Heartbreaking memories.

I once knew a girl,

She was as happy as could be.

Innocent of 11 or 12 one would say,

Did nothing wrong and kept herself out of harms way.

I met her again in the mirror that day,

She seemed sad, but I couldn’t tell.

I smiled at her and she smiled back,

But with sadness I wished she never had.

If eyes could tell stories,

They revealed hers to me.

And in those eyes I got lost,

In memories of joy, pain and grief.

There was that bitter memory,

One she promised never to keep.

She then flinched and I flinched too,

But I promised, “Only between me and you.”

And so she started that story,

The one she dared never to tell.

In fear that one day that man,

Would haunt her dreams again.

She stood behind her bathroom door,

With a man she called ‘uncle’ holding her uncomfortably close.

Her dad was there just a few feet away,

But he was occupied by something that had come his way.

She looked at him innocently,

Knowing something was wrong.

And he gave her a dirty look,

One that said, “You are mine now.”

He touched her in places without her consent,

As she stood still and shocked with nothing to defend.

Her father stood there still unaware,

Of his daughter’s innocence being stolen while he stood there.

The images went blurry,

As she began to cry.

I wanted to comfort her,

But those tears were mine.

That girl in the mirror,

Wasn’t just ‘somebody.’

‘She’ was ‘Me’,

Lost in a heart breaking memory.

- Karen Pereira.

This poetry was inspired from the movie Northern Country. I started this poetry in my F.Y and finished it this year (S.Y)... it was supposed to be a part of a T.Y.B.M.M initiative but I couldn't finish it then.