Silver Coals

one.
all who loved me
all who touched me
all who took from  me
were marked with blisters
everything about me boiled
my quiet
my eyes
my laugh
my hair in a tiny ponytail

imagine this headline,

"Small Town Dance Recital Audience Flees From Blistering Cries of the Loneliest Brown Baby Femme in Lime Green Sequins with Matching Tutu"

​two.
as a teenager, 
i became my own sweltering mess of a fire department
quick to put out my own flames
i can recognize now how i wrapped that
ugly hose around my desire
always careful 
always on fire watch 

fires in my palms
i slept on bathroom floors
never kissed my friends
often turned my attention to soft men
who cried in front of me 
had heartbreaks in the shapes of their mothers
& no matter how soggy the self i offered up
they always charred their tongues

Baby Lettie a few years before I started taking tap dance classes & crying at recitals in lime green sequins with matching tutu.