Insouciance

Where is it I watched myself from

those times

I said no, then followed you along anyway.

Those times

I could not find my voice, my legs, my fists-

to scream, to run away, to swing with a fury.

That purple glade, that cold foreign muck that seeped my bones

that kept me compliant,

that something invisible that held me firmly

when everything

in me said this is wrong and I don't know

and stop stop stop.

I felt it under my skin, like an oncoming fever,

like a knife severing

surface from substance.

How like you and everyone else

to watch my sideshow

and think, how like her,

without real thought or action

or interest in my opinion, just

Come along little girl, old standby, old lady, dear ghost.

And even now, I would be that ghost among the towering trees

along the quiet path, between the flowers,

following words and my own

thoughts

without a thought to

any of you.