An Estranged Daughter’s Verse (99th Special Written Creative Piece)
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A little older and little wiser, I lay in my bed typing onto my document, envisioning that my long-known relatives may read this.
And yet still I stay wrapped within my blanket, recalling to the ten years ago when I hid inside of it with frightened tears overflowing.
Wishing everything lay silent outside for once after four years of never knowing its presence — half of my life of never knowing its presence.
Where childhood should be filled with sunshine and letters asking for magical gifts during the holidays, I saw your gin spill onto both.
Tens of emptied bottles lined up your room, the smell of it makes me sick to this day; both a blessing and a curse as I near the days that I step into adulthood and all its awaited socials.
Back then, a sober home was the only wish that I put in my stocking as the snowflakes fell that eve, engraved onto a card that is now hidden in my closet. Maybe unread by its intended recipient.
This reminder of you in my adolescence and the lackluster, and recently understood, permanent goodbye makes me question whether it was a blessing or a curse.
The existence of you taught me to give a damning care; to be fierce, to be steadfast, and to be kind even when the sirens come blaring — a blessing in disguise.
The lack of you taught me to fend for myself behind locked doors and ghosted hallways, confining myself within my imagination and to secret peeks through the window facing the park; unto parents who forfeited their comfort, and children who sensed their pain but simply smiled at them to replenish what they had lost. This window flaunted so little views but instilled me with peoples’ truth and fears, and love-coded sacrifices — a curse when you are merely nine.
A little older and a little wiser, the memories feel torn. Half faultless, half torturous; a complete chaos, a complete canto goldmine.
As December rolls into January, a decade and childhood is going to pass.
No more tedious shouting,
no more wearisome slurs to hear and cues to hide behind a rose-tinted toy.
A new start, a kind start, a loving start with no sight of you; dwelling within a new-founded peace amongst those once pained.
Pained from all the gin you spilled onto our then-sweltering house, the one she endeavoured to make into a home.
One that now lays forsaken in our unspoken history.
Blindfolded forgiveness is a virtue, or so I have been told,
but since when has practicality and un-forgetfulness been an offence?
As I lay my words upon this page barren with no shield or remorse, I hesitantly admit that I hope yours go down one day, too.
Learn to love again, and live. It would be a loss of your neglectful sacrifice if you didn’t.
After all, I’m merely an estranged daughter with a verse to say,
I should know.
A verse I never imagined writing; one that I hope is not meant to be pitied,
a verse I now confidently present to all.
A verse that I know will be heard one day.
A verse, written by me, and hopefully reached to you.
As I once wrote for her,
I write for you, too.
I truly wish you the best even now,
and until forevermore,
my dear father.
