UNDERGROUND VOICES MAGAZINE/CYNTHIA RUTH LEWIS


	UNDERGROUND VOICES: POETRY

CYNTHIA RUTH LEWIS

Another future, twisted poet

I was never quite like the other kids:
I detested the bus that carried me home
more than I hated school

They all thought I was lucky
for having my mom at home to greet me;
someone to help with the homework
and bake pies--the other kids,
being latchkey victims, would go home
to droning cartoons and endless cookies,
while I went home to my mother's neurosis
her paranoia
her compulsive obsessiveness
folding into my bones,
worming into my brain

paving my future

She was never physically abusive,
but her verbal barrages seared themselves
into my mind like bad dreams,
intimidating and inhibiting me,
her psychotic creed forbidding the few
friends I had from being allowed over;
the endless field trips I couldn't go on...
being sheltered, in general, from a world
I desperately wanted to know and be
a part of, but not quite knowing how

It's been difficult through the years
as I've attempted to struggle with all
those old demons and ghosts, my frustration
eventually shaping itself into bizarre
and detailed poems as I tackled bitter memories
and tainted psyche, the words splashing
relentlessly upon the page like blood,
trying to make some sense of it all,
trying to take the sliced and frayed edges
and plait them into something productive;
a therapeutic journal of sorts

And I can't help but cringe today
whenever I pass a group of children
waiting for the school bus--
I scan the bunch, straining to pick out
the odd loner of the group;
the one hugging the fence,
staring down at their shoes,
trying to fold themselves into a shadow,
and I always want to catch their eye
and give them a sympathetic look
to let them know I understand;
that they're not alone,
and I drive off, chuckling to myself
knowing that, abiding by the gods of fate,
another future, twisted poet is born

I'm 38, having written poetry for the past 17 years.
Currently back in the publishing world after having
taken a 2 year hiatus due to creative apathy and
temporary insanity--which, actually may have enhanced
my writing. It has certainly enhanced my weirdness.