when i was growing up

as a little girl

i had the privledge of walking around

running around

my neighborhood barefoot

without fear of stepping on broken glass

a newly established suburban area

on the outskirts of big san antone

as i grew

i began to realize

through much discomfort

i am who i hate to be

i didn't choose it

but i see it

others can't

it's too close

the disconnection is all too thickly lain

i hate to see overdevelopment of native land

the clearing of it before it has even been bought

the poorly established infrastructure

that cracks within 50 years

but by then the takers have moved on to a new city

just to take everything

run it down

rebuild it worse

and call it their own

as long as they can make a buck

i wish more of those people

felt the shame

i was conditioned to

simply for existing

as a 

disabled

non-binary

queer

neurodivergent

goofy

whimsical

multidimensional

being

but alas

i grew up

as a

little white mormon girl

in south texas

that's all they saw

they only value what they think they can control

and for little girls

control usually means rape

to think that is where it ends for us

is as insane as it is naive

children experience to the fullest of what is

including pain

then confusion

as they grow

the doom that is waking each morning storms in the mind like an electric current

buzzing buzzing buzzing

you begin to use all your strength not to live

but to stop yourself from banging your head on the wall

the gound

anything to stop the sounds

of the memories

that somehow repeated themselves

with every man you met

you ask your therapist

'how did they find me?

how could i not have known?'

she looks you up and down

and says

'they can just pick a person

a certain type of person

who's easily led

easy to manipulate

it all has to do with boundaries

and resilience

some people have some

others get ptsd

like you'

i shake with anger as i see through

what we all must somehow live through

for no reason

this could all be easier

if love meant more than money

white people wouldn't be called fools

for trekking barefoot

there would be a solumn understanding

that the outdoors for white people

and the outdoors for people of color

tend to mean vastly different things

unless you are to grow up in a white neighborhood

like i did

outside would be a lot more dangerous

a lot more unkept

though a lot more used

in the pain can be forgot

it never had to be this way

it was never supposed to be this way

our purpose as people

is

to love ourselves

and steward each other

understand we are all earthlings 

with a loving mother

may fathers teach their daughters boundaries

rather than how to sit still in uncomfortability

may therapists stop blaming victims

for being hurt

obviously it happened because it was not expected

may we all name our oppressors and abusers

and allow ourselves to see the ugly in our own hearts

so we may let light in

and grow