I. When I speak, I stumble over sentences.

Like words are so uncomfortable in my mouth,

That they fall haphazardly into the world.

II. My hair is a wreck, and my eyes are like winter.

There are days where I feel like the atoms of my body

Came together in a storm and never quite fit just right.

III. I constantly find myself going back to the months I spent with you.

I hear your words in my head all the time.

"You put your love in a basket clearly labeled 'Do not touch.'"

"You can't be raped by someone you love."

"Kill yourself if it hurts so badly."

IV. It has been almost a full year,

And I still think of you almost every day.

People told me love was beautiful.

There was nothing poetic about the way I loved you,

And your struggle to maintain power over me.

I still tremble in memory of you

Whenever my boyfriend touches me.

V. I wish you could see that you made me afraid

In every sense of the word.

Fear is constricting.

I spent too many nights 

Wishing my lungs would stop gasping for air.

My very existence became whiskey and wasted thoughts.

I forgot who I am,

And I'm still busy trying to figure it out.