Ophelia, When You're Old Enough

Ophelia, when you’re old enough,

I want you to know

One// It’s not my fault.

Two// It’s not my fault.

Three// It's not your fault.

Four// It’s your father’s fault.

Five// It’s all his fault.

Ophelia,

You are not the catacombs beneath a pervert’s bed.

You smile happy, and your flowing brown ringlets mask the roadkill guts of who your father is.

You are not an exercise machine

Or a pilates machine.

Or a locker room.

Ophelia, when you need me,

You can hold my hand.

You can shake my hand.

You can cut off my hand,

And use it to protect yourself.

Ophelia,

You are a forest that grows for only you.

You grow buttercups and bluebells,

And nobody can set you on fire.

Nobody can paint over you,

Or pave over you

With an incense stick impaled through your palms.

No one can tie your branches behind your head,

And carve their initials in your bark-

Because your bark isn’t wood,

It is the rays of light

 That seep through your father’s curtain of carbon dioxide.

He thinks he’s keeping you alive,

But one day you’ll understand

He’s poisoning us both.

[Ophelia,] when [you’re] old enough

You’ll understand why my friends called the police on your father.

You’ll understand why your dad was in the back of a cop car.

He may tell you that I was a liar

And I was just a teenage girl looking for attention,

And he’d be right

Because he gave me the very attention I wanted.

He saw me as the singer and guitarist I’ve always wanted to be.

He said I must be very talented.

And I must’ve been so talented that he just had to see how [strong] a girl guitarist could be,

As he grabbed my hand to shake and he wouldn’t let go,

Pressing into my veins,

He was a spider

And my blood was marinating his fangs.

He picked me out of our group of girls

Like I was fruit,

As if my flesh and body was ripe for the picking.

But,

Sir, my wisdom teeth haven’t even come in yet.

He said Courtney killed Kurt.

He said like Courtney, I was a killer.

And that I was going to die one day-

That I was going to be killed one day

For speaking my truth.

I stepped away to build a chasm,

But Ophelia,

He used your vines to come back to me.

He asked if I kids.

I said no.

I’m 17.

I am a kid.

He said I’m not too young to start.

I pulled away once more but he wasn’t letting go.

He said he wishes he could meet more girls

That knew every Radiohead song by heart.

And I said

“Sir, girls like that aren’t girls,

They’re women,

And they’re your own age.”

OK Computer was released in 1997.

You were graduating high school

And I wasn’t even born yet.

Ophelia,

 I could feel your sunshine turn to a cyclone behind me.

You became the tornado that wrecks a home,

But still

I was the one feeling like a homewrecker.

We called security.

Security called the police.

I sat in an office.

A gentleman explained to me

That a female officer will be here soon.

I felt like I was in trouble.

Toys R Us prepared me for

My first dollhouse,

But never for

My first police report.

The police said this is not your father’s first time.

I was upset.

I walked to my car in 88 degree weather,

Black hoodie over my head.

Your father was a predator.

And I was a piece of meat.

He liked my little Slayer tank top.

He said I would die by assassination.

But I didn’t care what happened to me.

All I cared about

In that moment

Was you, Ophelia.

I want to apologize for sending your daddy away.

I want to apologize for ruining your book fair.

I want to apologize for my being there.

Had I not existed, your father wouldn’t have met me.

He wouldn’t have acted.

You wouldn’t have to see him go.

And now, I run from your father’s graveyard,

Picking up dry bone of little girl’s skulls.

My bloodied hands reach out to hold yours,

But I feel nothing there.

I hope you can forgive me,

Ophelia, when you’re old enough.