#6, or “I May Think of You Softly From Time to Time, But I’ll Cut Off My Hand Before I Ever Reach For You Again”
She littered on my spirit like my being was her least favorite neighbor’s garden
Her lipstick, wine red and matte, an imprint on my reflection
Cracked glass and teeth scraping, how her kiss bit back
Baby was all sharp edges and I was but a child who never learned not to run with scissors
Grim smiles, cold hands intertwined
Didn’t care where she ended and I began
Unzipped my skin to get her warm
I used to love it when she was here, she kept me vigilant
My own personal heroin(e)
All up in my veins, varicose love song
She sang me home on starless nights in foggy waters
Home
Where my heart resided between clenched fist and crossed fingers
Behind my back, hoped to die, I swear I fought tooth and nail
Little did I know, she swung her tenderness like a hammer
There I was, hung up all good and straight
And wasn’t I just the prettiest thing in her display
She taught me that lips can dissect with the precision of a knife
Ever since that first time, I’ve thought I glowed better under tight lids
You see, she always made sure she’d poke me some holes so I could breath
So you can imagine that the day she disappeared was the day my Earth stood still
Was all lackluster moon, no sun in my wings to make me shine
All black space, no orbit
Could not get that damned lid off the jar
Light flickering, tinkering out, I did not believe in fairies anymore
But I missed her
Like an animal free of a trap after gnawing off their own leg, I missed her
Left my blood trailing so she could follow it, she always said I smelled good
I waited, and waited and waited
Made a sentry out of me with all that time
But she never returned, got not so much as a postcard or a voicemail
Nothing in this world is louder than a silence you did not ask for
Suddenly rainfall on my window sounded like the devil mocking my pain
I was left alone in the exhibit she had made of me with only myself to blame
Maddeningly, still I longed for her all the same
Remembered my teachers telling us how sometimes house slaves grew comfortable in confinement
She’d given me a silver choker that I wore nearly every day in her absence
Have you ever been trained so well, you put the chains on yourself?
She was always there, always there, always there
In the back of my mind, on the tip of my tongue, the corner of my eye
I picked up the phone and put down myself
She answered with feint traces of laughter on the second ring
Unbothered, patient, silver is good enough for you, isn’t it
Silver, as if we all don’t see it and think that gold shines better
I ripped that choker from my throat so quickly it gave me whiplash
Better my hand than hers, but still it stung, and burned, and scorched, and bled
I murdered that ravenous thing she left inside me in cold, scarlet blood
Smothered it bare, staunched the wound
Buried it in my backyard with bitter tears and hollow laughter
Thinking of the first time we met
I was reading ‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’
She told me then that I seemed more like ‘A Mortician’s Daughter’
Now, every once in a while
On blustery nights and blue moons
There’s a ghost in my window
