I feel it like a twist in my spine: momentary paralysis, a choke on the truth
I declare I'm better than this! your lies, your blatant deceit.

But she exists: giant lips and hair and pale eyes against ravishing olive skin;
A vision of exoticism.
Yes she exists: undeniably, in photographs and in the world and probably in your hands and in your mouth and in your bed
and she probably breathes in the same spices and sweat I too succumbed to,
She exists.
And you lied.
And you owed me nothing, as people never really owe each other anything.

And these pangs
Feel all too sickeningly familiar;
this time I promise myself
not to turn the other cheek,
not to ignore hard evidence, which condemns and reveals the harshest morning-after light
but my eyelids betray me; my mind is set to rewind, it can't get past
your soft mouth or your smooth chest or your voice saying "if you steal my heart, you can tell his father...." or your piercing eyes that felt like danger and freedom and wanderlust intertwined and
I know
putting you on paper is just further validation and permanence
both of which
I seek to avoid.

But I need to speak this pain because it's still moving
inside of me;
How can you, perhaps one step beyond a total stranger, gut and roast me like this? Ripping open wounds from years past,
as if all that scar tissue never
formed in the first place?