Hothouse Flower by A. Martine

Hothouse Flower

let us go down there then
taste the sound of your 
favorite pretext and give it
ready-made it’s not your fault
i know you bruise so easily
barely brushed
barely listened
hardly heeded
it’s a shield waved in false anguish
the tragedy whispered under fluttered eyelashes
the unspoken pretext swimming in the lake of your theatrics
you bruise so easily
let us go down there then
touch it see how it sounds
you bruise so easily 
so easily gives leave to slice and harm with forlorn tease
i cannot have not the right to point out your hardness 
but when did you last call your mother
let us all go down there
funnysorry sights
won’t we all have monstrous things to say

My fault. I remember, I forget
You never fail to remind me
How I have harmed you, how you have harmed me
“But if you got wiser, I would not, would never”
“But you kept going”
“But I should have reached back”
I should have bet on that tenacity of yours
That snakes its way into my conscience
And always finds me in the end
And can I say: I have really tried and set sails.
Let us not go there, let us not prod the hull of that boat
We shall sway, and therein lies only reproach and that mouthful of
Bland nostalgia
I haven’t called, won’t answer letters
Won’t even give the courtesy of assent
Because I bruise so easily
And everything is out of touch, so let us not go there 
Therein lies sadness, sometimes, melancholy, even, that panic, stale and pedestrian 
But pedestrian is good enough, pedestrian is better than fury, more intricate than fury

​

A. Martine is a trilingual writer, musician and artist who goes where the waves take her. She might have been a kraken in a past life. She's an Assistant Editor at Reckoning Press and a Managing Editor of The Nasiona. Her collection of poems, "AT SEA" was shortlisted for the 2019 Kingdoms in the Wild Poetry Prize. Some of her fiction, nonfiction and poetry can be found or is forthcoming in: Berfrois, The Rumpus, Bright Wall/Dark Room, Metaphorosis, South Broadway Ghost Society, RIC Journal, Lamplight, TERSE. Journal, Gone Lawn, Truancy Mag, Crack the Spine, Confessionalist Zine, Ghost City Review, Rogue Agent, Boston Accent Lit, Déraciné, Porridge Magazine. Follow her @Maelllstrom/www.maelllstrom.com.