You're a match and I'm still gasoline, in five acts
Maybe I could be good at this, I whisper, but I keep it so quiet that you can’t hear and hold me to it
I. You crawled into my heart and made a nest, lapping at the blood around my mouth and gently kissing the bruises mottling my skin. Maybe I could be good at this, I whisper, but I keep it so quiet that you can’t hear and hold me to it. I know I’m going to fall hard. I just hope you’ll hold my hand on the way down. II. I think the wound that is my soul may be too covered in scar tissue for me to go back to girl-that-was, girl-that-I-miss. I think my heart might be too young. I spent so many years breaking and protecting and building walls that now, now that I’m finally learning to feel, my heart is like a child still learning— III. Something has changed. I feel like all I do is feel with all my broken pieces and the black holes between them. in the secret place inside my head. All I want is love, and love, and love, and still I run from it, fast and sloppy. Does that make me a monster? Does that make me profane? Does that make me human? I feel like all I do is say yes, and yes, and yes, please, take what you will, and more still, only the words never make it past my throat. IV. Here are my carotid and my aortic and my femoral. Here is my neck, I say, Yes, I am here to breathe for you because I don’t care what you do if afterwards you make my body a shrine because, surprisingly, I trust you. For so long I’ve shown less than an ember, a coal, with barely enough oxygen to continue to burn, and I know you wondered if I wanted, too, and with you I think, maybe, I do. V. You crawled into my heart and made a nest, lapping at the blood around my mouth and gently kissing the bruises mottling my skin. I love you, I say, and take your hand, ignoring the punch to my gut and the collapsing of my lungs because no one ever told me when I was young— Maybe you don’t have to sacrifice your beating heart whole and bloody, wrenched from your chest, maybe you can just offer its care to someone who might treat it with gentleness.
Wow, just wow. Lonely robot theme is so right about being punched in the gut.
I got that stomach sort of flipping when you you're in a lift (elevator) why did I translate that, anyway you are amazing
"as is this writing.
and I know you wondered
if I wanted, too,
and
with you
I think, maybe, I do."
"Maybe you don’t have to
sacrifice your beating heart whole
and bloody, wrenched from your chest,
maybe you can just offer its care to someone
who might treat it with gentleness."
Oof these hit hard in all the right ways 🙏💕
This is incredible! I love all of it. So tender, but also kinda violent. When I got to "maybe I could be good at this" I had to stop reading. Only because the image it conjured was so stirring, I had to write a poem of my own before continuing.