Perfidy

I remember, I told you I love you. I sent that

letter on your birthday, you said I love you too

and will never walk away.

We played house and you made me smile; made

me forget, dabbing at my wound. I remember

it healed in the shape of a star.

The first time you left I cried

I cried until my eyes were shaped and

cut like a gutted tomato.

You called and said you couldn't help

cut the cake on my birthday. Remember?

You said you were sorry again

your words, like black glittering stones,

gathered at my feet leaving paper-cut

wounds all the way down.

I said goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.

You lied, remember,

you lied with a wink and a smile.

Still I cried until the tears dried up and blew away,

until my shrunken cheeks felt the sun,

until my heart, like a black glittering stone,

sealed up, was shut up.

And here you are on my sun porch

soaking up my face with your eyes.

A perfectly shaped tear lingers artfully,

like a rescued heroine from Steel's pen, against

your cheek waiting for my reply.

I look through you and see the picket fence behind.

Behind you is the life I have the life I dug out

of that big, greasy trash bin; remember the one

where you idly tossed my love, my trust, my mind.

I turn my back on you and your watery friends.

I saw my reflection in that one dewy drop

upside down, looking like a shiny warble.

What I see is what I'd become in the house we called our home.

I was the maggot swollen under your skin,

the oozing pus from under your seat, scraped

from your boot of inconvenience.

Your tears are icicles to me. I close my eyes,

shatter them under my heel,

and slowly painfully close the back door.