your name is the only thing that makes the alphabet matter,
I knew this was real when you told me to stop dreaming
and start living. I love you.
it'll never change.

Never fall in love with a poet.
They will break you apart
like stanzas.
You are a metaphor,
a simile, an oxy-
*****.
Never fall in love with a poet.
They will tear you apart
like a rough draft,
burn you, and then
call it art.

© A. Leigh

it's unnerving how easily a pair of eyes strip me down
and take away every layer of defense
I have built up over the years.
hey sweetie, why don't you come over here?
because I don't want to, because you're repulsive
and your voice is scary and I felt your eyes on me
from the instant I crossed the street and I was hoping
you wouldn't speak.
want me to show you a good time?
but I was having the best time before I knew you existed,
when I was still just a person walking home
and the silent threats you make hadn't made it to
the horizon of my mind
****, what you doing walking around with hips like those?
hips like these belong to my mother and
her mother and all of the women that have come
before me. in my body I possess history and blood
so strong it was only ever spilled during times of war.
how dare you. attempt to take that strength and power and pride
away from me. don't you know that I am magic,
that my body exists as art only
I should be allowed to admire
who gave you permission to steal from god's temple?
[I still see the dark look in your eyes
when you said that to me, the emptiness of
your pupils haunt me. they say that you see
me as nothing more than a body, a corpse.
someone to walk over.
someone to conquer.
you licked your lips and winked, the
wrinkles in your skin were clear even in the dark
and I could see that your two front teeth were
missing, so now I can't stop having nightmares
you grabbing me and tearing me apart, using
the same legs you whistled at as toothpicks]
why are you walking so ******* fast?
because you are terrifying. because I know
despite how brittle your bones may appear
there is a large chance if you catch me I won't
escape. because the risk of not escaping is an
automatic death to me in every sense of
the word. because I have friends, and they have
told me how their bodies were pillaged at the
hands of men like you.
who the **** do you think you are?
I think I am an island and I wish you
wouldn't insist on being so intrusive.
******* too, *****
I just want to go home. I just want to go home.
why can't you let me do that?
you're not even that pretty anyway
when I met up with my best friend
she hugged me
and said I smelled like vanilla,
that I got more beautiful over the summer,
and that boys are going to lose their minds
when they see me.
my mother shows me off
boastfully, brags about my small waist like it
is a trophy, tells all my family that I am
peligrosamente hermosa,
dangerously beautiful.
and I believed them until I met you.