Isabella Fusco

Grade: 12

Bay Village High School

Instructor: Erin Beirne

As The Days Go By

Poetry

As The Days Go By

I
Among 7.7 billion people in the world
This woman-
This woman is my mother

Getting off the big yellow school bus running down the steps
the tall doors shutting behind me.
Running into your arms after school was the best part of my day.
Watching you cook dinner
standing on my step stool so I could just look at what you were looking at
I wanted to be just like you.
I would walk the same as you
I would laugh the same as you,
and my smile I wanted to be just like yours.
My goal was to be just like you, but kids grow up and their goals change.

II
Long, dark brown hair
Long legs the length of the empire state building
Beautiful black eyes
I wish she still looked like this
Walking into the freezing supermarket holding your warm hand
Your eyes sparkled as we walked through the doors
I noticed everyone staring at you.
"Mommy, you are beautiful!"
Walking around next to you felt like a reward
It was like getting ice cream in a waffle cone with sprinkles on top
"Mommy, are you my best friend forever and ever?"... "Yes, baby. I promise."
Now I know why people say promises always break.
If my own mother can't keep a promise, then who can?

III
Five year old me
Staring into her black, beautiful eyes
She looks happy with her bright white teeth showing
She looks put together like nothing can stop her
My necklace
You gave it to me when I was a baby and I never took it off
It was a beautiful silver heart with tiny footsteps
Wherever you went, I followed.

IV
At night she disappeared
Locked in the bathroom
By choice.
My heart broke watching you close that bathroom door again
I knocked and knocked, but you would never open the door
Were you hiding something?
Was there something I couldn't see?
It's like you always hid something from me.
From morning to night you kept to yourself
no smiling
no laughing.
It's that time again
You get up from the couch and you smile and laugh
All the way to the dark, empty room.
That room took you away from me
You didn't care.
You never cared.

V
In the morning
I'm not gonna see her
9:30…
12:30…
She's up.
She sounds like a zombie
She looks like a zombie

VI
17 year old me
Staring down into her droopy, baggy eyes while she sleeps
She doesn't look good
She looks absent
I was only 12, and you pushed me away
I didn't want to lose you.
You were my everything

VII
Sitting on the red velvet couch
It doesn't smell so good
It smells like burnt wood
It's that time again.
It's time to walk away
So I stand up and walk out the heavy front door
"You put me through so much, how can you not see that?"
You saw nothing
You didn't care.

VIII
As my own mother is looking into my eyes
A single tear falls
Why can't she stop?
Will she ever stop?
Aren't you supposed to be my hero?
My role model?
The person I look up to the most?
That's who you were
Not who you are.

IX
Driving my silver Toyota
Looking through my rearview mirror
I see nothing
Just the cars behind me
She's not there, she's never there
At that moment, you were gone.
I was driving away with a lady I met five seconds ago
You cried, screamed, and ran for me
It didn't help, nothing could help
I walked into this brown brick building with maybe three windows per floor
There was nothing here for me
No food, sheets, not even a bed
All I could think about was how you could do this to your own child
"I was just eight, mom. How could you?"
I guess you thought other things were more important
More important than your own daughter.

X
My mother
Standing in the white snow
She looks skinny
So fragile
The smoke coming from the lit cigarettes
The only thing I could see
I didn't want to see you.
It hurt me to see you.

XI
She is a good mother
She was a good mother

XII
Standing in the Big Apple
Thousands of people surrounding me
My eyes go straight to the woman who hurt me
Who I will never forgive
She's still the same
She will never change

XIII
My mother
The beautiful woman who was so pure
My mother.
I look into the mirror in the place I called home for the past five years
I see me
Finally, I see me
and not you.