not done.

We’re driving towards my house,
and away from the ocean
I like to call my home.
This is the second family vacation
in two weeks;
my parents are in the front seat,
fighting.
For them,
it is voices hushed
like a closed chimney
or fountains shut off
for the winter
my dad is speeding.
He and I get angry
in the same way
we begin to stop moving
and start accelerating
everything we can,
so we can pretend
that we are really in control.
This is the first disagreement
they’ve let us see in months,
and I am crying,
first, because I am sensitive
as the inside of a clam
and, congruent with my egocentrism,
I believe only I
have the right to be angry,
not remembering that one day
I will most likely
time-bomb off my emotions
in front of my own children.
I am crying
second, because I am terrified,
of what other children’s families face
when their authorities
start smoldering.
My parents love each other,
and their children,
they do not open fire
on one another, or anyone else, for that matter,
so what of those
whose parents shoot cannons
of words
or fists
or abandonment
on everyone in sight
I would not have survived
any other kind of parent than my own
I am not
any kind of soldier,
so I apologize
to anyone
whose parents have less patience
and more battlefields than mine
which has to be
pretty much anyone.