There is something to be said about me loving women:
I did not love them gently. I had rage and
though their skin was smooth, their hearts could be as hard as
a man’s. Then, there are the men who I held when
mugs of green tea were only something we could burn our
tongues on, we would slide them together
and their wounded bodies slept on the other’s welts.

I have learned it is okay to be soft to those who can hurt me,
that there are hundreds of ways to love someone
that his hurt and her hurt is not always similar to mine.

I have relationships with and in watercolors.
The paints are conversations we could never bare having or
dishonesties swirling, permanent on some canvas –
picked up colors as wiry black hairs and straight auburn ones.
She folded my dress on the balcony but
a grey windstorm violently stole it. She made it happen.

I have learned that purity can hurt me, too,
the skipping stones that stub someone else’s toes and make
their feet taste like salt. The women I have loved
saw moonlight brighter than I ever would,
just so they could dim it themselves, like a dull knife.

When the soft bodies became too hard of hearts,
someone told me that I was going to love again soon
but it was not the same. I do not hit my pillow when my head
becomes insomniac, thinking of their faces.
I love men who are as fragile as tea leaves and taste so
sweet: their hurts feel just like I am vomiting my breakfast.