Girl,
how do you see me?
from the hollow of the elbow of your newest
crooked and criminal
through cold
fish eyes?

We never truly made up
you plastered on a smile
icing on a flacid cake
a week old and cracking in heat
perhaps we misunderstood
licking the sugar
when we should have been chewing
whole mouthfuls
of mouldy and stinking cake
sleeping beneath the shininess
hiding fears.

Girl,
now my toes dance
in firework arcs on the beach
celebrating
being untethered and heard
in ballet surf,

without you

now my love climbs
any tree
not just the hopeless one
greased with your spit
of horrific spite,

without you

the fish hook removed
from its crimson rusted hole
my lip now heals
set in a wink
without you.

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