Moving Day

It's Moving Day!

Wow... while that really should be the title of a new poem, it is not yet. I am just announcing that I have moved all my material from this blog to a new blog titled Victoria's Closet. Come check it out and give me a little feedback to let me know what you think. See you there!

http://victoriasclosetpoetry.blogspot.com

Victoria is my Name

I was born Victoria Lee Stewart in January
In a small retirement community a full week into the new year
Yet I was the New Years baby

I once asked my mother who I was named for
A queen perhaps, or a far away city?
"No" she said, "I just thought the name is beautiful- you are beautiful"

But she didn't call me that beautiful name, instead she called me Vickie
She spelled it in a different way then most
with the "ie" on the end instead of a "y"
Nobody ever got it right

It rhymed with all manner of unpleasant names
Which I suffered throughout elementary school

Vickie, Dickie, Sicky, lickie, Mickie, picky... icky

Finally I had the chance to re-brand myself
A move to a new state when I was nearly 12
Now I was Tori...
No longer gangly, and awkward, with buck teeth, and stick out ears
I was tan and tall and pretty and I was "The girl from California"

And Tori didn't rhyme with anything gross

The move was no good for a girl with no self-esteem however, instead it proved to be a disaster that set me on a path of self loathing and self destruction

Suddenly attractive to boys and with out compass or sanctuary
I became victim to the whim and desires of others
Mississippi holds no fond memories for me
I cringe at the thought of meeting someone who knew me then

Leaving Mississippi behind did not remove its shadow from my heart
The shadow cold and lonely followed me thru Arkansas, Okinawa, New York, Connecticut and back to Arkansas again and Wisconsin and Florida and Arkansas again, and again to Arkansas

The dark times were dismal with this shadow overhead, no light could penetrate. Anguished nights spent screaming into the dark,
Cicadas roar covered the sound with no purchase found in those days

Years passed until I finally made another move
To a new place inside myself.
I decided to grow into me
I know it sounds too simple but that was just what I did
I left behind the old shadow, the shame and solitude
I changed from the inside out, my food, my outlook
I nourished myself in ways that have nothing to do with my address

I am Victoria now and forever
I am beautiful and free

Three

The Bible speaks of discernment
To hear and understand, but to think as well
Not to follow blindly but to study
To know and to lead

There are three

Three men who caused the pain
Three of offspring to suffer

There are three

Three faces of man to make it right
Three of offspring to live

From the day of Adams sin
His death began and it spread
To suffer in the sweat of his face
To eat the fruit of his war

To the resurrection of Christ
His death repaid and he reigns
To suffer his Kingly throne
To witness the wages of sin

There are three

Three lives of the children
Who eat the lies
Three children to suffer

There are three

A man we await
Who was once and forever
Who has left but not gone

There is one
A love to suffer
A truth to tell and understand
One truth
Discerned

Rembrandt http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/gutenberg.org

Proverbs 8:1

Is not wisdom calling out? Is not discernment raising its voice?

The Purple Cigarette Case

As I walked into the cabin up on the Missouri mountain that first time, my ears still buzzing from the shock of learning about Ramona, the very first thing I laid eyes on was a purple cigarette case lying on the rustic wood coffee table. I took in the wood paneled walls, the striped earthtone olefin sofa set and briefly noticed the scent of the place. Musty, stale smoke, some kind of sour whiskey or beer... but my eyes kept going back to that cigarette case. I hadn't seen that case in a few years but I recognized it immediately. It was Ramona's case. I had this hysterical thought that they were wrong, they had to be wrong! Ramona was obviously just in the other room... there was her cigarette case right there on the coffee table after all. Oh and look here is her purse on the floor beside the couch.

