i was two when my father taught my body its first word:
no.
and then taught me to swallow it.
he was sickness in a man’s skin,
breathing love like poison,
hands that didn’t stop at no,
mouth that dressed **** in lullabies:
“****, you feel so good.”
“in another life you’d have been my wife.”
“you know you love it really.”
“mm don’t move just let me in.”
“don’t fight it kyra.”
and i didn’t fight—
not because i loved him,
but because he made love a word that meant hurt.
from two to thirteen,
he made my body his altar,
my silence his prayer,
my childhood his *******.
he only stopped ******* me
the year my blood came,
like rust in my underwear,
and even then,
he only stopped the *******,
only stopped taping it—
kept his fingers, his breath, his rot inside me.
he called it love.
i called it nothing, because there was no word for this.
anger lives in my throat now,
a scream rotting behind my teeth.
grief sleeps in my marrow,
and shame wears my face better than i ever could.
there is no hope here.
he didn’t stop because he saw a daughter,
he stopped because he saw blood.
and i stayed—
a body he ruined before i learned what a body was,
a name he spat back at me when he came,
a daughter buried under the man who made her.
there is no ending.
there is only the memory of his voice
and the way it still fits inside my skull,
like it was made to stay.