Supernova

“ What is to give light must endure burning”

-Victor Frankel

Your words’ barbed edges still quiver

beneath the flesh of my heart,

your hatred a cooling weight

I feel obliged to carry.

I forget I ran for liberation.

I escaped to save our son,

the life you wished to terminate

at gestation. I crossed you-

never cross paths with a moving train.

I was a bad girl.

I stayed pregnant.

Now I am a woman

with a four-year-old you want to father.

Suddenly he is your soul.

I am supposed to forget

those blistering phone calls,

though my ears still burn

from your invectives.

I am supposed to forget

you told the DHS I was an unfit parent

while you smoked dope after teaching kindergarten.

I have spent too much time apologizing,

defending you, excusing you,

believing I deserved your hatred

since I dared to conceive without your consent.

This bitterness is a weight

I must set aside.

If I relinquish my camouflage

and dance in the fire,

your words cannot hurt me.

I will absorb them into my own flame

as I go nova,

releasing the restraint caused

living in time

to other peoples’ lies and expectations.

There will always be predators.

I am not prey.

No longer satisfied to live

a moving target,

I step into my glory.

I have remembered the purpose of being burned—

to be reborn.