Criticisms

I
Am good.

For twenty, more,
years your words
had power; held
me
in their sway.

For twenty, more,
years your words
meant mine
must be crafted, molded
to impossible levels
of perfection - never
good enough until, sterilized
with a thousand
reworkings,
they
were yours -
not
mine.

Form and style - the function
and the delivery -
of words, thoughts
dictated by your
word, your
thought.

Cleaving our lives
and still -
the red strokes
of your
criticisms -

how you,
not I,

might say my
word, my
thought -

scribbled
unaided, unbidden
or requested, alongside
the weaker, thinner
marks
of my pencil;

a faded voice
crying out
to be heard
over your
absences..

For twenty, more,
years your words
were
the bar
to be met.

You
are good;

I
am good;

and there is no shame
now
in knowing

I
Am better.

_{(He Knows :: 04-13-2010)}