She had the muscle memory of all women.
You mixed one scent with the other.
She’d not sit and wail and wait and surrender.
You wandered through the night, living in your
Own reality, treating women’s bodies like toys.
Thinking that they never take action, that they’re
Passive objects at your disposal, stripped of autonomy
And agency. You’re convinced that your drive
Dominates their own sex.
And she receives all the controversial messages you send
And try to infect her with. She’s not buying your bullshit.
You saw women either as holy or abysmal.
She never understood where you placed her.
Why it even mattered to her. Coming out of your body.
Oh, what did you create?
What are you preaching?
Who are you lying to?
Stroking her hair without recognising the scent of it?
She grew up in your house of judgement.
The languageless vocal cords, your weapons on your sleeve.
You demonised her for everything wrong about you.
Never explaining your insults,
Never understanding the need to apologise for the curses
You threw at her head.
She remembered you behind glass, fragile yet unbroken.
What were you holding on to?
This is the invisible echo losing its blood throughout her life.
You, the silent and distorted face, holding on to her,
Her almost absent body, trying to shed you, the memory
Of what you feel like, the terror you released in the song that was her.
She stepped back to let you know.
That some kind of love had always been there.
Behind bars. Without touch.
With your mouth shut so you could finally look at her
And smile without the urge for destruction.
Croque-Melpomene 