Hearing vs Listening

51-ish.....2 divorces....2 teenage boys....1 in the USAF...1 slipping out of my hands and off of my shoulders because I cannot carry this load by myself much longer. I cannot have another male in their lives to tell them or I what we have done wrong. Cannot hear one more tsk-tsk. As if the click of a tongue and the shallow terms of accusations will help snap me out of mundane mothering. So I hang up without a closing sentiment, because I have no more sentiments except for the physical pain. The physical pain of not being listened to. Of 15 years of single parenting reduced to one slap in the face, that I have been and continue to be, a poor custodial parent. I leave the phone on the coffee table, stare and swallow. The pain resides in my throat right where, if I had an Adams Apple, it would get stuck. Instead , the broken glass, ripped up years of hopes and dreams, gets stuck right below my throat. I CANNOT let the broken glass I swallow get to my heart. So I bleed alone. And no one hears. And no one shows up because friends do need to hang up. Because even when I talk, He won't ever listen to my words. He has left a debris field and forced me to put on a mask and go through the days being the The Voiceless for The Fatherless.