Broken Family Poem by Brooke Luchich

Lying in my bed at night I could hear them fight and yell,
Falling asleep wishing I could fly away and escape this hell.
My dad was always in a bad mood and my mum was always crying,
But they thought they could fool me and my brother with their lying.
My sister would just leave when things started to get too hard,
But me and my brothers only escape was to hide in the backyard.
I remember once seeing my mums’ clothes thrown out on the front lawn,
The arguments continued and more and more our family was torn.
Eventually it all got too much and mum packed her bags and moved out,
I was so young I didn’t know what this meant or what it was all about.
She came to dads once and he called the cops and said to get off his property,
But mum said she didn’t care and wasn’t leaving until she got to hug me.
I was crying when the cops came and mum had already gone away,
They asked me lots of questions but I wasn’t sure what they were trying to say.
The lady kept asking if mum and dad were nice to us and if I was happy,
I couldn’t believe this cop would think mum or dad would lay a hand on me.
After a while I decided to go and live in mums’ new house with her,
No one was as close as we once were not even me, my sister and my brother.
They hated me for taking mums side and threw all my stuff at our door,
I was so hurt that my family didn’t want anything to do with me anymore.
I could go on forever about how this story played out but I’ll cut it short,
We all lived together again but mum and dad just continuously fought.
My brother and I live with mum now that she’s moved out again,
I only visit dad now because we fight and drive each other insane.
It’s been really tough and taken a big toll on my brother and me,
But slowly we’re sorting it out and at least I still have all of my family.