Needles

Fri, 06/21/2013 - 22:05 -- kopecj

They looke like needles

That someone decided to slip just beneath the surface of your skin 

Wherever they thought they might fit 

They look like they hurt 

Like you had real reason to carve each one 

Against your dark skin, they're white like ash

 

There is another one, a newer pink one

Right above the paper-like crease your elbow makes on your inner arm 

You said 

That this one came from a mishap with a car door

I try to convince myself 

That because this one is rounded and thick 

It must be true

So far I haven't been successful

 

I know that I'm probably being stupid

That not every story has to have a heart break 

That if I could just summon up the courage to ask

You'd tell me

Exactly where the needles came from 

But I just can't 

 

You were not born a liar

A nd in the back of my mind there still lies a whisper

Saying that you slit those needles there 

That you liked the way they looked

Before you were stable enough to know any better

And even when I smother whisper like a fire that didn't know how to burn 

I still don't want you to make the lie true

 

Because

 

Right now, you're my proof

That I or anyone else for that matter 

Can walk through the wild fires life sets

And dodge most of the flames

Escape the third degree burns

 

Right now, you're my proof

That I can make it through high school

Without knowing the taste of cocaine 

Or the feeling of steel slicing flesh

And still meet the dipkoma at the end of the tunnel

 

Right now, you're one of the last people I have that can prove 

That in this generation 

There doesn't have to be a moment 

When you give up 

 

 

 

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