A questionnaire of my family history is only a monologue I tell myself.
Practicing in front of the mirror to get better.
So, the next time the doctor’s words I am sorry falls back into their lips.
& I am onto my feet.
A vapid, monologue screenplay.
The rehearsed version of my life.
Answering the questions.
Somehow still fumbling through the words.
Yet leaving voids in my answers as my family’s members absence did.
Mother?
Two strokes. She’s alive but not apparent enough to know it.
Her blood runs too thick.
Blood pressure always boiling.
Mother knew how to live fast but never well enough.
Father?
Dead. He was alive but never long enough to hold it.
Heart always dropping and head into the palms of his hands.
Thirst never stopping.
Alcoholism is a wicked thing I say.
Siblings?
Brother. Alive somehow not present enough to count it.
Healthy. We count his days as tick-tack-toe though.
Family history has a lineage that says the roots in this family tree are rotten.
Sister. Victim to mental health.
The prodigy of a broken foster system.
I reckon her days are counted in lines.
Between days she’s alive & the days she wishes she wasn’t.
The doctor does an homage in the way she bows her head.
Makes the hollowed-out chest of mine seem like it’s filled with water.
I let out a gasp.
Trying to fill the room where all the air has seemed to have evaporated.
Hoping to catch my breath.
My story filling their break room like a lingering coffee smell.
Keeping them brewed in satisfaction that it could always be worse.
My story always seemed like the punch line for better days.
Our family has been waiting since genesis for such.
These are the days I wish I believed in something.
A god to drown every nightfall with dawn.
family sickness death grief history health wellness doctor god
