Regret

Regret

Regret pedaled faster faster
screaming Look father, look father no hands yet!
Remember the opium dream
and the way drugs taught me to be mean.
You address me always like you’re regressing me,
and it just makes me remember that
strangers could undress me better.
You read me like I’m an unopened letter
that has sat silently on your coffee table for eighteen years.
Remember when, you met me you called me baby,
and I was the one you waited so long for.
Remember I told you once I leave the light on at night cause I’m scared stupid
and you turn it out every night,
infantalizing me and demonizing me.
Remember, when you said in sickness and in health?
Remember, how when you fell sick and did’t come out of bed for days
I begged you in the darkness, of which I am afraid of,
to say something, say anything to me?
Remember, it was you who always rolled over
leaving me to guess thoughts tied to your crying sounds.
Remember, when you were this person who believed you were worth being happy?
I do.
I remember pedaling faster and faster without hands.
I remember my dad saying, “you’re bound to fall riding that way, boy, one day,”
but he let me,
and I remember when my skinned knees and stitched up lip
taught me a thing or two about letting go.
Maybe so….
I remember not wanting to let that happen to you and me,
and it feels like I’m back on that bike
with no hands trying not to be scared of what I already know.
Remember that, baby,
how I felt you were worth a couple bruises and broken dreams.
Remember that,
next time you choose

to say everything
by say nothing to me.