Because of things
that happened
20 years ago
In a bed at night
When I was vulnerable
Accidentally trusting you
Old enough to leave Home
Not old enough to buy a drink
Just lost enough to fall for you
Give myself to you entirely
Because you had found me
Where others had pathetically not
In me you found the obvious
Fear
Insecurity
Abandonment
Neglect
trauma
You found yourself in me
Except you were twice my age
Affected tho like me - but wrong
My teacher so accessible
And so all the more taboo
For a feral girl without boundaries
Oh you knew me
You smelled me coming down the hall
My untamed heart
My broken heart
My disappointed heart
My empty heart
Waiting for all of you to get inside of it
And fill me up
I thought I needed you
I thought it was love
When you are starving
everything looks like food
Even the poison
You looked at me -
right at me - into me -
I felt you inside of me
naked in my chair like a stress dream
This was English class
Because you acknowledged me
In front of everyone
And without anyone knowing
You searched me
beseeching
pleading
I imagined you begging
I was so stupid to think
You could be mine
And I could be in control

For four years I imagined you begging
For for years you were oh so careful
Late nights at school editing
Driving me home- dropping me last at the top of manhattan
Peeling clementines for me
As I watched your fingers pull back the skin
Just like that
As we discussed my poetry
Until I was gone from you
And had only your words
“Love, Tom”
And a book of poems
Emily
I knew you loved me
And when I returned
In the snow globe of
old 72nd st station
We kissed
You possessed me
This was our secret
You said
And I laughed
In my head
Then out loud but
anonymous and silent
In the rush hour train station crowd
I was not keeping this to myself
I was - so - young
What did you expect from
My hormone flooded
Underdeveloped and broken besides
brain?
Besides thinking I was your
Pet ******
Secrets are for confession
spoken once
never to be repeated
but you repeated
didn’t you?
Mistaking me for Ophelia
Getting me to a nunnery
So the truth didn’t get you fired
But my lips parted
As only a ******’s could
telling all my sisters
What did Ophelia do with all those
tokens anyway?
She didn’t take the ******* train.

That was the night
I was ticketed
For smoking a cigarette on the platform
And tossing it into the tracks.
A secret I begged the officer to keep
From my parents
Which he said he would
But did not
A lie only
A policeman could tell.
So robust I had to believe him
I should have expected him
To betray me
By just doing his job

I could say that
About you Mr teacher
Or was ******* me
without a ******
Without my permission
Part of my homework?