the words fell from your mouth in perfect shapes across the tile, just as the layers of skin fell from your shoulders, sprinkling the floor with what seemed to be a never ending arrangement of all of the things you hated about yourself. the ones that didn’t get you noticed, the way you arranged your words haunted my safest dreams, the parts of me i’d never been able to show anyone, they were uncovered without effort.

i heard you once, the best parts of you were the ones no one else got to experience…home alone, care free, i took three steps into your living room and heard your lungs releasing all the air they’d just taken in along with words of your favorite song, i saw the way your body moved and for the first time your steps weren’t precise, your body without it’s perfect posture, all the parts of yourself that haunted your most uncomfortable dreams…they were uncovered with little effort.

i saw you once with a bruise under your eye, a fault, a flaw, however instead of hiding it you stood taller, talked louder, paraded stronger as to guarantee you’d be noticed, these things you loved about yourself that i absolutely hated, the way you flaunted the bruise as if you’d done something to earn it. it was always the right place at the right time with you, that or the way you ran your mouth, either way you were only happy when all eyes were on you for your physical perfections or the little scars that made you even more appealing, the things that helped you float off to pleasant dreams…i wish they’d been concealed.