Dear Seven Months,

You dazed me like a snake charmer

and slipped your cyanide personality down my throat while I reeled

and sank into my veins.

You exploited me for that which you sat and shivered

those six years of careful friendship-disguised-plots-to-ensnare.

You made me guilty of self respect

and forced those words out my stiff, unwilling lips

with your superior experience as citation.

Your charmer’s flute was feeble,

but my submissive taught ear found it hypnotic

and my mind swayed into a settled numbness through which sight was too slanted

to decipher the map you used to shift our conversations towards your chosen end.

Your actions have tainted the waters of my memories

with thick oily poison that settles on my “first kiss” and makes it dull and lifeless

when that moment was sweeter than I now find you capable of.

My blind baby steps into self-exploration

were not assisted with calm calloused hands of commitment

but kicked down with the worn soles of condescension and selfish needs

placed above that which you foolishly called love.

Sincerely, Fuck You

I originally wrote this poem on a whim when I was dealing with leftover emotions from a previous relationship in my life. This relationship had not been a good one, and a partial contributor to that was the fact that I did not know I was on the asexual spectrum at the time. My partner was assuming I was allosexual, like him, and I didn’t have the knowledge or words to explain that I wasn’t. This complicated our ability to communicate our needs because I did not realize the way I felt about being physical was different from the way he felt, and he had no way of knowing either.

Although I learned a lot about myself (and relationships) from this experience, I had to learn it the hard way and that left a sour taste in my mouth. This poem was my way of fully letting go of those negative emotions and moving on.

I wrote this poem because I needed to, but I submitted this poem because I wanted to share this story with others.