I got up and wandered around a bit. Not my house but it didn't seem to matter. Ramona's mom, Nan and her cousin I had never met; CJ and... Ashley! Oh my god little Ashley...  with those big round eyes just like her mother...were there too, they were talking, everyone seemed excited and lost all at the same time and I just couldn't focus on them no matter how hard I tried. The house was small. Only 2 bedrooms. It was furnished like it had always been there. The furnishings and decorations placed by some elders in the family years ago and left to be attended by whomever happened to currently possess the house. But there... and there. A cigarette case, a purse, a calendar on the wall.  A doll on the floor of the bedroom, a sweater... my god that was my sweater! I had forgotten she had taken it so long ago. Notes scrawled and stuck to the refrigerator under a magnet. Little pieces of Ramona all around me. Somehow I knew they were her things even if I hadn't seen them in years or ever before. I could feel Ramona in every room. They weren't her rooms she had only been there what a month? Two? But she was there now big as life just the same. Any second she would walk through the door and laugh at all of us being so silly; crying and carrying on.

I sat on the couch and tried to focus on Ashley. Six years old, an orphan so young! My mind drifted again to a letter Ramona had written to me just a few years ago. Ashley must have been a baby then. She reminded me of her health. She had become a diabetic so young, at the cusp of her years of teen angst. She rebelled against her disease as hard as any teen ever did against parental rule. She had smoked cigarettes and weed and popped pills, drank and partied like she was fulfilling her destiny to die. They had told her she would not live to see 21 years old. But she was 21 when Ashley was born. The years of self abuse had taken their toll but there she was pregnant and hopeful for the future. She had written to me and begged me to take Ashley if she should die.

We were kids, she and I; 19 and 21 years old. What did we know about wills, lawyers and custody agreements? Yet there was Ashley before me. An orphan.
Reflecting on the events of the day, I thought about how crazy that I should be sitting here at all right now. That Ramona should be gone and I am here.  We had planned the trip haphazardly as we usually did things. My marriage crumbling, Ramona had run from hers and was now hiding in the mountain cabin with her cousin.

We had spoken on the phone several times since she had left Orville. She kept telling me, "These people have MONEY!" She had told me all about impromptu helicopter flights to the gulf for shrimp, and obscene money spent on booze and barbecue and everything under the sun.

"They work in oil, you know, THAT'S where the money is," she had said.

Looking around it didn't seem like they had money. Land yes, they had land. The cabin sat on I don't even know how many hundred acres. She had wanted to buy me a plane ticket to visit; hash it all out. Somehow I was sure that my visit would result in my divorce.

I had rushed to the airport in Hartford, Connecticut this morning; an hour drive from Groton where I lived with my husband, Aaron and three kids. unable to find my address book with the new phone number at the cabin. I wasn't able to call to verify our plans for several days before the trip. I was worried but ultimately I trusted her to know my flight information. She had bought the ticket afterall. In retrospect it seemed odd to me that she hadn't called me... but then I was under so much stress at home myself, and really Ramona was like that. How many times had we gone 6 months or more without talking at all only to have the phone ring at 3 am and there she'd be,

"Girl, I know you have a good margarita recipe, right?"

We never skipped a beat, every conversation left off was picked up months or years down the road as easy as if we were never apart.

When I had stepped off the plane into the terminal I was only slightly surprised not to see her at the gate. As I waited for my baggage at the carousel I wasn't really even concerned. I carried my bags to the payphone in the center of the airport and fussed around in my purse for a phone card or cash, I don't remember anymore in the end I think I just dialled collect.
When Aaron answered the phone I asked him if he'd finally found my address book.  Ramona wasn't here.

"Are you sitting down?" He asked me ignoring my inquiry.

"Uh... no, Aaron I'm standing at a payphone in the middle of the airport," I retorted in annoyance.

Then came the back and forth... god he could be like a dog with a bone! Telling me over and over to sit down because he has bad news.,. I was becoming more and more irritated with him as a sneaking dread began to come over me and I was suddenly positive that he was going to tell me that my mother was dead
when suddenly I noticed that Nan... Ramona's mom? Nan was walking toward me.

