I am in the winter, and I am in the snow. I am the child of a vengeful cloud Through the black trees, my sharp winds weave and grow (echo, I echo) I am a quiet death, I will take them while they sleep I am the rattle of their window pane, And the numb beneath their feet I will wake you at the moment, in the deepest of your slumber When the moon wanes to the center and lightning meets with thunder When a rush sets through the freezing streams I’ll bleed you out, and strangle your dreams I’ll spend the last of the air that I breathe to bring you down here, into the deep with me (into the deep, you will be here, with me) ~ A. L. Stippich
dear brother
dear brother, don’t forget to turn out the lights (dear brother, don’t forget to let go) the leaves will still choose to change their colors and the earth beneath you will still turn all the same what is gone is over, the dead cannot speak any more than they can hear; your cries remain foreign to closed ears (brother, to stay inside the still is a slow way to die) tragedy is every crack in your road; every fistful of sand in your eyes we can make up our minds to wash them clean or let each grain bore holes ‘til we go blind so let, slow the veil that covers your soul slip back down from your face to the floor; mourn yesterday when it is (and only when it is) and close that door and, brother, don’t forget to turn out the lights ~ A. L. Stippich
am i here?
If I should die And no one knows Well, That’s alright, it’s how it goes, I suppose that is, if no one knows when it’s time for me to go, you know? I suppose, if no one knows and the sun still rises and the grass still grows, that’s just how the world has a tendency to flow if no one knows and it’s time for me to go so I leave these words and I leave these notes as a piece of myself that has no plans to go so that more would know (far from when I go) that I once walked the same ground you do ~ A.L. Stippich
Things Unseen
Finding out someone’s story can be such an enlightening journey. Everybody has one, after all.
I was not aware that unconditional love was a real life concept until I met my husband. Growing up in a warped church and home environment taught me that forgiveness was only a preached myth from the Bible. In my experience, love was issued on invisible strings of terms, conditions, rules, and regulations. People left one by one after the terms were broken, because I was broken, I learned that I had to follow all of the rules set forth to me in order to receive care; constantly on the edge of a cliff.
Being raised in a bubble of fear means you only really know fear. If you are not taught that peace and help could be provided to you, you are not going to know to look for it, especially when your childhood precedes the age of technology. As I was homeschooled full time throughout my schooling years, I had little understanding of how the real world worked on the outside by the time I was ready to enter it, let alone any social skills.
While many children were raised up to appreciate human interaction, affection, social development, and nurturing, some of us are not as blessed. Some of us are left to stray off to the side to be forgotten in a sea of unimportant faces, left for no one to hold. When most kids were being exposed to new and exciting development, I was being conditioned to avoid a leather belt. To accept violent, corporal punishment for misbehavior, some incidents leaving lifelong mental and physical scars. To long days and nights of constant arguments and tension while I hid from the war zone. To learning the best pressure points to torture an animal with and how much enjoyment you can get watching the life leave their eyes when you kill them by the time I was seven. To keeping my feelings to myself.
To never say anything about what happens behind our front door because our business was no one else’s.
I was raised by a sociopath.
Depression, PTSD, personality disorder, anxiety disorder, dissociative disorder, agoraphobia, and a horrible case of morsicatio buccarum since birth. These are some of the effects I have faced after a childhood that was not and for the sake of normalizing the ability for me to talk about my abuse, after thirty-some-odd years of life, I want to talk about it. It is time to talk about it.
The past four years have been a difficult road of pain, processing, acceptance, and healing as I finally decided to turn around and face it all. I am still at the point of understanding and healing and I think I always will be, but I am tired of keeping that to myself. My experiences in life have made up who and why I am today.
Everyone has a story of their journey to becoming who they are today. Welcome to mine.
Life at the Burrow 