I write about my ex a lot,
we didn't talk much, but our tongues touched,
we used to have *** a lot and
it was so hot that it set my soul ablaze,
and no, it wasn't my first time, but ****,
he sparked something in me, I was ready to tell
my mother I am in love now and I am a woman
in ways I never was before, I hoped that these
flames never go out, I'd proudly show off these
burn marks and these scars, I'd leave my
Neosporin at home.

I said that I needed someone to come along and
break my heart, but no, it was only a joke, I just
needed that spark to write, something to get me
fired up, something to get my pen scalding ink
into the page, but why did it have to be pain?
You were never good at detecting sarcasm,
you were never good at reading my text
messages, responding to my love, my love
this burns, I have reached my boiling point
everything of yours must go now.

Take back those texts which were more like
I was conversing with myself, the phone calls
that were always convenient for you, the "baby,
I really want to see" when you felt like being bothered,
the "I miss you" when you wanted to slide inside me,
because remember, we didn't talk much, our bodies
touched, we used to have *** a lot, naive of me to think
that lust could convert to love so easily, you quickly
reminded me that I am was playing with fire.

Take back those shirts and hoodies that used to smell
like you, the ones that I would breathe in deeply when
you weren't in my presence, take those good days back,
they cloud my judgement and make me forget that the
bad times outweighed the good like a fat kid on a seesaw,
take back those words, you didn't mean any of them, those
lies that stuck to my thighs, this body tagged with your graffiti,
this love that was never reciprocal, never equal, I love math
but I have always had a personal beef with improper fractions,
take this body, this ******-WAIT. Actually, just bubble wrap that
and put it in a box and send it back to me, I will be sure to give it
to someone more deserving than you next time.

My friend warned me after our second break-up that this is
dangerous, but I said no, I waved her off, that because you,
an arsonist and me, a pyromaniac, that this is just the way our
love goes, I turned off the sprinklers, ignored the beeping of the
detectors, I snatched the batteries out after a while, I told my
friend no matter what do not call 911, do not extinguish this,
there is no point, this forest fire destroys everything in its path,
this love is a slow burn.

There are things that you can't take back, things that you want
to give back, or throw away, they still find a way back into your attic,
or back in your bed, or lodged into your brain, I remember scrolling
Twitter once, and landed on one of your tweets, you said that you
was just dating but it was nothing special, and that caused my heart
to combust, as if implying that I was nothing special, like I didn't concave
my body in the ways you wanted me to, like I didn't engulf myself in
submission, like I didn't become the woman that you wanted, nothing
special and that burned like spraying perfume into my eyes, and that
singed like rubbing alcohol into a fresh wound, hurtful pits of rage, I
felt flames coming from my ears, I spat venom, I became a Komodo
dragon, I became dead set on ruining everything you owned, my blood
simmered, it reeked of the smell of my bubbling flesh, I have reached my
melting point, everything of yours is gone now.

At least I can say I tried even when it went up in smoke, I coughed and
choked and my eyes ran tears, I am the last thing to go, and though this
pains me, I must leap from this burning building even if it means I'll break
my legs, at least I know about sacrifice, at least I know about love though not
much to show for it but at least I tried; I am the one who flew too close to the
sun, I am the one who couldn't control the chariot and Zeus had to strike me
down, I came back alive as a firefly, pray you get to catch me next time, I arose
from the debris blemish free, my friends will say look how you glow now, and I
will say yes and I now have tons of material, but why did it have to come from
pain? I hope you are scrolling on Twitter or Instagram or see me in person and I am
smiling, and you think wow what happened to all of her scars, isn't she something
special, she looks so beautiful, she is so happy, without me...without me? And I hope
it burns your hearts to ashes.

Week six.  
There is a natural disaster occurring, tsunamis of
morning queasiness Monday through Friday, Tuesday's
lunch on my favorite pants, denial dances on the weekends.
It was Sunday. One word, two syllables caused a tornado
of emotions, hurricanes of tears hit my hands and pours to
the floor, my heart sinks and drowns. How many casualties will there be?

Fact:
I account for thirteen percent of the population but
thirty-seven percent of all abortions.

Saturday.
With my hoodie sheltering my identity, I enter the building.
Protestors, shouting this is ******, hand me pamphlets that I ball up and
throw away, sign my name and wait. Blood samples and *** tests.
Ultrasound pictures, nurses ask do I want to be sleep or awake?
Counselor asks how will I feel on Sunday? Floods of tears drench
my shirt, uncertainty and guilt gets caught in my throat. It’s time.

