Autopsia
Nelia Perry
You silently watch your feet pitter pattering against the edge
of the sofa hovering slightly above the scratchy carpeted floors
and you count the strands of dark thread wound up in the lighter stained
yarn. You hear the lady in the big chair say something but your mind is lost
in imagining the itch of the floor against your small body.
You wish you could take off your shoes and rub your toes against it
but the lady asks you again about your temper in school.
You feel prodded and pricked at, her dissecting eyes on you,
her mouth cutting deep, looking for answers you don’t want to share.
You’re never mad at school except when you are pulled from class early to come here and
you don’t know what to tell your friends on Wednesday afternoons at two. You
bring your eyes up from the carpet-counting to meet the lady in the big chair.
You want to ask her why you’re here but know it's because you yell at home and you think your mom loves your sister more than you. Sometimes you just want to count
carpet yarn and feel it rub on your feet and sometimes you just want to
scream because it feels good in your chest.
The words you say are too old and you’ve grown up too quickly and you never counted sheep and you hate that your mom hurts when you say she loves your sister more and here you are sitting on the couch with the lady in the big chair watching you with her surgical features knowing they are scanning your every move and she
pitter patters her pen on the paper and you don’t know what she is writing down. You’re supposed to discuss feelings but are told to feel differently.
You don’t and you don’t know why and you
feel indulged to yell from your belly through your chest
because you love your mom and you love your scream
but you hate feeling small on the couch where your feet can’t
touch the rough carpet and rub away your anger.
You sit there silently counting the carpet strands listening to pitter patters. You wait for the lady in the big chair to ask you again
about your temper in her high pitch supposedly-comforting-to-a-child voice as she cuts
away at you little by little knowing she won’t find what she is looking for. When you
return home you’ll feel beckoned to scream but told
to drown it out in a pillow pressed to your exhausted, misunderstood face
imprinted from all the times you’ve done it before and nobody even realized.
Nelia Perry (PO '24) is a Molecular Biology major who loves climbing, writing, and having tea in Frary!
Nelia Perry
You silently watch your feet pitter pattering against the edge
of the sofa hovering slightly above the scratchy carpeted floors
and you count the strands of dark thread wound up in the lighter stained
yarn. You hear the lady in the big chair say something but your mind is lost
in imagining the itch of the floor against your small body.
You wish you could take off your shoes and rub your toes against it
but the lady asks you again about your temper in school.
You feel prodded and pricked at, her dissecting eyes on you,
her mouth cutting deep, looking for answers you don’t want to share.
You’re never mad at school except when you are pulled from class early to come here and
you don’t know what to tell your friends on Wednesday afternoons at two. You
bring your eyes up from the carpet-counting to meet the lady in the big chair.
You want to ask her why you’re here but know it's because you yell at home and you think your mom loves your sister more than you. Sometimes you just want to count
carpet yarn and feel it rub on your feet and sometimes you just want to
scream because it feels good in your chest.
The words you say are too old and you’ve grown up too quickly and you never counted sheep and you hate that your mom hurts when you say she loves your sister more and here you are sitting on the couch with the lady in the big chair watching you with her surgical features knowing they are scanning your every move and she
pitter patters her pen on the paper and you don’t know what she is writing down. You’re supposed to discuss feelings but are told to feel differently.
You don’t and you don’t know why and you
feel indulged to yell from your belly through your chest
because you love your mom and you love your scream
but you hate feeling small on the couch where your feet can’t
touch the rough carpet and rub away your anger.
You sit there silently counting the carpet strands listening to pitter patters. You wait for the lady in the big chair to ask you again
about your temper in her high pitch supposedly-comforting-to-a-child voice as she cuts
away at you little by little knowing she won’t find what she is looking for. When you
return home you’ll feel beckoned to scream but told
to drown it out in a pillow pressed to your exhausted, misunderstood face
imprinted from all the times you’ve done it before and nobody even realized.
Nelia Perry (PO '24) is a Molecular Biology major who loves climbing, writing, and having tea in Frary!