Regret is 20 years of broken strings
Unknotted pearls
Trampled and split and sharp and bloody under bare feet
Stained glass
Under a crowbar and bleeding knuckles
In the sun
Little boys whose scientific minds
Hold more than they should
You teach them to
Carry grief and galaxies
But not the rules of communication
Secrets and haunted eyes that got too dark with the years
Of reaching hands and demands and threats
A lifetime of abandoned souls
Soft faces that turned to sharpened steel
Tongues like blades and acid in her eyes
A speeding car no one bothered to catch
A suicide stopped but always there, laced with the disobedience
Of chasing foolish dreams
Of being young and wanting and empty
Hurt and broken and trying and questioning why
My life was chosen before I was born
I am prodigal demon she tells me she loves
But never offers more kindness than necessary
Every kindness laced with broken edges and rusty blades
Behind the closed doors of her self preservation
Where she is worshiped for being a mother
And I am condemned for being a son.