance and healing and the meaning of life. He is very not okay with his young, awesome life being cut short, thank you very much.
He did have some useful information for me though.
“It’s quite experimental.” Lucas warned in an ominous tone.
“Obviously.”
“They usually only accept terminal patients… you know, because of the ethical issues.” He eyed me warily. “But in your case, they made an exception.”
He was adorable. He said that last line like a late night infomercial. Or maybe a used car salesman.
“This is not some elaborate black market scam to harvest my organs, is it?” I raise an eyebrow at him. “I mean, no offense, but you look like you could use a new heart.”
Lucas had to grab his oxygen mask after laughing so hard at that one. The nurse at the station gave me a dirty look.
After Lucas recovered he looked me in the eye. “How much do you have left?”
“Time? Or money?” I joked. The look on his face was not amused. I cleared my throat. “One month. And as you know, money is not an object.”
“Well, one month can give you… at least eighty years in virtual time. So pretty much a whole lifetime, if you decide on it.” Lucas shrugged. “Once you jack in though, there’s no going back. Your clock will end as scheduled and that’s the only way out. Also, it’s totally immersive, so you won’t even know you’re in virtual. It will be like… you’re in a dream but you don’t know you’re in a dream.”
“So I would really believe everything was real? Like I would grow up to be ninety years old and I would actually think I lived all those years even though really it will only be one month?”
“Mostly, yes.”
“How many of the other people will be real?”
“Most will be computer generated. You might meet some real ones, if they are in the same time dilation settings as you. There are very few people with the resources for a whole month, you know. Most people can only afford one day.”
“So there’s a chance that I will marry a program?” I furrowed my brows. “And then if we have kids, they will also be programs?”
Lucas cocked an eyebrow. “There’s a high chance, statistically. Like I said, there’s only a few real participants at any given time. Not that it would matter to you, you won’t know the difference.”
I thought about this. Would it really bother me if I didn’t know? I bet my computer generated kids would be adorable.
His expression suddenly turned serious. “There’s something else. It’s rare, but there are a few cases of people noticing little things not quite right and they become increasingly convinced they’re in a simulation. Which of course is true, but when you’re jacked in and you’re not completely sure if you’re crazy or just being paranoid, it can be terrifying. They call it Simulation Induced Paranoia, or SIP.” He paused. “Participants become really…. distressed.”
I chewed on this for a second. “I still want to do it.”
He looked surprised. “Really?”
“I really don’t have anything to lose.” I replied nonchalantly, like I just decided on a dinner entree. I should probably be alarmed that I was acting so cavalier. Lucas wasn’t exactly giving a stellar sales pitch. Then again, it was true, I really had nothing left to lose. I’ve done what I could with my twenty-two years. Might as well have another lifetime to try again.
Lucas stared at me for a moment then sighed. “That’s the thing. The longer you’re in virtual, the higher the chance you might experience SIP. Remember, Harper, a month is a lifetime. The chances are very low of course - less than 1%, the virtual worlds are very meticulously programmed after all. But if you experience SIP, there’s no cure, no safe word, you’re stuck until your clock runs out.”
“I already decided.” I said resolutely. Once I’ve made up my mind on something I was usually unshakable. It was one of my many flaws. “In fact, let’s do it tonight. I want to get my whole lifetime, not a year less.”
—
Everything was too bright, the sounds too loud. I wanted to scream but I couldn’t. Jacking in was a very jarring process, it felt as if all my neurons were firing up all at once. Somehow I felt tremendous pain and the heights of delirious ecstasy simultaneously. Like I was feeling every possible thing all at the same time. There was a terrifying moment when everything went black, and for what felt like an eternity but was probably only a few seconds, I truly wholeheartedly believed I was actively dying.
Maybe I was supposed to die on the table during the procedure. Or maybe I really did unwittingly offer to have my organs harvested for the black market. Damn it, I probably caused my own death in my extreme efforts to avoid it...
I blinked twice. The room slowly came into focus.
“Hey, sleeping beauty.” A familiar voice.
It was Lucas. But also, it was not Lucas. He did not have his portable oxygen tank close by. His lips did not have their usual bluish tint. He looked… healthy.
Everything came back to me at once.
“Oh shit, Lucas. That was nuts.” I shook my head, clearing the cobwebs. “That felt too real. I really felt like I was in there for twenty-two years.” I checked my watch. I’ve only been in Virtual for twenty-two minutes.
He chuckled, swiveling back and forth on the expensive office chair I bought him for Christmas last year. My boyfriend never could sit still. “You’re a champ, Harper, you were the one who wanted to push the time dilation to a year per minute. I was worried pushing it that far would compromise the world building, but your mind was amazing at meeting the program halfway to fill in the gaps. You made yourself a rich orphan, really? Money is no object? Hah!”
