Dark room {revision: Narrative Poem}

My room?

Why would you ask me what my room looks like?

It was small, dark, and clean.

My room was mainly black

because I was worried about

letting too much color in.

I was worried about the colors

fading away in a house that felt

very black and white. A house

where fear lingered over me.

I,

I sat in that room in the dark, talking

to no one but myself. It was the room

where I could speak because it was not

allowed in the rest of the house.

I created it as a space to feel safe, as

space where I could be without worry.

But good things never last and the fear

in the house slipped under my door.

That room was small, dark, and cold.

The room where I watched the door,

where I listened for footsteps.

The room where I couldn’t sleep.

That room which wrapped

its hands around my throat

looking me in the eyes,

telling me, “shut up,”

telling me, “I brought you into this world I can take you out,”

telling me as her hands wrapped around my throat,

while my hands scratched at her shoulders.

Telling me, “she should be feared.”

And she should never be loved.

So why would you ask me what my room looks like?