Anika (Imagine Violet)

I know you felt the stings of words cutting like razor blades

Felt the pain of your bones turning into ice, shattering your spine

The perfect product for a victim

Packaged and sealed, left on a shelf with no expiration date

Maybe the pain in the pit of your stomach resonates. So you caged yourself.

Displayed pieces of you for people to take. Sliding down through the cracks of aspiration into emptiness.

I’m sorry it took me this long to get to you,

Time left you in a cold empty bed and in agony, you slept.

But in your sleep, I’ve noticed your lashes…long like the life you’ve lived. I pray to catch you while you’re awake…to see how the pain coloured your pupils so deeply

A story so eager to hear, unafraid of what you’ll share

I know I’ve walked away further from you as much as I’ve held you close

But I've noticed your blinks get lighter, losing the depression that rested itself on your lids

A painful glow that’s slowly opening the curtains to possibility.

Leaving your skin the colour of human

Seduction sings with every look you give, it makes me weak to my knees but your essence lifts me up

It’s perfumed on everyone you meet

Love lingering like lavender on your tongue, softening up the damage from this world that creates everyone like a product

Every letter in your name represents a story about you

Your past is not against you

Rather it collected itself like rainfall which reflected a rainbow

You paint with your heart

You create with a story

Thousands of words that tell people your history

There is an end to the exchange of your story for slurs

Your story has love written in it

It lives behind your eyes

Your breasts are carved with the softness of violet

Velvet to the touch

Like a wild violet, self-seeding, growing invasively making sure no obstruction can wipe you out

Bloom into the outside world

Grass coloured un-doubtful green

Courageous blue sky

Expensive Rainbow

Cherished Violet

Your identity is more than your suffering

Care about the craft of love

Life is livable because you were loved once

Laughter is heard because love is an ecosystem within you

Not everything deserves a poem

But this poem, deserves you.