Broken Record.

I'm only putting this back up because of Leslie.

I won’t let me kids use hurtful words to cut each other down.
I get the hypocrisy since outside of work I have a bit of a sarcastic sense of humor.
There's kind of a lot of hypocrisy between who I am outside of work. I like violent video games, play fighting, driving over the speed limit.
I don't mind the dichotomy.
Do me a favor and don’t let them know.

This is a poem of explanation for why I don't let them break each others spirits, about how words are violent too, about how much I have to repeat it. It needs editing still.



You get so angry
so irritated
when I won’t let you use those words
those angry words
hate filled words
even playing around
bad words
so called because they serve no other purpose but to cut each other down

“That’s how we talk at home. That’s how we communicate.”
You argue.
But not here.
Not here
Not in here,
not like this
not those words
not us
we are not going to be that repetitive
that predictable
not going to continue those cycles of tearing each other down with words full of hate
hate and fricatives
fricatives and stops like k and g and t and f and s and j
making them fun to say,
but not so fun to hear
and horrific to watch as you laugh
lifting the words casually over your shoulder like a sledge hammer
saying check this out
watch this
and then you take that sledge hammer you made and
swing them down as they crash down against your five year old brother’s head
crush him with just one hit.
Are you proud?

And when you are young
Taking the words
trying them for the first time
with your friends, at night, behind the building
in the cover of darkness
you shred them and put them in paper
roll them
run your tongue along the edge,
secretly worried about paper cut
not sure if you’re supposed to spit out the bits that end up on your tongue
light them on fire
suck the burning shards into you
and the words make you crazy
but you use them to numb you out to the rest of the world
no one comes near you now
because they burn from your tongue every time you open your mouth


Man,
I wish I could tell you
Teach you
Explain that there are better highs
Better words
Good words
Not bad words
Don’t tear you down
Won’t numb you out
Enhance
Explain
Connect you to life and others and experience

And I’m not just talking about the maddening rush
of a perfectly formed piece of literature
the swirling high
of manipulating and controlling and
hunting down and grabbing hold of words
in such a way
that you have created art and significance
and then by juxtaposing incompatible images you have somehow managed to make yourself perfectly clear. To name your demons.
Sucked down and buoyed up, transported away.
No.
I’m talking about
bigger highs
better words
words with depth and meaning
words like
I love you

And you sat back there so your mother wouldn’t catch you
the thing is
Your mother wouldn’t care.
She uses them too
shaped into a knife
slitting her wrists every night with them
just so the worthlessness gets directly into her blood
remember crying when you were little
as she held your wrists
over the bathtub
less clean up
and slit them too
drops of blood on the floor
same knife you use to cut the chicken and vegetables
same knife you use to fight
and why not?
it’s the sharpest thing you own.

So that’s why I won’t let you use those words
bad words
Not here
Don’t bring them in here
We’ll learn new words
Words that we can stack
build on
stand on
build each other up with
Words we can plant in the ground
grow into trees
use like bricks
build a tower so tall
Stand on top,
Yell our words
God himself
Looks to see what you have done.


and then we will climb down set it on fire
not the kind that burns out tongues
or burns our lungs,
but the kind that burns like a signal
see us
we will choose words that create more
make be more
they are our tools, not our captors
and we will use them to create not destroy
and so when I tell you that those words,
those words
have no place here

it is not my method of control
it is not a plea

it is a statement of fact.

Those words have no place here



tl;dr version: I'm not particularly fond of this.