It was the way you didn’t understand
passion unless it was
passion fruit vodka, but you know
how to fuck, and it was
enough, enough for you, but
it wasn’t what I needed when
I’d been awake all night, watching
the luminous numbers drip away
because you were beautiful and you
couldn’t love me.
I was the way you showed no
interest in me, even after your
lips found mine on that frosty day in
November, when you had a
girlfriend and I was intoxicated
with the taste of your mint gum.
It was the way your arms were too
long to be proportional to your body and
kept me safe in my dreams, until
you rolled away in the middle
of the night and cringed when
my skin brushed yours.
It was the way you threw
bold-faced words at me in
the middle of the street, trying
to hurt me, but not seeing the
indifference I had borrowed from
sweatshirts and mix CDs now in
uniform boxes along the wall.
And now it’s the way your blatant
I’ll wait for you forever stabs me like
an IV needle being put in by a
pale-faced and clammy intern because
I was never worth the truth from you.
C. Brown 