– I don’t ever want to get married

Waking up every morning and seeing mama’s face
being painted with high resonant slaps
from dad’s palms hurt my soul
He’d wrap his hands around her neck
in preparation to take her life
heaven knows he beat the hell out of her

My dad doesn’t eat stale food
and my dad is that clean, uncluttered, tidy
ship-shape and Bristol fashion type of man
so mother has to quit her job
ditch her life and take up resident jobs
like blow jobs, effort-pivot bed strokes
cooking and cleaning

Every night he’d touch her in many ways-sexually
until he incessantly took her breathe away
That very breathe he’d take away the next morning
by beating her even if she did everything right
She was only a mannequin that wore scars
instead of scarfs and bruises instead of blouses

I as that little child I was
would just peep through both hinges of my door
and watched how my motherr begged to be freed
All I saw when I looked at her were wounds in her soul
Mother would fall on her knees and pray
as if Jesus should take dad’s place
She would weep and scream to God
to take her pains or her life
She always cried

When mama said she was leaving
all he said was “Bye Felicia”
He gave two shits less that she was gonna go
After all it was just a random nobody
that nobody was sad to see go
But mother never really left
and it was all because of her kids

My mother did not marry a man
she married violence
She was being spun as though she were
a fidget spinner
She would be at his service all day
and at night still have him disrupt her cervix
The love was missing, listen
My mom lost her confidence
and eloquence, in consequence of hiding the
evidence of his actions, yet he had no penitence

Her body was a map
each line was a footpath
a first class road, a way to a city
Every city was a memory of love and pain
Her love was a rapper, she was his only audience
His punchlines were love concealed pains
Her body, her ego, her love, her spirit and soul
were just all a bunch of messy scars

I don’t ever wanna get married
Sometimes I wondered why she was still around
But if only pain was without hurt
if only she could go back in time without regret
The person she had fallen in love with had changed
his personality had become more deranged
She let him have the upper hand
and che let him dictate her sick rate
and how often she was allowed to get sick of him

Eveything changed me
It played on my mind, in my sleep
and I just couldn’t be
My family was teased
people gossiped because my daddy’s wedding ring
had become a boxing ring

She lost her sense of fashion
because her style was all about long sleeves
dark glasses and thick make up
Long nights of talks full of laughter
were now nights full of disaster
But my mother never give up

My father was a cocaine addict
and when she complained
he slapped her and yelled
“I don’t care what you think!”
She got another painted cheek and a split lip
all because she tried stopping him from another sniff
It was too late when she realised
that her blue skies had turned to grey
and her memories had faded away

My mother was pregnant
but my father would still forcefully sleep with her
They struggled one night as she fell off the seventh stair
with her vision blurred, she toppled over, over,
over and over until her life was over…
She died

It is so painful to think
that the last time
was the last time that I saw my mother
All the time the people said, “it’s ok”
“he’d change”, “things would get better”
my mother is now 6feet underground
and I don’t even know how she feels
She can’t even hear me cry
She can’t even tell how much I miss her
She can’t see how bad I am growing into
and there is nobody to tell me “Ama, you’ll be fine”

I was raped severally, I went wayward
My brother is now a junky
and I a nymphomaniac
because there’s nobody to talk to
and no mother to walk to
My dad, my dad, he is in prison for drugs
If only he could see the beauty of resilience
If only he could see the beauty of resilience
He wouldn’t suffer the consequences
of this grotesque aftermath
Sorry is now just a sorry word

Trust me there were times before the wars
there were times before the scars
there were times when she knew
he was nothing less than sweet and lovely
there were times before she knew
the fault in her shooting star
there were times
when she was his world, his home

When your vows are supposed
to plough the love between you
why would you somehow allow yourself to be so sour?

I don’t ever want to get married to a man like my dad

Falling in love with a beater
is like living in a plastic bag
You think you have enough air
to breath inside the puff
but you know you definitely will die
Take a moment and remind yourself
that marriage is no rush
Take time to find yourself
and refine yourself
The most beautiful
and successful relationships and marriages
thrive not on love alone
but true friendship
I don’t ever want to get married to a man like my dad

– This piece was inspired by a close friend’s family.

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Link to the Italian translation