"Why is Nan here? Nan lives in Arkansas, this is Missouri..." my thoughts were swirling as I vaguely heard Aaron finally say,

"Ramona passed away last night."

"What did you say? Why did you say that?" I was suddenly furious! If he had been standing in front of me I would have punched him right in the face.
Then I saw Ashley trailing behind Nan and I knew it was true.

I dropped the phone and we hugged each other so tight right in the middle of the airport and I was screaming and crying. I think she was too. Ashley clutched at our legs. All the years that she had felt like enemy mom, vanished and she was holding me up. My legs quivered under me and I don't know how I didn't fall. I don't remember how we got to the car. I don't know how we did it without losing my luggage. All I really remember now is the long drive in the backseat, with Ashley leaning over on my lap and then walking into the cabin and seeing that purple cigarette case.

That afternoon we drove back to Jacksonville, Arkansas to Nan's home and the place where Ramona and I had become friends in high school. I spent my two week vacation helping to plan my best friend's funeral. I was grateful to be there, if she hadn't bought me that ticket I wouldn't have been able to get there. That was in 1995. I miss Ramona. Everyday.

Uncondtional Love

I wanted to tell you
What I've learned about
Unconditional Love

Right from the start
I knew that he never had it
Not until he met me

For so many years
I loved that man
I begged him to see
I was giving him everything
He ever asked for
Ever dreamed of
Everything he always wanted
He couldn't see it

I thought - I knew
That we would get thru it
That any minute he would
He would open his eyes and see me
And it would all be worth
The pain, the tears
The bruises
We would both finally have
What we always wanted

I was willing to bear it all
To have unconditional love
And to give unconditional love

Eventually, it all fell apart
The choices weren't mine to make anymore
Still I knew - if I had faith
and I kept on loving
That one day it would all be worth it

What I didn't know was that one day
My baby girl would be 5 foot something
And she would stand and look me in the eye
and say
"I wish you would die"
I didn't know that she could never appreciate
The sacrifices I had made for her, for her brother
For her sisters

I didn't know three angels would
Shut the door to heaven from me
And open their mouths to drench me with
Retribution

I didn't know my firstborn
Would turn her hate on herself
I didn't know that I would be
Forever locked in the hell I made

Because I had loved unconditionally

In the end he never loved me.
Love is a verb you see
And the verb he held in his heart for me was hate
He hated me with his words, with his hands

H edidn't know how to love me
Or anyone else
And he never cared to learn

In the end it was never worth it
Not worth my pain, my tears
Not worth my bruises
Certainly never worth my babies

And these will never learn this lesson
Because I never taught it to them

And now I see her trying to love that way
My baby girl
Giving away too much of herself
To a boy who will never open his eyes and see her.
And she doesn't yet know
And you tell her but she doesn't care

It was never worth it
It will never be worth it

College Scholarship Essay 2015

It has taken me 45 years of living to finally figure out who I am. As a troubled teenager I had no dreams other than to leave my mother’s home. Teenage pregnancy and marriage at 17 achieved that goal. At that point all my own dreams had to take a back seat to motherhood, and surviving the situations brought on by my choices. Years of domestic abuse and self-abuse coupled with a car accident in 1995 have taken their toll on my body. Qualifying for disability in 2009 was the beginning of getting my life on track. Finally having a stable income and home allowed me the time I needed to get a handle on my health and my dreams.

As a mother of four girls and a boy with special needs, life has been especially difficult in my particular socio-economic status. As a thrice divorced mother, my choices have further complicated my situation. When I first attempted to return to school in 1999, colored with these choices and hampered by these circumstances I still did not know who I was as an individual. I majored in accounting because working in taxes was the first thing to which I had applied myself of any importance outside my family and I seemed to excel in my client relationships. Little did I know at the time that what I excelled in was not the love of numbers; but of helping people. During my time at Pulaski Technical College I excelled academically, and came to terms with myself as a writer for the first time.  My Professor; recognizing my talent, tried, unsuccessfully to get me to change my major to creative writing. But I was still going through so much abuse from my current husband at home, I felt that I needed to simply get training to make an income and that my personal dreams were not important. I didn’t have the time to waste on myself. I graduated with honors, Phi Theta Kappa but after graduation, my life finally spiraled completely out of control.

