You think too much

the soft voice reminds me of my mother’s 

and her mother’s

and her sister’s. 

The ancestors all make up the mosaic 

that is mine. 

Glimmering eyes, 

dark skin, 

self destruction and tragic endings

made up my own formative years, 

and those of my family. 

A bloodline curse, one could call it-

being too aware of every drop of blood, 

of every knife, 

of every slit throat and pill popped. 

I was never given the chance

to sit in a field of daisies and forget, 

nor was there a time where I did not have to forget, 

because I didn’t know. 

I grasp the fragments of the past and future

and spend every moment piecing them together, 

but all the while I forget the present. 

I wish I could lie in the bathtub, 

with rose petals and candles surrounding me, 

and not be tempted to hold my head under the water. 

I wish I could breathe after waking up

without the temptation to go back into a permanent rest. 

I wish I did not know, I wish I was never made aware, 

I wish I was ignorant and blissful, 

but I do know. 

I know, I think, and I accept.