It’s like you dissected me, exposed me, beginning with the heart and slowly working backward through the ribs, the dermis Your idea of love is a poem you’ll never write. then outward leaving notes in my skin with your scalpel and delete line after line…

Two gasping Quick inhalations And then ‘You have got to learn To wing it Only then can we All flock together” She told me when I was age four Then there was that day The day of Blood They called her grandmother I called her…

The struggle… It was there inside, Underneath All the smiles And pretension. A mask of many faces Worn on many occasions Painted, plastic What a masterpiece It was then.   Now when rising up There is no need for masks Or pretension. All washed away…