As my health deteriorated, and my family life nose-dived, I survived a complete mental breakdown and subsequent homelessness. I struggled to keep my children and lost half the battle. My dedication to God and my children were the only things I had to hang onto. When I went on Social Security and Section 8 my life finally began to level out and as the years progressed and my children grew I still followed their dreams, not mine. I spent a couple years as an autism advocate and was elected Vice President of the Arkansas chapter of the National Autism Association. My daughter became a singer-songwriter and as her co-songwriter and manager I finally began to dream dreams of my own. I discovered a talent for songwriting and music management and marketing that I had no idea about. When she left our partnership it devastated me to lose my daughter and best-friend but I found that the loss of the music was just as devastating. 

I have since written a book of poems based on my life as a survivor of domestic abuse, I have performed my poetry in front of audiences in Hot Springs with great success. I have also built a reputation in this town and a strong network of friends and colleagues as a music promoter, and I volunteer my time with several music festivals and galleries. I have been told that my help with website development, and social media marketing is unique and invaluable.  I want to continue to dream, to make my dreams come true and others as well. I plan to study the arts and add this to my prior business education to help other artists to realize their dreams. I envision one day opening an artist co-op here in Hot Springs to promote the arts and dreams among young and old alike.  The arts have opened up my world to possibilities I never imagined and I hope that many other people can be inspired as I have.

After 45 years I finally know who I am. I am a woman, a mother, a special needs-parent, an advocate, an activist, a dreamer, a poet, a song-writer, a social media coach, an artist and I am a survivor. 

The Local Show Music Menagerie at Whittington Place

Victoria Meyers doing a reading of her original poetry last night at Whittington Place for the Local Show Music Menagerie.

Posted by Melinda Horn on Saturday, June 6, 2015

No Tribe of My Own by Victoria Meyers (30 of 30)

Trapped in a short tunnel
Feeling like a hot poker stuck
In my shoulder
Can't think
The shiver runs up into the
Back of my neck like
an ice pick

Anxiety tries to overcome
My best intentions
Knowing what's right
What's true
With no audience to listen
No peer to be found
I have no country
No tribe
No family
How did this happen?
Whenever I get this way
I'd like to have a couple
Of strong drinks
Always comes with being broke
Maybe I should take up stealing
Lying and cheating
At least they think they're free
Think they're having fun
No brains no headaches

Grandma's Boxes by Victoria Meyers (29 of 30)

Talking to Max today
I said, you know I'm trying to let go
Of this box I've held around me
All my life
THIS is how you
SHOULD do it
Then when I can't really meet
That goal- I've proved that
I'm just a FAILURE

I told Max today
I don't want  you to fall into
This kind of a trap I set for myself
She asked me, "So why do you do it?"

Reflecting on the question I mused
That it must have been my mom who
Told me over and over how
You can't do this thing
Or reach that goal
Perfection unattainable
Unreasonable expectations

Max told me today
Don't let Grandma's boxes
Box you in
They're all full of dusty old memories
Dust them off and make them shine
Have a yard sale and get rid of them
Who wants to buy Grandma's boxes?

The History of My Heart (Conclusion) by Victoria Meyers (28 of 30)

The history of my heart concludes with hope and longing for the future.

It doesn't really conclude because it still beats here in my chest.

Though it flutters from time to time, it shudders from the memories and the damages and ravages of time.

Still here it beats, inside a great black hole in my chest and the hollow thudding echoes in my bones and my steps.

This heart is weary but not worn out. Resting but not yet done. Perhaps it can find the strength to love another again? Not now, not soon, but maybe.

