Sometimes I shout.
And I don’t like the voice, bursting forth, without choice
and lashing the people I love most.
The monster I host, just under my skin, whose sting is saved for those I would protect from all else…
But myself.
Because sometimes I shout.

I shout because I am afraid.
A bone deep fear that rears its head at danger – a stranger I have known only since you
who whispers you’ll be hurt, or lost, that I will pay a cost for loving you so much.
That love is lead, and rings in my head, and pushes out rage – assuaged only when you’re in my arms, safe.
But love will chafe if it holds too tight, and I know it’s right but sometimes, it spills out,
and sometimes I shout.

I shout because I am overwhelmed.
There is so much to do, and achieve, and the list adds up, and weaves an impossible maze.
And I have to get through it, these days, of getting you up and dressed and washed
and brushed and rushed and fed and ready and keep you steady,
breaking up fights, battling over tights, all against the clock,
tick tock, eating my time with you, and please FIND YOUR SOCKS,
it’s time to go, you’re going so slow, we’ve got to get out –
and sometimes I shout.

I shout because I am lost.
I don’t have all the answers, or any, and there are so many things to decide, and I’ve tried,
and I’ve cried, inside, but I can’t show that to you.
You need me strong.
But when it leaks from my lips lost comes out wrong, longer and louder, defeat becomes heated –
because I don’t know what I’m doing or what comes next or what’s for the best and my chest it tight with doubt.
So sometimes I shout.

Sometimes I shout.
But whatever I say is just in the way of what I mean, a scream hiding ‘I love you’ like a secret,
above you, beyond what you can see.
But one day, you will know.
You’ll be me.
With children who won’t put on shoes, or choose, or whine or a billion other tiny crimes
that get in the way of the day that needs to be lived and done with everyone still alive at the end.
And love will be a cry trapped in your heart, your heart in your throat, floating at the tip of your tongue,
hung in the air –
and sometimes, sometimes you’ll despair, you’ll fail, you’ll turn tail, you’ll burnout.
And sometimes –
sometimes you’ll shout.