You erupt at my fingertips, the beat of my heart,
My breath, you burst, your body, the deadbeat skin,
Frowning, all its devastated layers, looking down on me, trying
To swallow me, stomp me back into nothingness, grab
Me by my hair to pull me out, violently, to make
Myself worth your while, useful to you, the body of a
Girl, yours to behold, yours to let go, yours to discriminate
Against, a punching bag for your insanity, entangled, I.
Stop breathing, you are too loud, you irritate me,
Go, go, go away, go do something, leave me alone,
What do you want from me, toughen up, you don’t
Need this, you don’t need that, I didn’t have these
Things either. I reimagine your scent. I can barely
Remember. I started to refuse to breathe you in.
I breathe you out. I focus on the dirt, the smell of your
Silent decay. Call me heartless. Call me so wounded that
I simply cannot forget and am suffocating within memories
Where you burst, your body bursts and swallows mine, away, I.
I wish I could write letters of love to you, but
Had I not decided to live, you would have let
Me disappear, dissolve in your cornering presence.
I cut and cut and cut you off, and almost nothing
Remained that I wanted to last, wanted to save.
You always mixed up the worst with the best, you never stopped,
I had never been enough, to cure you, maintain you,
Feed you my entire soul that you continued to break
And I didn’t know where to go to get rid of you.
Every step towards you feels like I’m taking part
In your death, you want me there, you always
Wanted me there, you never wanted to be alone,
You needed to inflict hurt so you felt alive, in charge,
So you believed that you had meaning in this world
That you always turned your back on but wanted
Everything from it, demanded, greedily, criminally,
Draining me, draining the world I lived in, enriching
Yours, letting me drown in your filth and rot, not
Accepting no for an answer, to join your prayers
That bring you underground, into the fire, I don’t know,
But you want me there, your daughter, alone, I.
Croque-Melpomene 