Kamran was my first boyfriend. We met

on a Halloween hayride. I liked the way

he saw me in the dark light of the bonfire:

little good-girl-rebel-vegetarian.

So I told a white lie of intention and spent

a decade trying to be what he saw in me.

But alone in the dark refrigerated glow

I still hungered for flesh sucked off the bone.

Kamran was kind to me whenever we spoke

on the phone. He once warmed my frozen

shoulders in the gymnasium and lived

in a mansion with tall walls painted the color

of jewels. The one time I went to his house,

he watched from the stairs as an ugly confrontation

played out between me and my mother. 

I didn't talk to him again after that,

but each time we passed in the hall

I looked beautiful, ugly and cruel.

Copyright © 2016 |  Pet Murmur