For now this heart is learning, to love me. Learning to uncover the truth in a memory and the harsh cold reality without breaking. I feed it with self loathing, and memories, and dreams purged from my guts and re-digested truths.

It trembles and quivers with pain and exhaustion. Yet still it beats.

Each new day the tide changes, the burden is lighter. I do not mean to forget the lost ones, who still are trailing my progress.

I will never let them fall further then I can see them, but they are too far to catch me soon.

The history of my heart cannot ever fully conclude alone.

It can end,

Yes; it can stop beating, though it doesn't., even as hard as I have tried to make it stop.

I've pounded at it and even tried to cut it out with a knife.

There it still beats inside that iron box, that great black hole.

My quivering damaged heart begins to glow with hope ever still.  

The History of My Heart (Part 4) by Victoria Meyers (27 of 30)

The history of my heart has a latest chapter. One of exquisite love and ultimate horror. It's name can only be called, pain. With death, and death, and new love and hope dashed. Wings spread and soaring heights of love that fall and fall and fall to a fiery burning depth. It was going to be the final victory and it became the final torment. The depths of the mothers torment and the wife's desire know only the rule of heart.

Salvation found and peace and joy cultivated for nothing and lost, maybe forever? The sins of the father, on the son are nothing compared to the sin of Eve on my child. On my heart. A wicked indulgence to be so bold, so crass. To question Jehovah, God, the only way to peace and the furthest fall from grace.

The heart that finally found the greatest love, that finally found the highest purest love and then lost it. The heart that finally found the most exquisite peace and the joy and loss, and loss and broken carnage of soul.

The heart polluted by the demon that came in so many forms, the trickster. The lover. The death. The pain.

A beach, some wine and sweet sweet promise of death yanked away. The fall of hope rising, and falling and rising and falling again. Like a Ferris Wheel ride. My heart could take no more of the dizzying heights and garish carnival lights, looking down on the crowds of soulless mournful ants and wind rushing through the iron spokes the roar of the wind, the hideous musical joyous ride of a lifetime.

Where does one go to find such pain? Arkansas. Florida. Anywhere it seems.

The history of my heart has not ended. The history of my heart continues to unfold. With sickening hope it blinks its moist eyes once again in the sunlight, in the morning mist. It hopes, it breathes it refuses once again to die.

Three deaths are visited upon this heart this life, pray it will not be four, pray it will be released. Pray it is forgiven. Pray. Pray . Pray.

Pray the vine grow forth from my fingertips, thru my pencil tips. Pray the vine with heart shaped leaves will spread its lush green healing over the girl in the chair. Pray the vine will carry the forgiveness of the light thru its lifeblood to overtake the pain, to overtake the life and soothe away the shame.

Pray the vine heals, the green love spreads far and wide and covers the earth with hushed softness and rainforest strength of the oldest and tallest and strongest.

Pray.

To Be Continued....

History of My Heart (Part 3) by Victoria Meyers (26 of 30)

The history of my heart moves on to tell of escape from hell, and landing in the fire. Of horror high school and sweet first love turned sour. Of blurs of keg parties, and punk rock glimmers. School parades, and dances, and secret whispers. Of epic breakdowns and adolescent psychiatric wards. Of pills, and razors and sex, and weed. Learning to drive and stealing cars. Of the contrast of ROTC and uniforms. Of trying to change and being slapped back into my place, of growing away instead of up.

Teenage pregnancy and teenage marriage to a man who should have been in jail for our love. A black love that followed the course of slum and slime that my life had become,  had been but I didn't know. I didn't know who else to be. Reactionary actions on the part of a contract-uary obligation.

To the day when I walked into the baby's room in the morning light and saw that shining smile. My first light in a life of hell. She said HI. And she smiled a smile that melted hearts of everyone. No one could resist that smile and suddenly the weights of the corners of my own mouth became less and a smile snuck out of even my own heart. 

