Getting it

"Spaghetti again?
With zucchini?"
Raised high,
thrown down,
reddish brown,
spreading blood-like
across tile.
Granite rage,
over small,
inconsequential things,
like crashing
boulders raining
from hurricane-
green skies.
Purple-blue terror
spinning, negative -
black against
white, turned
inside out
as tiles
impact skin.
Bright red,
spreading over
cool tiles.
Unforgiving, towering
above cowering,
shrinking, not-
quite-violet.
"Please no
more, please."
"Why do
you make
me do
this? How
many times
have I
warned you?"

* * * * *

Late night,
silent house,
floorboards screaming
at each
feather touch
of bare,
tip-toeing foot.
Keys hidden,
phone locked
away, doors
padlocked, but
forgotten basement
window permits
escape like
wriggling from
death's womb.
Running, breathless.
Ocean of
dewy grass,
shivering terror,
and excitement -
a dolphin,
surfacing, gasping
after ten
years submerged.
Miles away
still hiding,
running place
to place,
praying sanctuary
does not
become cage.
Papers signed,
writs sworn,
arrests made,
testimony given,
bars close ...
at last
a deep
breath, life-
giving oxygen.

* * * * *

One year
one day
later, spaghetti
served with
zucchini, and
deep, sparking
laughter. Dancing
through days
of forgotten
joy, dizzying
freedom, long
phone calls,
old and
new friends.
Moving on,
the fear,
the wasted
years, bleed
into brown-red,
new-tilled earth,
sprouting fresh,
newborn life.

Redeem: To make up for. In this case years of lost self and lost life.