When I tell her, “Friend, I can’t call you that anymore. You’re toxic and I’m drowning in open water,” I imagine her toes disappearing into her fuzzy bath mat, her fingers curled around a razor, cursing how they’re both disposable. I imagine her blood sticking to her forearms, a welcoming sign of life, a guarantee…
You’re toxic, I’m slipping under. She sent me 21 snippets of paper with one word on each and said, “Here. Make a poem out of these.” The idea excited me, the poet in me, until I finally told her I couldn’t be her friend any longer. A week later I opened the slips and saw the…
I love when a film is tragic and moves everyone in the theater to tears, and then ends abruptly, leaving nothing but the slow scrolling white text of the credits and the sounds of sniffling, soft comforting whispers, and the rustling of jackets. People will linger a few moments longer than necessary, because the theater is heavy with…
And suddenly I was bombarded by a tiny alien they called sister. She came home from the hospital and shook my expectations from their pedestal of joy down down down to the disillusionment of sisterhood. Her eyes sparkled in the sunshine, as they say, but I shielded my own, longing to escape back into a…
I grip my sudsy scalp, trying to wash out every whisper of his skin, his breath, his convincing words and broken promises. This isn’t the usual small circles, a gentle lather. It’s jolted and furious and directionless, how I felt when I first found myself falling in love with him. I told him no and…
I only have five rules. The rule of thumb: I refuse to be diminished, destroyed, or derailed by men. The rule of forefinger: I am my own number one. The rule of middle finger: fuck apologizing for things I’m not sorry for. The rule of ring finger: I am more than the ring that may…
I saw Dad claw his left shoulder and slide to the hardwood floor. Enormous ambulance men simultaneously asked me what happened and shoved me aside. Since then, I swore I’d never fall into the habit, but being part of Sam’s everything came to include cigarettes. Suddenly they were around the house, in my purse, constantly…
Along came November, not a single expectation in sight. Before was October, skeptical that you’d text, but managing a word here or there. In September there was some hope, some rebalancing and figuring out where we fit each other. August was our bittersweet denouement, spending every possible moment together, as if that could ward off…
There seems to be some magical age when a kiss becomes significant. Most people’s actual first kiss doesn’t “count” because it happened in the kindergarten sandbox, before they really knew what it meant. And then there’s me. I’ve always told myself my first kiss didn’t “count” because it happened with another girl, even though we’d…
For the final day of the A-Z Challenge, I’m featuring another guest blogger. Welcome Minnat from Yours Truly, Minnat! The dictionary has two different definitions for zenith: 1. the point on the celestial sphere vertically above a given position or observer 2. a highest point or state; culmination. I tend to focus on the latter definition. I…
Victim to Charm 