i was okay being marked ‘damaged goods’
because i was yours and you let me believe
that you could possibly be mine.
you found me beautiful, remarkable,
understood me in ways that no one else could.
i thought with you i found meaning -
i was made whole in your embrace,
my name never sounded sweeter than on you lips.
'no one will ever know you the way i do’.
i was unknowable the way most broken things are
the pieces were all there but in no discernible way.
no way anyone but you could look at my jagged edges
and find beauty and strength and love.
love.
it’s so strange how the first time the words left my lips
and pressed themselves into your skin 'love, love, i love you
i’m in love with you’
yours only grew silent.
i could pick apart the ways you twisted my love
made it something perverse and ruinous.
'you don’t know how to love someone’
and maybe i don’t but i thought with you i could try,
that i could learn be someone worth loving.
i was never one for fervent prayer
but i got my knees and i prayed to God.
i prayed for guidance and assistance.
i prayed for patience and wisdom.
i prayed to be absolved of the sin of loving you.
we were great, beautiful, and terrible things.
and i wonder if you ever truly loved me
the way i thought i loved you.

I memorized the way you spoke my name.
the way your lips curved around the vowels,
like the soft kisses you used to brush on the tops of my cheeks;
even the harsh consonants
rounded out to soft sounds.
soft lips, soft hands, soft sighs.
you said my name like a prayer, reverent,
as if holding a communion with God
and only He knew the right dips and sighs in pronunciation
yet He decided to share them with you.
there was teasing and jokes and nicknames,
but alone you whispered my name.
it had power. it had grace. it had meaning.
you were the only one who truly knew it.
sometimes i wonder, if when what we had died
my name died on your lips.

I wonder if I think of us in religious images
because I blame your God
(my God, our God, whose God)
for keeping us apart before we could begin.
I couldn’t find places of worship in your skin,
I couldn’t find them in the hard chapel pews.
They might be in the book you love,
That I struggle to make sense of
Because the words on the pages don’t match
The words in the sermon.
Between peace and impasse,
I’d pick the former if only it meant
Understanding where things went wrong.
Maybe loving you was sacrilegious.
Maybe the assurance that I was “good enough” That I was “worthy of love and loving”
Shouldn’t have made you bathe in holy water
And reread passages of your book
Looking for the answer to your prayers.
I couldn’t save you from self imposed damnation.
Your parents, your church, your faith.
I was never your salvation nor you mine.
But maybe I’ll pray for us,
Who we could have been and who we were
And hope that God still hears my prayers.

i’ve welded words like knives.
they say to build your walls up high
but levis break and dams fail
because to build up obvious defenses
means showing you have weakness to hide.

attack,
in brute strength
in cold precise strokes
in disinterest and neutrality
do not show anger
such humanity is a lofty goal
and you are a monster.

aspire to be less
to feel less
to hold yourself to less
you are worthless
(there is worth in worthlessness
for when you are gone
all that remains are your words like knives
but even those wounds eventually heal)

A diver and a feather both fall
simultaneously
from the same height
into a pool of still water.
The diver makes a slash,
the feather hardly a ripple.
But when they land
the water changes
in the same way it did
when you entered my life.

i.
i built a temple of devotion
my heart laid in offering
i christened it in blood and tears
and adorned it in cloth
built from words
pressed into a neck
and buried into ribs

ii.
i tore down a temple
my own place of worship
with blooded hands
and tear stain cheeks
i washed myself in the unholy seas
leave shrines and sanctuaries
in the hands of gods worth worshiping

iii.
i buried a seed in arid soil
laid forgotten in a dead land
parched
dry
i trampled over it
pushed it deeper within the ground
ignored
alone
i sought something i could not touch
but knew not how to dig

iv.
i stumbled by chance
into a home that was not my own
i sat around the hearth
and poked the idle flames
hestia laid beside me
but i could not see her face
she was joined by another woman
whom i did not know
they sat with me in silence
until the dawn broke again
when they moved on their way
inviting me to follow

v.
i know the feeling
of mortar and stone
there is grit underneath my nails
and a heaviness in my arms
but i’ve forgotten the structure
of temples built long ago
i know longer know
of altars offerings
made to mortals built up to gods

vi.
i want to build a home
brick by brick
your hands in mine
the sweat on our backs
turn over the earth
and plant roots beneath the ground
let it hold fast
in the weathering of storms
let it stay warm
in the cold of winter
let it be blessed and graced
in unity and strength
a home built upon steady foundation