Disregarded. He is ignored, dismissed. The wordless message: Disappear. The murmured message, grumbled by those he should most trust: Shut. Your. Mouth. She hides her face behind a mask of licorice-black hair. Strong, afraid, searching. An impediment of speech ensures that telling her side will be complicated, slow. There's no one to tell anyway.
His need for belonging and adoration eclipse rational thought. He tells tales to weave a reality that is livable. Safe.
Her need to understand, to fit, to breathe, overshadow restraint. She begins the tightrope dance of belonging in the world of men.
Who will hear? Who will enter into the web of fantasy and choking silence that winds 'round his lips, his mind -- soon his all. Who will be on his side first; who will shout his worth?
Who will reach? Who will call her down from that too-high strand, that too-risky place, and invite her into safety? Who will listen, beyond shaking lips and stilted words, and understand that she already is; that she is becoming?
The hearing, the reaching: they take time.
It is inconvenient to love.
The leaving, the ignoring: they are effortless.
Play blind, dumb, mute. For the sake of ease.
It costs all to withhold. It is inconvenient to love.
