I used verbs instead of my hands.
My time to hide and reappear.
My lights would flicker or die.
My body froze and I accepted
What I could. I looked back on
Cancerous hands and gestures and
Whispers and felt that nothing
Would ever be enough, would cure
The images in my head, put into
My skin and everything below the
Surface.
I would let the girls laugh.
I tortured my body into a
Metamorphosis that was never my own
And yet. My wounds listened to
Everything that was uttered against me.
Salt and blood would linger on my body.
I tried to disappear behind the protective
Projections, would hollow myself out
To fit into the hearts of pedestrians.
You forced me in my place when
Nothing except my subconsciousness
Was awake. I became an adjective for
Your display and disposal, to be twisted
And blown out of proportion.
You made sure that I would feel older
Than my peers. You let me discover the
Language of what happened on my own.
I would stare at the carefree girls,
The sexes of boys, the insatiability,
The cruelty of all erupting from centuries.
You have made me so angry.
I was still a child. I held on to it as much
As I could. I died in the chasm you created.
I became my own disembodiment to satisfy
Your needs and lie to mine. I believed in love
But you rendered me blind to it,
Claiming that I could live without it.
“The Temptation of Sir Percival” by Arthur Hacker (1858-1919)