But not to be outdone, the darkness returned in full force, as I lay on the floor in a bloody beaten haze and watched the cop at the door's eyes meet mine before I fainted and heard the words from his mouth, “she's just fine, nothing to worry about” and just before the blackness took over and shut out the light forever the cop tipped his hat and walked away – the door shut and there I still lay. 

The history of my heart experiences escape again so very far away, to an island of sun and rain and palm trees.  To life and love and death and sorrow. Broken marriages and disco lights. Giant bats soaring through the night. Waves crashing against the sea wall in C condition weather and me, climbing over that safety wall to sit on the giants jacks and dare and hope and wish that the crash would be my head dashed against the sand. Slime surfing and rock climbing and a girl who would die from falling off of the most beautiful waterfall in the world. And I would take her place. 

To a new chapter, of adult life, playing house and white lace curtains. Return to the real world of snow and loneliness and booze and isolation and running away. To a house in the middle of no where where I would almost lose my mind and my life to a piece of stew one day.  Then back again where the nightmare began, Arkansas and Air Force and Ramona. 

Yet running again, again again. Self loathing and play acting and finally is it real? This time purple flowers on a fan and trolls on a cake- the guests refuse to show to witness the marriage of the golden boy   returning from the Navy. 

Babies and babies, and Avon calling and Tupperware parties and whirling life catching up to me even while the little girl quakes inside. Five long years of southeast Connecticut, and snow, and October beach parties and fresh fresh leaves. Rats across the road form the nuclear submarines.  Pretend, pretend, pretend its all real, its all right, that you feel.

Until that day, the darkness is back again and once again- now she became we -and we all return again back and back to Arkansas. Cursed place of my origins and hopeful play on relatives who just don't seem to care. And that plane flew away and the cloud lifted and I smiled. I thought I was free but I went home and enslaved myself one more time. 

To Be Continued.....

Marks of Growth by Victoria Meyers (25 of 30)

There is no door frame anywhere
With marks tracking my my growing height
No house, apartment or trailer
That I can point to in my memory and call
Home

 In the same way there is no ground
No city, town or state
With roots of mine growing down
There is no school or team I call my own- no alma mater
No fight song or school pledge
There are no reunions that I will
Attend

I am aware that there is a large family
Out there from which I originate
I have no ties to it
No connection or bond
As far as I am aware they don't
 Think of me, they may not know my name
I know they do not know my
Address

I'm not sure but I think
At least some of my own kids
May have inherited this detached life from me
I know there is no door frame
On which you can find a growth chart
Of any of my 5 children recorded
Not in any house, apartment, trailer
Not even in any camper, van or car
In which we have
Resided

Shadow War by Victoria Meyers (24 of 30)

I've spent the morning reading about another family, and another and yet another; torn to shreds by this Orwellian governmental control that seems to seek to claim all children as its own.
Citizens.
It's not just one town, one state, or one country. The stories pour in from all over the world. A child with difficult symptoms, constipation, diarrhea, skin rashes, perceived behavioral issues and mental illness.
The overall consensus in the mainstream says drug the child till they drool. Keep them in a diaper till they die at 30 years old from the years of neglect and abuse they will experience once they've had the permanent insertion of the government teat.
We have not come as far as you might think from the days when we housed our brain damaged "psychopaths" in neck irons in straw strewn sanatorium hallways and cages.
When you hear about the "government teat"*  I have always pictured the masses of doctors, hospitals, social workers, lawyers, school and prisons who unwittingly conspire to keep that money milk flowing as little piglets attached to the fat government hog. But no- I realized today I didn't get it quite right. They are even smarter then that! What they really do is install that teat into your child. Like little energizer batteries from the Matrix, so each and every one becomes their own little government hog. Satellite hogs.
They've really got it all figured out but all the while- children, all over the world are dying. Some quick, some slow. Doesn't matter though, we don't yet have a population shortage so there's always a new one to take the place of that lost teat.
And how? What is the method? Targeting of families who try to disengage. As long as you comply they leave you in your little bubble where you actually believe you are the one in control. Your choices. Your democratic voice.
But let not a demon take notice of you, that he will terrorize you all of your days. "If you can, do not let them notice you, or your life will be filled with regret. They stalk those who prey upon them, therefore, hide your good works. Only those who are quiet and modest will avoid their attention altogether." **
How is it everywhere? All over the globe? It seems it should be stopped at borders. Don't the borders mean anything anymore? In a world where only six conglomerates control all media it's really not a huge leap to consider that governments not really as sovereign as we would like to believe.
Tread lightly mother warriors.
We are left in shadows still.


