Thirteen

a poem by Jaleesa Davis

Still, after seven years, I can’t say that my heart still feels no pain, before that day it was sunshine and afterward it was just rain.No one ever told me my story wouldn’t be goofy or fun, and as far as stories are concerned, I wish I didn’t have one.They say you always have a choice in life, that is until someone takes that right from you leaving you with only the choice they make, the one thing I thought I was able to give who knew you’d take.I told you I forgave you because I did, but I still cry about it and I still mourn over it because I was just a kid.And maybe I never used word of mouth to say no or that I didn’t want to continue with the actions being introduced, but I can tell you right now that I wasn’t seduced, and that I shouldn’t have been with you.I’ll always blame myself for what happened to me because what good would it do if I continued to blame you, I’d still be unhappy.It’s been seven years since you took the one thing I was allowed to give, and sometimes I wonder how I live with that memory in the back of my brain, there is sunshine and yet there’s still rain.I’ll never yell that dirty R word because I know it’s not real, and that’s not what it was, but I’ll always loathe you because it was supposed to be my choice and it never was.You were an adult and I wish I could tell you that I am now too, and yet I still sometimes think about you.I’ve repressed that day so much in my mind. It feels like it’s been loads of time, between then and now, and it still affects me and I don’t know how. published in Genre: Urban Arts First Edition