Our sleepovers consisted
Of playing house and she insisted
That I be the boy
And she be the girl

My first kiss
Was unfinished
We were sent to bed
But not to sleep

We kissed under the blanket
And footsteps interrupted
Then light ambushed through the door
And shame came knocking

On Sundays Leviticus followed me home
Lived outside of my bedroom
And visited unannounced
Just to remind me that it existed

It comes fluently
Like a first language
Guilt is the accent I've learned to hide
Letting lies slide off my tongue and fly
Like birds released in a breeze
Can never be seized from the sky
I wish it wasn’t so easy
But the muscles in my tongue have been trained in resistance
Enough to push the weight of all my secrets underneath it

Erasing evidence
Is as easy as touching a screen
Checked it off my to-do list like
Some trivial deed
And the memories
Neglected effortlessly
I trampled
The dwindling fire you were bending over backwards to redeem
My burden of guilt released like
Wind and rain
Extinguishing our
Final flame