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to all the boys i thought i loved


*inspired by Rudy Francisco*



I am not a vessel.
Sometimes I like to think I am.
Like to think that if I allow others’ sorrow to fill me

with all they have overflowing, I will feel fuller,
think that the empty I pretend is there
because I don’t want to deal with the full, can find peace

in someone else’s tears. I am not a carpenter.
It is not my job to figure out how to construct,
how to fit all your broken pieces back together again

after you have been used too roughly.
honestly, I suck at puzzles and I’m wrong to think I can handle
anything more than Ikea tables with diagrammed instructions.

I am not your coach.
Not there to be screaming in the stands
protecting you from yourself

and making bad decisions that will affect the team.
I am not responsible for your responsibilities
though maybe I use them to distract me from my own.

I am not your therapist,
Your nutritionist,
Your mother.

I know it feels nice having someone to fill every gap in your life.
I know because that’s what I’ve done with you.
Corks and plugs and sandbags trying to keep everything in me
from spilling out my swiss-cheese skin,
my chest riddled with holes from the target practice I’ve let my past use me for.

I think I owe you my deepest apologies
for using you
without realizing.

For letting you sink into my deepest trenches
to try to plug the leaks,
then blaming you for venturing too far

and saying you asked for too much
when I invited you to take
my whole kingdom.

Self is the childhood friend you have the most history with.
Self is the best friend who tells you everything you don’t want to need to hear.
Self is the only one you can fit all the pieces together again, the only one who can draw the picture on the box.

I tried to be your self
so I wouldn’t have to
face my own.

To all the boys I thought I loved,
I couldn’t love you
because I was trying to learn to love myself.
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