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true stories
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i could tell you stories, oh, i could tell you stories about the children i have known the ones abused for years on end the ones trapped in some hellish-home who, if they now find some way out remain in pain though none can see their agony of memory stories of hallucinations youthful clean machinations of suicidal six-year olds and homicidal eight-year olds and teenage schizo-paraniods with fearful wild imaginings —delusions of their own inventing sure, i could tell you stories, true stories in horr-i-fy-ing de-tail but then you'd lie awake at night with bugs a-crawling in your heart and ask the walls, “how could God fail?” to keep the little children safe and then you'd fear to dim the lights you'd sleep in fitful restless starts afraid to fall asleep at night lest you fall into a part in someone else's nightmare-play —you'll long for night to fall away and then you'll wake a-suddenly with a tiny breathless scream drenched in sweat of tortured dream and know full-well your life has changed you'll never ever be the same for now the mark of hidden crime is plain before your eyes and mine and now you've joined me in their pain that ever-falling cold black rain that drenches souls of hope-lost youth and drains the boils of naked truth into our eyes and minds and hearts nevermore to give us leave to fantasize, to braid and weave those lovely lies to which one clings —with happy sweet imaginings of how life is and ought to be for those of us who think ourselves still free. by Ronald L Conte Jr |
© Copyright 1995 by Ronald L Conte Jr