#aneverwriter

So I welcomed you into my arms

And carved you a home inside my body

Just to keep you warm

But see, I tend to forget

That you can’t make a home in a person

Because you will be left empty

When they take their leave

Not everyone is meant

To withstand the storm and calamity

That goes on in your head

And more importantly,

You can’t love someone

Than the love I carried for you

And my tongue has never tasted anything more sacred

Than the sound of your name

I am praying to the gods old, new and forgotten

To forgive me for trying to reach for a heaven

I never knew even existed

But how could I resist the temptation

When you are the closest thing

For the love it never had

To the girl with a crown of broken hearts:

How does it feel to carry the burden

Of the love of many

Yet having loved none?

I am curious to see

How your heart is doing

Inside your ribcage

Trapped and afflicted

To listen to the sonnets written

By every boy and girl

There’s a graveyard

Filled with tiny little coffins

And inside of them

Are stories of things that could’ve been

Of chances I should’ve taken

Of holding hands that could’ve led to kisses and drunken solemn nights and lazy Sunday mornings

They are the stories I did not pursue

The dreams I’ve long since forgotten

The people I wondered about in passing

And in all honesty

My mother taught me that love came with a price tag

Through my parents I saw that a family was about financial stability

Not love, or unity, or trust, or forgiveness, or what--even?

 My mother taught me that love came in size 0

“Eat less, exercise more” “darling, I love you but please change”

But Mom I—“It’s okay to have an opinion but you’re wrong and I’m right”

 My mother taught me to apologize for everything

I’m sorry I’m not perfect, I’m sorry I’m not skinny, I’m sorry I’m not pretty

“That’s alright, darling, just do it again; except this time do it right”

 My mother—my poor pitiful mother

Needs to be taught how to love

When my father finally had the courage to pack up and leave

To give up in a relationship that shouldn’t have lasted in the first place

I gained the courage to stop apologizing

 On the night of my 20th birthday my mother gave me a phone call

And in the static line that connected us thousands of miles apart

I told her, ‘Mom, I’m gay’—unapologetically

I was—I am—done apologizing for being myself

 I listened to her cry hysterically on the phone, barely able to hear her say

“What happened to my life?” as the phone fell from her hand and I heard the busy tone

I don’t know, Momma, but that sounds like a personal problem

 Mother I am size girl not size 0

You don’t have to tell me that boy is not good enough for your standards

Because he doesn’t even exist in mine

Mother I’m gay and I cannot—will not change my mind like you tell me to

Mother I will modify my body as I wish no matter how it makes you feel uncomfortable

I will no longer apologize that my life choices makes you feel as if you’re a personal failure

 Mother I love you but you need to change

For the sake of my sister and the sake of our family

Accept that love isn’t found in credit cards and shoe boxes

The amount of carats in that diamond is not equal to what real love feels like

 Mother I am saddened by your state

I wish I could write you enough words to make you understand that being different is not wrong

That loving another woman is as natural, as unstoppable as the sun rising every morning

That love doesn’t come with a price and instead, acceptance

But mother I cannot make you learn how to listen

 I never imagined I’d want you to be at my wedding

Where there will be two brides walking down the aisle

I often imagine you rendered catatonic with the sight of me bringing my girlfriend over for dinner

But mother seasons change, I hope people do too

In the end I want you there, fussing over my hair and my dress—acting as the bridezilla

And remembering that it is my wedding, not yours

I am done letting words die on my lips

From now on I will let them roll out of my tongue

No matter that they may get twisted

Or that they may not come out as poetic

My mouth will no longer be a graveyard