When you’re seventeen
and drunk off of
poetry and
peonies
and promises,
you start to give
pieces of yourself away.

It’s easy at first,
parcelling out knees
and elbows, and
all the bits of you
the world has
taken for itself
on playground sidewalks
and crashed bicycles.

But when someone wants
not the spaces
in between your fingers
but the one in between
your legs,
wait.

Not for marriage
or God or
even the perfect person
to come along
because they never will.
And that’s okay.

Wait for yourself to grow
and to love someone
like candle fire,
a slow, bright burn
that makes the
darkness of night
seem less
frightening.

You’ll fall
in love
with people
like broken glass
that gleam under
streetlights
and cut your
hands
as soon as
you touch them.

You’ll sleep
next to lions
and cowards
and drug addicts,
some too scared
to touch you.

And some promise
to never leave
you in morning’s light
without a new scar.

Because they don’t
understand that you are
yours,
and yours
alone.

But remember
no matter
if your secret places
were found
or taken,
your light will
return to you
one day
when you least
expect it.