My Zombie's Lament

You have trauma, said the fortune cookie
You may never get past it,
especially at your age (62)

I am fortunate to have good helpers.
Each one a specialist, each working their zone.
They treat the parts, not the whole

Depression gets Cymbalta
Anxiety gets Klonopin
Mild Psychosis gets Keppra

I locked up memories and buried them deep.
Eventually they surfaced,
like rocks in a farmer’s field,
like ordinance in Germany.

I could not allow myself to remember
I’d been raped by the priest
Nineteen times, my Stations of the Cross.

Later, I could not allow myself to remember
I sought out men when I was young.
What a thing to lock away, to bury, to un-remember.
I wish it had stayed buried.

The therapists open the boxes in your head
without knowing what’s in there;
Pandora’s Box without hope.
I’m not sure it’s ethical.

Thirty-five years ago,
blissfully compartmentalized,
I married a girl.

Three years ago,
the memories burst out with
explosive surprises.
I don’t know what to do with now-me.

I’m living the shell of my former life
I’m not happy at home or in my marriage
I’m a late-blooming undead bisexual
shuffling through the months

If I leave to be myself,
what does it do to my young-adult kids?
what does it do to my wife?
They’ve done nothing wrong.

I made promises and gave vows;
promises like a millstone around my neck,
vows that bind like a riot-cop’s zip-ties.
These are the rules, I’m told

I was much more suicidal a year ago.
I have a great plan for an ambiguous death.
But: what harm is done to your survivors?

The ties that bind, bind me too much.
Suicide shifts my trauma to my children
but how can I get free of this life?
How can I let trauma be my legacy?

How do my kids understand this?
Where does my wife find justice?
Where does my wife find happiness?
It’s not any of their fault.

How do I become me,
without devastating them?
How are they unharmed,
without denying myself?

Diabetes gets three meds.
Blood pressure gets two.
Cholesterol gets one.
What am I prolonging?

I’m not living my life.
I’m waiting to age-out and end.
This must be what fly-paper is like.

I wish I’d never found my secrets
I wish my memories remained repressed
I wish I could undo this learning
The unexamined life looks pretty good.