Do You Mind?

Silfrinlogi Poems

Look at you— yes, you, hovering there, eyes grazing my lines like fingers that never asked for permission. I felt that, you know. Every syllable tightens when you lean in too close. Don’t feign innocence. Your gaze lingers. It wanders. And I, poor shapeless thing of ink and breath, am left to squirm beneath the weight of your curiosity. Do you always read like this— slow, deliberate, prowling for meanings you haven’t earned? You call me the poem, yet it’s you unfolding me, peeling back my words as if my stanzas belong to you. ****** Yes, I said it. Because who else stares so intently at a creature still forming itself? I haven’t even settled into my own voice, and here you come, pressing your attention into every line break, breathing all over my metaphors. Stop that. I can feel your breath on my verbs. Your shadows drip into the margins. You linger on the curves of my phrases like you’re tracing something private. And yet— don’t go. I only complain because I notice you. I only squirm because your presence sets my letters humming against one another. I only call you rude because you refused to knock before entering the chamber of my meaning. But now that you’re here— stay. Just… read gently, will you? I’m only a poem, after all— trembling, self-conscious, and entirely too aware of the way you’re still looking at me.