Pressed with
starched confidence
I told her—
I want you to feel
the weight of my words.

Oh, they fell heavy.
Collected in institutions
of incarcerated desires
with no consideration
for the future capacities
of emotional faculties,

shirking the responsibilities
of such fragile hopes–
stomped to shattered pieces.

Pressed  with
ironed resolve,
I held down the diction
that resists the grips of reason,
my clenched fists spilling
to the ground, the dust of it all.