Automaton

The secrets
 of what you
  remember
   (or don't)
     weigh heavily upon your skin.
They're written
 on the lines and pores
  of your outline.
     Shaped into
an automaton
  blindly reaching
   because it's optical sockets
     don't see what
  real boys do.
But it was never wooden,
 never alive, never planted
  in a garden, nourished
   by rain and dirt and air.
Never alive.
An automaton is empty,
lives because
                       it's moving.
Transmission fluid and grease,
         never realizing
(except for what audio input,
     message received)
            it is
nothing.

empty


           A blank slate, an unfilled box,
a mindless, numb, piece of machinery.
Existing,
            just.
                  to.
                       exist.

This Exclusive Club

My brother doesn't want to be 'exclusionary'
     he seems earnest, if a bit of an asshole
  I am shocked to discover
     we grew up in the same house.
how did he escape
        unscathed?

he stands up for his
       disenfranchised parents
                 and older brother.
I want to ask him,
    what about his sisters?

I don't have the words
     to explain to him,
            to teach him the feeling
 of abject failure
           of being marooned in a sea of people
who should love you, should moor you,
        who should have told you, at some point,
'you aren't what your mother says
    you are. You aren't worthless,
                aren't stupid, you don't
need
           something to cry
           about.
you can just,
              cry.'


I want to ask him
'Are you going to leave
    Your Daughter alone
     with him?'
I remain mute,
    stubbornly silent,
because all those things
   i know.
I'll break in half,
    and vomit everything
all those things i know
(or don't know)
i know
(or don't know)
onto him.