cold
cold, cold, hard damp tiles
bare feet
they didn’t care
with their thick shoes and heavy clothes
pale legs above bloodless toes
the cold hurts
before it numbs
but fear is hot
insides shaking
lips trembling
don’t cry, she warns
don’t whimper or weep
it will be worse for you
stand strong, little mona
stand and stare
see what they point to
see it and know
there is no safety
for little girls
who don’t do what they are told
tears fall silently
on downy cheeks
please don’t notice
i promise i’ll be good
i won’t make a sound
i’ll be daddy’s good girl
you’ll see
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About Mona
I am a middle-aged, cradle-Catholic with a degree in Theology, a Masters in Religious Education, and 27 years of theology teaching experience -- mainly High School, some College. Now I work as an Administrative Assistant in a Jewish Synagogue.
I am a wife, and a mother of two sons.
I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse.
I am the mother of a suicide victim.
And in 2005 I managed to make it through Hurricane Katrina.
I love my family. I love to write. I am not sure about the Church any more. And God and I are not currently speaking -- but I haven't given up.
Published writing:
• From Hurt To Healing, Publish America 2004, ebook on Amazon, 2011
•"Forgive and Forget," America Magazine, September 16, 2002
•"From Victim to Victimizer," Human Development Magazine, Summer 2005
• It's Just Not Fair, Introducing The Fairly-Good Mother, ebook at Amazon, 2011
My Blogs:
Catholicism in the 21st Century
From Hurt to Healing
Surviving a Loss
Only Good Things
Traces of Hope
Conversations with Jesus the Nazarene
I am currently working on a book on Grief and Loss that seems to be trying to become a book on Hope. We'll see how it works out.
A gillion things churn in me. The image. The image. I read it a week ago and it took this long to be able to respond without choking. This is how it feels in me. Watching from behind, both watcher and watched, belonging to the big man always watching me and the watched one can never leave that moment, but the watcher goes back into the world, back into the socially-sanctioned psychosis of methodical silencing, knowing what she saw but having neither words to explain nor space to speak them. This is unassailable truth with inherent integrity. You remember. I remember. All the boys and girls remember.
And the poem, choppy lines and monosyllables and a plaintive quietness in which the unspoken declares a crime against humanity, the systematic torture of children.
Thank you for sharing how it made you feel. Words aren’t ever enough.
You know me and you know the feelings inside my words. I hate that you know. But I’m so glad not to be alone in my knowing.
Made of stars? We are. There’s not a reason for everything, no matter how we will bang our ‘why?s’ against that truth. You are real. And you are amazing.