you sob for clipped wings you’d not used in the first place, convinced you are owed retribution by a life unlived. anything to feel justified, anything to feel righteous, all of those televangelist promises made to a religion of victims. you claim to be stunted rejected afflicted to want some cosmic intervention or good intentions but you seem to forget, you know, that the divinity you demand is the same one that put you to your knees.

i can’t remember a time when every word wasn’t an accusation, to tell the truth i don’t even remember when you got the idea to be jaded, that cynical was provocative and that using the second person meant you could say whatever you wanted as long as names stayed off your fingertips. never mind what you want, i want to stop having a reason to call you silly, i want to stop tearing the roots of everything you cling to. i’m waiting for the part where you hold your own hand and fall into your own arms and thumb away the bitterness on your own cheek. i wonder  if you’d take it, given the chance, or if you’ve been silenced by so much conviction that any allusion of love appears mocking.

you’d spread your lips for anyone who looked you in the eye when they talked to you, mindless at the thought of connection or understanding or someone new to feed on, limerency no longer a bullshit science (like there’s logic and reason in lying spread-eagled on the floor clutching your chest and running over every punctuation and sideways eye and all of those other things) you find tawdry, suddenly the protocol is violated and you are excited to slip anyone the tongue, you’ll tell your soul to anyone.