I spend a lot of time
Trying to make myself
Smaller
To shrink myself down
So I take up the least space
Possible

I spend a lot of time
Wishing I could
Trim down
Sharpen my soft edges
Harden my shape
I would rather be someone's rock
Strong and safe
Than their pillow
With loose ends and a soft center

It's impossible to allow someone
To trace my softness
When I recoil where their fingers
Graze my skin
I can only imagine what they think
Of my weakness

It's impossible to live in this body
That I feel unsafe in
A fear I'm constantly aware of
Judgment from all angles

It's impossible to escape
I can't hide from this hatred
My being, my mind
Controlling the image of
My self, my body
My mind is sharp but my body is soft
There's no question as to who
Will give in

I am a goddess
I am strong
I am powerful
I will knock the wind out of you
Make you beg for air
I will bring you to your knees
Pray before you enter the chapel
Of my body
I am a palace
And you should consider it an honor
To enter into my halls
I am made of light and fire
Do not forget that I will blaze and burn
I cannot be quenched
I am an untouched treasure
Pure and rare
Do not disgrace me
Or discard me
I am a goddess
And I refuse to be treated
Like anything
Less

i want to be a cardiologist
maybe then i'll understand
why my heart skips
when you graze my skin
and why it splinters
when i hear his name

i want to be an ophthalmologist
maybe then i'll understand
the novel in your eyes
that your lips cannot express
and the daggers in his stare
that burned me as i passed

i want to be pulmonologist
maybe then i'll understand
the way i lose my breath
when you sigh my name into my lips
and the way my lungs shuddered
when his red-rimmed eyes pierced my will

maybe if i learn medicine
ill be able to explain
why i feel the way i do
for you
or ill find a cure for
heartbreak
so i will finally be free
of him

they've said to do what scares you
because that is what helps you
grow
if something is exciting
and terrifying at the
same time
it is probably the
right thing

you terrify me
every time you score your
fingernails across the
small of my back
catch your teeth on the
curve of my neck
press your lips to the
soft spot above my
belly button
you send tremors through my
glass spine
i could so easily shatter
but you mold to me
blurring my edges and lines
into yours

you terrify me
and excite me
so i think that means
we're doing something
right

you looked at me like i was a treasure
and for the first time
i felt golden

You make me think in poetry
The world becomes a rhythm
A cadence
Ticking along to the beat of our
Synchronized hearts
My name is a song
When it comes from your
Tremoring lips
Every silence is full
Of comfortable emptiness
Nothing is ever void
When I'm tangled in you
I'm drunk off your
Presence
My head spins when you
Trace constellations
Across my collarbones
You play me like a piano
Touch my body like keys
And control every
Shaking breath
The world is a wonderful place
But it is poetry when I'm
With you

I wonder
If you kept
My sweatshirt
Or if it was too
Painful to breathe
The perfume of my
Memory
The stench of my
Absensce

I wonder
If you burned
My sweatshirt
Like you lit the bridges
Connecting us
Erasing
The perfume of my
Memory
The stench of my
Existence