you were so close to me
like lips close.
like CO2 came out of your nostrils and ruffled my eyebrows.
your breath sultry-fied the air
i was breathing
i wondered how your bearded chin would feel on my neck.
as i waited for you to come closer, i counted
the lines on your forehead
do you think a lot ?
or are you just easily amused?
am i just one of them?
if i kissed you would i taste the aloo in tiptopko samosa?
or the timur in momoko achaar?
would i taste your obsessions?
or would i taste thai candy corn?
the one you had and hated?
would i get a taste of your taste of distaste?
i held your sweaty palms unusually, casually.
when you whispered i looked fly in earrings
i heard several things.
i heard “you’re so hot right now”
i heard “tell me who you are”
it was your inebriating voice
until something pulled me down and told me
intoxication is precarious.
i heard them saying “boys will be boys”
as they braided our hairs for school
i heard myself panting on my way to the morning bus
before the watchman dai in narayan galli
eve-teased my thirteen-year old, basically non-existent breasts.
i heard her frantically throwing the steelko vase in the living room
when he didn’t answer where he'd been the night before.
who he was with.
i heard her telling me “bhaigo. forgive him, k garnu”
i heard myself saying i like earrings too.
the whole summer fling thing came
like my periods without cramps
post cranky, happy,
it ended.
like the advent of colorado winter.
the sun is deceiving, summer is officially over.
we talk as though nothing ever happened
because it didn’t. right.
sometimes, you say things.
something about this haircut going unexpectedly well on my face.
unsophisticated taste buds, sweet plum wine.
something entrancing in someone you meet
something about being too uptight
about being a closed book
and how i should put myself out there.
i’ve been trying to understand what that means
because the men I saw around me tried being fathers
but never lovers
because i could forgive but can't forget
i can't say bhaigo to those who
explored their bodies through mine
before i could pronounce assault
let alone understand it.
how should i put myself out there?
the closest i had come to was
coming close to kissing you
and it scared me. it scares me.
i hear the banging of the steelko vase.
then shrieks behind latched doors.
i hear “kiss him”
then “you’re too close”
trust me,
i don’t want to.
perhaps flipping through these pages is too much to ask.
the book cover is made in plutonium
i am
heavy,
scared to be vulnerable but lure-able,
believer in love.
i didn’t
try enough
i thought
you would.
now you’re the subject of my poem?
i deserve better.
lately, i’ve been buying myself more earrings.
27 since September.
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