Fact: I am five times more likely to get an abortion than white women.

I remain stoic.
But in the inside, I tremble like a newborn antelope fearing the new world.
I weep like a lioness losing her cub. The nurses strap my legs to the paddles.
My heart beats and I swore if you looked closely, you could see it protruding
out my chest, my mind races and I swore I saw galaxies and landed on Saturn,
I stare out at the strawberry colored walls and I remembered how far along
the nurse said I was. I couldn't muster the nerve to look at the ultrasound screen.

Fact: Sixty-nine percent of pregnancies of black women are unintended compared
to fifty percent of hispanic women and forty percent of white women.

Seven weeks and six days.
I couldn’t stop thinking about the numbers. I’ve been here for eight hours.
At half an inch long, it is about the size of a blueberry with webbed fingers and toes.
Out of wedlock birthrates among black women is seventy-two percent, fifty-four percent
for hispanic women, and twenty-nine percent for white women. I was doomed to be a statistic
either way. The procedure took five minutes, though it felt longer than the whole day I
was there, as if the hands of the clock stubbornly refused to move.

Fact: Abortion has killed more black Americans than crime, accidents, cancer, and AIDS.

In a daze.
I didn't hear the nurse say it was over. A wave of cramps wash over my lower body leaving a
paralyzing feeling in my legs. I remembered the nurse had taken the final ultrasound image.
I lifted my head a little to see but I didn't have the courage to look that time either so I averted my eyes to the ceiling but I knew it was pitch black. I could no longer hear any lightning that
ripples through the clouds or feel the avalanche of Wednesday’s pizza ready to erupt on my coat. The worst is over now. All that’s left to do is count the catastrophes. I call this my own
personal genocide. I put on my clothes and swallow the antibiotic pill as the nurses speak
but I cannot hear. It is all silent.

It is all silence.
It all fades. It all fades.

Faux Things

It was 3AM.
I had too many cups of *** and I wanted to hear your voice
before I fell into a drunken stupor.
You didn't answer my two FaceTime calls or texts so
it got my mind to racing, was our love ever real to you at all?

Your love was...
                            Press on nails
                            Eyelashes that I wore to junior prom
                            WWF (this broke my heart too)
                            Taco Bell's beef
                            Government cheese
                            Diamonds that bling but not worth
                            a thing at appraisal, gold chains
                            that turn your neck green, leather
                            boots that turn out to be polyester,
                            Louis Vuitton bags, bootleg movies....On the contrary my love was

Those blood diamonds that you go to war for, those
Ideologies you get ****** for, those truths you get burned for,
those faiths you get nailed to crosses for-staple my hands
to a cross and I bleed reasons why I believed in you over and over.
I was a martyr for love.

I was a *******,
the harder you hurt me, the more I craved you,
the more I needed you to love me how I loved you.
Maybe the love was never real and I clung onto
my own illusions...Or
  
                                  What about the way you called me baby rang from your lips, or
                                  the way our fingers would intertwine, merging like expressway
                                  lanes-I guess we were on the fastest route to heartbreak-
                                  Or what about the way our bodies would mesh, sort of like
                                  melting chocolate, your butterscotch and my mocha combining
                                  to make a new flavor.

Was any of that real? Because my love for you was deep,
I was never afraid to drown in your currents, come up for air, try again,
be engulfed in you. Every moment was precious like picking seashells at the
bottom of the ocean. You never even attempted to remove your floaties and move from
the shallow waters for me.

Nothing is a fake as the expectations you impose and the lies and the promises that
they can fulfill them...
                                
                                and nothing is as real as that heart sinking feeling,
                                drunken with disappointment, kamikaze mission colliding
                                right into your chest-How can I feel my heart beating and
                                breaking at the same time? How can these emotions be
                                erupting inside of me while you either feel nothing or everything?
                                Does it even pain you?

Even fake flowers can appear real. I wouldn't know how to spot a counterfeit dollar if it was in my hands. When did I realize that I was walking around with a fake purse?

                               But do you know what else is real? The memories and moments,
                               the time that we can’t take back. I can’t remove your kisses from
                               my collarbone or the way you held my hand at the train station as
                               if you didn’t want to release me, the look in your eyes as if you
                               wanted to say something but something was repelling you not to.

Maybe your love for me was real in that glimpse of time, in that freeze frame moment,
just not in the way that I needed. We can’t get that back. Can we? Maybe?
Why would I want to? Why would you? Maybe?…
                                                                                   Wrote the text that I never sent.