Eight-year-olds are absolute shit at hide and seek<\/p>\n
They always hide in the same one or two places<\/p>\n
And then wonder how you found them<\/p>\n
Except if they\u2019re in danger<\/p>\n
Except if they were me<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In my terrifying house<\/p>\n
With my terrifying brother<\/p>\n
And my terrifying step-dad<\/p>\n
Tiny, very not-so-terrifying me<\/p>\n
Had a hiding spot<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Closets were a game changer<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I had the obvious one<\/p>\n
My bedroom closet<\/p>\n
I used this one<\/p>\n
If I knew I wasn\u2019t in<\/p>\n
That<\/em> much trouble<\/p>\n <\/p>\n They could find me easily<\/p>\n But that was the point<\/p>\n Lure them into<\/p>\n The safety of routine<\/p>\n Like they had done for me<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Then I had the closet<\/p>\n Under the stairs<\/p>\n Full of Christmas decorations<\/p>\n And other things they tossed aside<\/p>\n I fit in there<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Of course, they would check<\/p>\n My bedroom closet first<\/p>\n I always hid there, right?<\/p>\n I wasn\u2019t the kind of girl<\/p>\n Who put up a fight<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Eventually, though, they\u2019d find me<\/p>\n It wouldn\u2019t last forever<\/p>\n But it was never meant to<\/p>\n I used this spot when<\/p>\n I needed time to be brave<\/p>\n <\/p>\n But then I had the hall closet<\/p>\n Less than 2 feet deep<\/p>\n Lined with shelves<\/p>\n No one ever looked there<\/p>\n They thought I wouldn\u2019t fit<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If someone did open the door<\/p>\n They\u2019d look below the shelves<\/p>\n On the floor<\/p>\n As if it was the only place<\/p>\n I deserved to be<\/p>\n <\/p>\n But I was small, and smart,<\/p>\n And scared, and in danger<\/p>\n And 8-year-old me<\/p>\n Could fit into some<\/p>\n Very small spaces<\/p>\n <\/p>\n So I would not hide on the floor<\/p>\n Not where they might think to look<\/p>\n I would suck it in<\/p>\n And scrape my skin<\/p>\n And I would make myself fit<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I would hide on the top shelf<\/p>\n In the tiny linen closet<\/p>\n They didn\u2019t realize there was<\/p>\n Over a foot of space up there<\/p>\n If you could just fit in the space<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Between the doorframe and the shelf<\/p>\n It couldn\u2019t have been more than 8 inches tall<\/p>\n I\u2019d have bruises on my ribs<\/p>\n And no one would find me<\/p>\n Till morning<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Eight-year-olds are absolute shit at hide and seek They always hide in the same one or two places And then wonder how you found them Except if they\u2019re in danger Except if they were me In my terrifying house With my terrifying brother And…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4616,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137515","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\/4616"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137515"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137515\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":138405,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137515\/revisions\/138405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}