"sips"

I am glad that I

am not the one

they speak ill of,

I am the girl

with charms in her hair

and islands on her flesh

and I have somehow made

this work for me

in a way that it cannot for everyone;

I remember when I was the girl

who spilled blood

on the white sheets under the chilled air

and tried to hide

from the world

that never seemed to want her alive

but I made it,

somehow,

through all the days

of knowing no one

like me,

through all of the days

stumbling in the dark

and taking sips

not knowing

what was wine and what was poison.