{"id":103021,"date":"2021-06-27T08:35:57","date_gmt":"2021-06-27T12:35:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/?p=103021"},"modified":"2021-06-27T08:35:57","modified_gmt":"2021-06-27T12:35:57","slug":"hour-19-black-sheep","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/2021\/06\/hour-19-black-sheep\/","title":{"rendered":"Hour 19 – Black Sheep"},"content":{"rendered":"

I can still remember the exact moment\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The rosy tint was wiped off of my glasses.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I was eight, and at 26 now<\/span><\/p>\n

I still don\u2019t know if he knows\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This one seemingly small moment was<\/span><\/p>\n

The impetus of my changed worldview.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The moment that knocked me out\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Of my family\u2019s orbit and turned me into the enemy.<\/span><\/p>\n

A moment, so small,<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet somehow changed everything.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I was bored, you see.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019d been at a museum the whole day<\/span><\/p>\n

And I was a child, over it and ready to go home.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Fingers clasped onto my neck;<\/span><\/p>\n

My cue to knock it off.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I explained, in my childlike way,<\/span><\/p>\n

That we didn\u2019t need to like the same things while<\/span><\/p>\n

Fingers dug into the sweat at the back of my neck.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

All I said was that I wasn\u2019t interested\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And fingernails became talons digging further.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He whispered daggers into my ears<\/span><\/p>\n

He gave me everything and this was my penance.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was nothing if not for what he had molded me into.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The next month was spent learning to be a lady.<\/span><\/p>\n

Quiet please, no slouching, don\u2019t dare to make waves.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

One moment turned into a countdown, a mantra.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I made you, you\u2019re nothing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sit down, shut up, move on.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What he didn\u2019t know was that being a nerd\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Has its advantages.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

By ten, one of the most well-read kids in class.<\/span><\/p>\n

Twelve, in advanced classes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Fourteen, I was rocking extracurriculars.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

All this to say that at sixteen,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When I had my first girlfriend<\/span><\/p>\n

I was smart enough to go back to those lessons.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shut up, don\u2019t make waves.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ten years later,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m the one everyone at the holidays<\/span><\/p>\n

Rolls their eyes at and whispers about\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In corners, but I\u2019m not ashamed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I am nothing like what they tried to mold.<\/span><\/p>\n

My compassion isn\u2019t lesser,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

My kindness is a strength unknown to them,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And all I can feel now all these years later is pity\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

That they will never step far enough out\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Of a self-contained bubble to greet\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The real world and her people. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I can still remember the exact moment\u00a0 The rosy tint was wiped off of my glasses.   I was eight, and at 26 now I still don\u2019t know if he knows\u00a0 This one seemingly small moment was The impetus of my changed worldview.\u00a0   The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3586,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3586"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103021"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103021\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103026,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103021\/revisions\/103026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}