Poem 04: Charm
the hand me down charm you wear,
gifted to you from a father who couldn't give love but gave plenty of punches,
smells like sweet seduction.
musky and mildewed but
masked with mastered winks and smirks,
you methodically murmur,
“Anything for you,
Princess.”
reduce,
reuse,
recycle
all of the lines that always work on women who thought they knew their worth, only to be given scantrons that tested their sanity after you filled the circles in with ink instead of lead.
there is no erasing the mistake of you.
you’ve led a life of eyes layered in lust,
Instagram filtered to look like hearts.
a life of lies and silent cries of anything to not have to be alone with “You” when that’s all any of your options ever wanted.
there are plenty of fish in the sea
and you certainly reflected a warped
iteration of that biblical command
to
“be a fisher of men”
or
at least a catcher of women,
who, when caught in your charm, smelled something fishy but preferred being confined in the net of your interest rather than acknowledge how much being hooked actually hurt.
it took that piercing pain of broken pinky promises
pressing into the palms of my purpose
for me to wake up from the love potion of your lips.
starving for your attention
and bloated with Potential’s poison,
I finally decided to flee from the fairytale forest of your words to permanent promise lands.
at last,
leaving you and your charm
to find another princess
to devour.
