The Was and Is

I didn’t crash in sirens, smoke, or flame,

No headline fall; no shouted shame.

Just dirty plates and tired light,

A clock stuck blinking through the night.

My son spoke soft, his voice grown flat,

That careful tone kids learn like that.

When hope grows thin; when trust goes spare,

When answers stop arriving there.

I told myself I’d earned the rest,

That coping looked like that at best.

That fine can rot and still survive,

That barely there is still alive.

I saw my face in shattered glass,

A stranger wearing my own past.

A woman fluent in excuse,

A mother dulled by alcohol abuse.

That was the rip, the silent scream,

The break between the was and been.

Not rock bottom and not a fall,

Just truth refusing to be small.

One path held numbness dressed as grace,

A slow erasure; time’s soft waste.

The other hurt in honest ways,

Raw mornings—sober—blistered days.

I chose the pain that stays and stings,

The kind that costs you everything.

No grand applause; no saving scene,

Just showing up where I hadn’t been.

I don’t beg pardon; won’t explain,

I lived the proof; I bear the pain.

I didn’t soar; I didn’t fly,

I survived, and they’re the reason why.

Wonderland Wanderess