How Offender Remembers

Dedicated to those who have hurt others and for the love in their loving parts.


Powerful last day of Santa Cruz, Psychodrama group. I played the role of Sonya's Abusive father - and she expressed her anger, her pain, his (my) shame.

At the end, I found my own tears,
By asking her through the years,
If she could remember,
Not just my member
But other qualities.
Please, Oh please;

Don't forget my love,
Because of my shove.
Don't deny all the smiles,
Because of the bile,

That also was there.
The time had to share,
With all of my faces;
My meanness, my graces;

My offender, my tender kind places;
My ungrounded phases,
When I wasn't whole,
And got stuck in the shoal;

And couldn't find the channel,
To be whole like the plan; I'll
Say over and over:
Please don't run for cover;

Because I once was;
A shark who had jaws.
It wasn't all of me.
Just like the tree;
Who broke off her branch and fell on the puppy,
Before she could love & see,

That the rest of my wood,
Was more healthy and could,
Support you and shade,
And help us to save,

Our lives anyway.
Although puppy remembers that day,
When I came crashing down,
Acting like a clown,

And was not awake,
And did forsake,
The love I did have,
In my other part's glove.

So I feel such shame.
No excuse for my game.
Don't deserve your forgive.
Want to die and then dig;

A deep, dark, dank grave;
To hide how I behaved.
But before I go,
To that shame bungalow,

Please hear my last words.
I'm still trying to stir curds;
Of stale, mother's milk;
Into beautiful silk.

To say: I love you.
Though I know it is true,
I wish I could touch,
Your heart just as much,

As my shame for my part,
In wounding your heart.
Don't imagine you can hear me,
But perhaps one day you can see,

That the small little things,
Of running on sidewalks or of swings,
On baby's trapeze;
Or a tender, loving squeeze,

Was proof enough there
To persuade how much I care.
That my mistakes were heinous,
But my love shone through just,

Enough to convince you,
Not to stay pinched too.
And cut off yourself,
Like I have been shelved,

So that I'm forgotten;
My wholeness is rotten,
And impossible to mend,
Because our connection had to bend,

Past the breaking point.
Wish I could point...

...the way home.


How Offender Remembers
by Loveson G. Flower
6/8/97