Summer Sentence

Summer afternoons have

always been too salty, 

A kind that squeezes

up your throat, in a way,

that it even forgets to 

heave the last sigh of existence. 

It takes me back to that

day when I first tried

to run away, 

The day when I first heard

the sound of my heart dropping,

A sound below 20hz, A sound 

incomprehensible by normal 

human beings-

A sound overwhelmed by the

screams discoloring the

the four walls that just stopped

being-home.

I remember 

the pink scarf, the rusty

road with scratches that

went too deep.

Pink is my mother's favorite

color, there was a time when 

it used to match her cheeks.

Ironically, it is also the 

color of the rose I plucked

for some secret teenage affair,

I choked it through my own

fingers, my palm is yet not

red from its blood, it just lies

with no breath. 

I am murderer, I have killed,

A chubby child with a noisy laugh,

A headstrong teenager with 

a tongue sharper than the 

comments on a girl's skirt

whose period started in the 

middle of her math class.

I have pulled away even 

before reaching the edge,

Wondering, what if the end

tempts me more than the

beginning ever did.

I have shushed resistance 

with adjustments,

Fisted palms scripted with

words that never left my

fingers, and, called it all 

a part of my self-defense.

Maybe, if I had used my hands to 

defend than to close my mouth,

She wouldn't have those blue-black

ridges highlighting her arms,

That have carried the load of 

five adults with zero help.

Now, I write poems to

apologize to all the 

women I ever did wrong, 

My poems scream words

that I never dared to

enunciate,

My therapist tells me to

practice spelling out

S-T-O-P I-T everyday,

The words that I should 

have yelled that day.