Ambivalence Incarnate
Poem by Lizzie Snellings
perhaps i grew bolder
or wiser or wearier,
but the wind changed direction
and something came unstitched inside my gut.
your pains have encased me in a crust of anxiety
i’ve been salt-baked under the hot of liquor-breath
desiccated my skin to use as rolling papers
you smoked me dry until I became the soot beneath your fingernails
The dingy side table branded with the rings of your unfinished coffee
brewed from the ground up bits of my rent.
i could never hate you, i say
it was a skill i refused to acquire.
these days the further away you are
the closer i grow to myself
and i think maybe this once
i could learn a new trick.
after you finally emptied your room
I thought I’d feel the hole in my heart start to fill up
but somehow it’s been calcified open
I can’t shutter the imprint of you out of the cement of me
for the best or for the least
you became something in me
I’ve chosen to like all of the parts of me
And I guess that means I have to include you
I cannot hate you
Yet I can’t remember how to love you
The wires are crossed forever inside of me
Because I can’t call on the muscle memory
Of my fingers curled around scissors
You’re a cancer I cannot cut out
A freckle on my soul that I only noticed on a day
when I finally decided to look my reflection in the eye.
MEET LIZZIE
