dear girl,
i would like to apologize on behalf
of those that will never.
the world lied to you
since you were old enough
to balance a book
to listen, retain,
consume without question

i would like to apologize on behalf
of those that informed you
your value is calculated
by the sum of your parts
that you are worth the contrast of fat deposits
over the angles of fragile bones

i would like to apologize on behalf
of those pining characters they wrote you,
every soul with a haunting disposition
who was given the noble ambition
to invoke longing within those
that remain on the outside
of the glass

because the songs that were sung on the radio
cast you as the the inspiration
but when they painted you lips for love
they denied you the language of narration
and you lived your life thinking
you could invoke magic
if you were only willing
to wait your entire life
for someone else to conjure it

i am sorry
that we filled your head
with empty adjectives
to whisper in your ear
that you were nothing
unless validated by the eyes of strangers
seeing you as nothing more
than a commodity
for which to window shop
and consume

and when they abandoned their casual browsing
their wants transcended your right
to exist
and it was you
they chose to invade
to tear open
because after all,
you were man made
a nail scratching a rib
a void to fill up
with whatever poison they thought you’d look sexier
choking on

dear girl,
i would like to apologize on behalf
of the fact that you remain unnamed,
an improper noun
a caricature,
a statistic,
a silhouette on the back window
mouth a perfect oh
that will never know words

i am sorry that the second
you entered the world with two X’s
they would reduce you
to an exquisite tragedy,
place them over your eyes
and declare that the death of a beautiful woman
is the most poetic thing in the world

i would like to apologize
because this world was never
quite big enough to hold you
and we knew
and we saw
and we opened our mouths,
took a breath,
and we closed them