By Alejandra Pena

I feel it in my bones, but not my body. The body remembers, but the bones bend. I count the days. My bones ache as I grow older. They stay inside me.
***
I have learned that a body is only a body submerged into water. It is a reoccurring dream of mine. I carry a rock with me, I sink. Every time I drown. Every time you drown with me. I close my eyes. I try to remember.
***
Here is my knife. The cost of safety is only one imagined. I speak in whispers. I hide from ghosts. They follow me to imaginary places. I touch my own hand and find that it is there.
***
I count to ten like you taught me. I name every thing I see, touch, and hear. I breathe in. I breathe out. I let myself expand. I take up space. I shut my eyes. I see sparks. I clench them harder. I would rather not know what is there, or what is not.
***
I am honest. I am good. I am kind. These are my daily affirmations. I look at myself in the mirror. I string out words. I repeat. I try to disappear. I am good. I am kind. I am good. I am kind.
***
Tenderness is not synonym to kindness. To be tender is to be an open wound. But I believe in goodness, and I believe in ruin. I believe in erosion. I hope everything I love one day kills me slowly. I wake up at 3 AM to smoke and soak up the moonlight.
***
You are gone and I am no longer brave. Do you remember when you would mold my skin into something fireproof? I withstood winters and I withstood time. Oh, I ache. I ache.

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Alejandra Pena is a lesbian, Mexican-American poet. Her work has appeared in Words & Whispers magazine, and will soon appear in Another Chicago Magazine. She loves her pug Kiwi & the moon.