Was an embarrassment by any standard
Seven small pus-filled holes
Nonetheless a constellation
Regardless of who might be within earshot
A midnight blue song to my body
The body smoking on a porch
The body unable to admit to yet nonetheless living its wants
The body downloading
My grandmother's broken eggs
The body in contract with darkness
*
Fell in love with married people, taken people, off-limits people, couples, ideas, trees, specific hairlines, every teacher, every airplane attendant, every bartender
“Unavailable people”
Was unavailable
Summoned love
And was decimated
Watched dogs take giant shits
Wished not for your death but your undoing
Which is to say
I allowed for the possibility of your liberation
*
Made a poetry of private curses
Put mint cookies on your eyes and crushed them slowly
Did not agree when you implied I was difficult
Lost my taste for silent resentment
Became a prince
Beamed love at passing cars
Did not play spectator to your hateful relationship with your mother
Advocated for free knowledge
Took photographs of ugly things
*
Arrived late and left early
Showed signs of having cried
Didn’t honor your whimpering silence
Or fancy your new bland project
Let you drop off
Stayed up late reading about cancer
Reading about James Baldwin
About how to unclog my chakra
The one currently jammed
By the unborn baby of an ancestor
*
Became willing to see myself
Beyond the edge of the shape to its texture
What is this white thing I am caked in
My White Lady mold showed cracks
To touch its blindness
To cry the onion milk
Emily Kendal Frey lives in Portland, Oregon, where she is a teacher & poet & psychotherapist. You can follow her on Instagram at @emilykendalfreypoetry. Her counseling website is at ekfreycounseling.com.