15 Love Letters
1,
In my defense, it was my first time
trying tequila; if I hadn’t been sloshing
Jose, I’d have laughed at your lofted bed
and suggested you fuck YOURSELF instead.
2,
You left me crazy, commiserating
with the magic marker’s ink you sweated
off onto my bed sheets and collecting
the clothes you left on my floor.
3,
I spent the whole time hoping
you weren’t looking at my naked
body, awkward on top of yours.
You must have been.
4,
We were home alone, sprawled
across my couch and your tongue
between my legs kept me awake
all night; we never finished the movie.
5,
You called me beautiful, kissed
the word into my mouth and, at two AM
trekked, fully erect, across campus
to your car for a condom.
6,
You used your fingers and played
my body like you played your guitar;
I shook like its strings.
I rang like your chords.
7,
I should have known
by the silk sheets on your king
sized, vibrating bed.
Unfortunately…
8,
Beneath that cool mountain waterfall,
your paper cranes had nothing
on the way my body folded
against and into yours.
9,
The bad decisions I made
with you are ones that still haunt
me when I wake up and realize
I hurt him by pleasing you.
10,
The Sarasota summertime wasn’t
enough to keep us separate; there were
too many hurricanes in which to swim,
too many bruises to leave.
11,
I used your body to pacify
mine when it had been rejected
one too many times, left
to the hurt of loneliness.
12,
We never were what you wish
I’d wanted to be, and you’ll never
be worth wanting; you were
just something to do.
13,
Real men don’t need to hold
women down on the bed
and force their pants down,
like you did to me.
14,
I’m sorry I left you at the bar,
with the full tab, to walk home.
I realized too late that you
were not him.
15,
We have only just begun
and I am anxious to be destroyed
by you.
