Marle was a girl
named after Father's favorite:
a girl in a game with a cyan dress,
and a pendant that she dropped.
The girl grew up seldom asked
about her gamer's name
that hung about not strange enough
to be spoken of.
The glint was not in her eyes,
like the pixels in the game.
Her Father worked long hours,
and then he played and played.
The drink she held in her hands
was quite unbecoming
of the princess that was wanted
with imagined purity.
It was a fourty-ouncer
that was tipped back and glugged
to make her swoon a little bit,
and then a little more.
Her Mother was a programmer
who moved from job to job.
Her Father filled in the gap
between her Mother's work.
He had a couch in front of a
dusty CRT.
He played it often, but did not
clean it very much.
The nights in which he played his games
he felt no guilt or shame
as he went from world to world,
and imagined realms unfurled.
His daughter played loud music
that bothered her parents not.
It made noise above the basement,
and Father watched TV.
Anime with energetic
beasts that roamed about,
told stories of wondrous things
that did not interest Marle.
Was her Father disappointed
to have a normal daughter?
Who did feel pained and slighted
when she was slightly ignored?
She tipped the fourty-ouncer back
and took another swig
from the bottle she had stolen
from the 7-11.
The sounds of music well-composed
were drowned by screaming men
whose pain she felt she couldn't feel
inside her drunken head.
She made her way under the blanket
in her comfy bed,
and looked through emails on her phone
and then stared at the wall.
Things seemed to spin a little bit,
and then she cracked a smile.
She felt not darkness in her chest
where feelings should have been.