An Unsent Poem
By: Celine Choi
I didn’t learn how I would have to hold myself tightly in empty rooms
until her fear threw a peach, flesh and fruit bruising one another.
But you invented a pain I had never survived before– it consumes.
I didn’t learn how I would have to hold myself tightly in empty rooms
until I viewed my mother as an art installation swinging by the wire.
In the painting she’s a lone ranger with a smoking gun. Her regret blooms.
I wrote letters to you after you cut me. You were bleeding too, I assumed.
In my letters I dreamed of meaning more to you than a body or a mystic
but you invented a pain I had never survived before– it consumes.
I didn’t learn how I would have to hold myself tightly in empty rooms
until my mother saved me from someone other than herself once,
which showed me how people could believe in such a thing as God.
Years ago, I left home with no plan to return to the lonely ranger and her groom.
I planned to write a love poem for the first time and mean it but then I met you
so I still dont know how to because the empty room is now a dark dark room.
I didn’t learn how I would have to hold myself tightly in empty rooms
But you invented a pain I had never survived before– it consumes.