   *(from "The Fight", Parks and Recreation (TV), Season 3 Episode 13 (2011))
**(Nicholas Kazan- Fallen 1998)

Posted by Victoria Meyers on Friday, April 24, 2015

Prince of Autism (an erasure poem) by Victoria Meyers (23 of 30)

The prince
in the corner of the room
among the shadows
boy
what do you want?
softly
perform a a little test
kind face
appeared suspiciously
hurt
hundreds of times
only free
the boy
glanced toward the prince who remained in the shadows
would you mind?
gesturing a moment
all you want
exactly all you have
still unsure of what was to come

Earth Day (an erasure poem) by Victoria Meyers (22 of 30)

Hands around
slow riser
thermometer
sick medicine
sick medicine
knocking
thunder
contagious
dead
big day
kind
hold hands
peace
saving the earth

My Own Road by Victoria Meyers (21 of 30)

I am in charge of my future
My decisions shape my world
Mistakes I've made
They've changed me
And set me upon a new road
What I learn is my roadmap
My experiences are my journey's log

Stronger now, I know my mind
I'm told that's not who I should be
I know better tho, from my journey
Mistakes I've made
They've changed me
Now set upon my new road
I am the cartographer of my own world

Like a phoenix from the ashes
My feathers shine in glory
As I am now victorious
Against the chains that once bound me
Mistakes I've made
They've changed me
Changed my mind
Am set upon this new road
And only I will chart its path

Sick and Tired by Victoria meyers (20 of 30)

Sick of the argument and
Sick of the crime
Tired of the abuse and
Tired of the grime

There seems to be no way
To escape this world of pain
Not until the end of days
It's here yet slow to wane

There's a pain crawling under my skin
There's an ache in my joints
It's bearable when I can smile
But when I can't its a
Writhing kind of  misery

Sick and Tired, Sick and Tired
Sick
and Tired

Regret by Victoria Meyers (19 of 30)

Regret is ageless
I don't like to blame
I am accustomed to taking responsibility
For my part in my life
For the mistakes I've made
For the trouble I have courted
I do take responsibility
I made a huge mistake and I accepted you
I made allowances when you told me of your past
I put your mistakes in my own perspective
As if they were mine
How I would move forward if they were my own
I made the mistake of thinking others are like me
You are not absolved from blame
You did hurt me
Your children
You did those things in the face of love
You had everything a man could ask
Unconditional love
A second chance
A third chance
Uncountable chances
You had me, you had us
You are regret

~Regret  by Victoria Meyers

Survivor by Victoria Meyers (18 of 30)

I am a survivor
I am still alive having
Survived unthinkable things
They are so normal to me I forget
I forget how shocking they are
Sometimes
But I also know the look
That look on your face when you hear
When I open my heart and I expose myself
I tell you of my pain, my shame
I feel judged
I feel scared

I am a survivor
I have lived through darkness
I have made it through a childhood of terror
I survived the streets
I made it out of gang violence
I lived with abuse

I am a survivor
I was beaten
I have broken
I have broken
I have broken

I have experienced the pain of lies
The pain of anger
I have experienced the pain
I have watched the joy leave my childs eyes
I have known the horror of truth

I am a survivor
I have made it through to the other side
I have lifted my self out of the mud
I have raised my voice
I have made it through to the other side
I know they are still behind

I am a survivor
I am a survivor
I am a survivor

~ Survivor by Victoria Meyers