Forgive me.
Life has been rather unkind.
Swiveling between present and past, I can't burn enough letters to ease the hollow feeling in my chest. To anyone else perhaps I'm dramatic and slightly out of tune in the world.
I apologize for not having the average normalcy of a white picket fence and a pet dog named genesis. My glass is empty and stained by the remnants of grape juice that screams 'I've been here'.
I laugh and can't seem to hear myself under violent waves and everyone who sees the empty glass thinks I've just finished another round of Italian wine. I somehow blend into the world of color and the people dressed in lemon green and fuchsia can't tell if I'm a subset of a dull aquamarine or the angry shade of a storm.
I fade into the background instead of standing out in the worst ways— a supporting character the author can't be bothered to name.
And in the crowd I know I've been made, they stare and ogle because I shouldn't be there— they see the alien painted grey and they probe. They want what I'm drinking, the few drops of juice in my otherwise dry cup.
The fort is guarded, the request absurd to my ears. My mind spirals and I'm wandering wineries and farms thinking where I can fill myself up again.
For the first time these lovely strangers notice my struggle, they smile and it keeps me on edge.
The glass changes color and grows robust, the body heavy against my thin fingers. It's a tantalising shade of maroon and I'm urged to take a sip. The sourness locks my jaw momentarily before the sweetness curls my tongue and toes. My cheeks flush and perhaps I understood what it felt like to feel the blood come alive under skin.
Could be my imagination but I could swear your colors bled and ran only just a little despite the constellations and Canopus glittering in your smiles.
The greedy part of me begs me to depend, to be lulled and taken between colors sweetly until I turn an embarrassing shade of pink.
I know those smiles, they're polite and not as beckoning so I know I'm not welcomed here. "I'm bothering you." Oh how I hate to be a bother.
There's a shake of heads and you all murmur all the polite things to say in a moment like this. You don't know what to do with me and cling to your colors and wine because you know it helps me.
Some of you know what it takes to restore vibrant brown eyes and turn a grey dress a raging navy blue like the sea. I'm going to need more than a glass lovebirds.
But I'm a sinking ship unwilling to kill her passengers. The stretch of my lips is beyond me but I have to pretend so you don't dissect me.
I socialize and laugh with people I don't know, my mind rages as I look for ways to say,
help me.
YOU ARE READING
Smile
Poetry"I've lived life through other people and broken off a piece of me for them to keep." Letters that explain what lips simply can not and understanding to those patient enough to read them word for word.