I disconnected my neurojack from the surgically implanted access port behind my right ear. That rich orphan stuff was my subconscious free at the wheel. I didn’t intentionally decide on it. I turned back to Lucas. “Why did you add all that stuff about Virtual in there, and SIP? Don’t you think that was a little too… meta?”
Lucas suddenly broke into that grin that melted my heart so many years ago when we met during undergrad at MIT. “Well, since you wanted to put the expiry dates into the program so people would know how much time they had left, I thought, what the heck, why not make it interesting? Why not make a virtual game in Virtual?”
I was not amused. Lucas had a penchant for bloated code and unnecessary side doors. Also, for not telling me about an adjustment until after he has done it. “That’s messed up. You should have run that by me. The expiry date was a suggestion from the beta testers and we all agreed on it. We didn’t agree on putting the game into the Virtual Universe as a side door..” I paused. “Also, what if I didn’t jack in? I would have died in a car accident or something?”
Lucas turned back to his computer and typed a few lines of code. “I had carbon monoxide poisoning ready to go, but I was prepared to improvise. And anyway, I didn’t actually think you would gravitate towards the game during the beta test, I just put it in there as an Easter egg of sorts. I figured most clients would only think about jacking in when they were close to their expiry dates, if they do at all. But on second thought, maybe I should take it out of the programming, it’s too much work to keep up.”
I jumped off the table and stretched my legs. My entire body felt stiff like I haven’t used it for months. “Yea, take it out. You’ll have enough work as it is when we start accepting our first commercial clients next week. We have four people scheduled on our first day which I already think is too much.”
“We’ll be fine.” Lucas was now typing more purposefully. “That reminds me, I need to finish debugging this before Monday. Do you mind picking up dinner?”
“Sure.. from that new Thai place again?”
“Sounds good.”
I smiled as I gave Lucas a quick peck on the cheek before I grabbed my purse to pick up the take out. Everything was going well for our start up. It was hard to believe that only two years ago Lucas and I were broke PhD dropouts who took a leap of faith building Virtual from our one bedroom Boston apartment. And now… well, let’s just say our first official month in business is projected to generate six figures in profits even after subtracting overhead. Mid six figures. And as soon as we open up our second and third facilities the growth would be exponential.
To top it all off, I was pretty sure Lucas was planning on proposing to me next week on my birthday. I saw a charge from some jewelry company on his credit card statement while I was doing some filing last month. Judging from the amount, it could only be an engagement ring. Lucas never would have spent that much on a piece of jewelry otherwise.
I sauntered out of the elevator from our high rise office with a pep in my step. The weather outside was just the right amount of sunny. Even the Boston air didn’t feel as suffocatingly polluted. Yes, everything was going well. Perfect, even. I eyed a meticulously trimmed bush suspiciously as I walked by. Maybe too perfect.
I felt a sudden stab of panic. The smile dissipated from my face.
Oh no.
Born’n ’93 ~
I see them looking back
Green eyes, mine
A forehead scar from Nanny's
Marble coffee table
When I was three
Left-side eye dimple
From when I got bit by a dog
Just before I turned five
Hair a long an' tangled mess
Flyaways cast me frazzled -
Or haywire
But my toothy chin grin
Looks like it did back
When I was eighty-pounds stouter
And I'm proud to note that my
Thinklines and laughlines
Are the clearest sign of aging
It's good look me straight in the eye
And ask how's this?
-----
@bykaileyann
#reflection #freeverse #poetry #spokenword
Summoning of The Wild
The great outdoor mystics call us
hiding behind the tall trees, and mincing around
in the everglades...
They want us out,
out with the bees!...
They want us living where there’s light and life!...
They want us fucking, cocks thrusting in and out of
sputtering velvet wet flowers with blushing red
petals that yearn to be entered again and again...
Long legs spreading deliciously while we part them ever further
Breasts bouncing and aflutter
while fingers dig into the flesh, pushing the legs
even higher into the air then imagined,
over the heads of our pressed and contorted loved ones...
They want our orgasms to be ecstatic, and our screams to reach
the highest heavens as the thrusting gathers momentum, and steam,
and our sweaty brows melt together...
The great outdoor mystics want us out there,
living it up...
They want fingers plunged into every orifice as tongues do the tango
under a banana tree...
They want a white jettisom of cum to blast from our cocks and paint the bark and branches behind us, soaking our partners ’til their fingers and lips are dripping and their bodies are quivering in a wasted heap, still joined
by the legs of our lovers...
The great outdoor mystics beg
for another encore
as they serendipitously hide from view...
These little devil fairies,
always knowing just where to hide,
and keep themselves clean from all the
unchained habits
of humankind,
though their sure to gain inspiration
which helps them paint the lush and fertile
nature scene
with flying squirrels, and dashing foxes
flashing by under the majestic cranes
that circle overhead...
It all sticks heavy in their minds,
as they draw us lovers
out and drive us to the brink...
Playing passion, and driving our
natural instinct
to magical and exciting conclusions...
©
4/8/21
Bunny Villaire
