Nothing to Do With Me

I am drawn to bodies of water like lines drawn in sand. I walk to water’s edge and stare ahead.

I learned to love, not the sky with its abundance, not the earth. I learned to love boys and men who hurt me, ignored me, touched me in ways I didn’t like. I learned to love them, worked hard on the erection of their pedestal which stood upon buried bodies of older desires. I learned to be good, complacent, compliant, pliable,

desirable.

My back is a sidewalk, my vagina a swimming pool, my eyes dead fish floating on the surface of the water. I am a million dead things.

I am the remainder and I do not remain. I am captured, tamed.

I learned to like it, as we do. I memorized the language. I learned the way to speak, to move. When I stepped out of line I was punished, reminded.

Maybe I don’t want this, I think to myself as I am caught up in some kind of sexual act. Maybe this has nothing to do with me.

I am bored. The ceiling is more interesting than his face buried in my pussy, because it could be any pussy, and this is not about me. He thinks he is good at it because he knows what his ex-girlfriend liked and this is not about me.

I am a seashell, a tiny grain of sand, a falling star, a smooth marble counter top. I am the patterns of flowers in gardens. I am nothing.

I don’t exist.

I walk to the water’s edge where nothing else exists either, where there is no need to make sense. I take the heart, unearthed, and

I drop it in the water.