Photo by Shae Detar

You must have planted a seed

deep inside my stomach.

wedged it right into the lining of my tissues while i slept,

where even the acid couldn’t get to it.

I dont know whether it feeds off of the longing

that you spoon into my open mouth

every time you fail to muster

a feeling

or a word for me

or whether it simply grows with the addition of long moments

where you continue to not love me.

In any case,

it has lodged itself there,

in the pit of my belly,

taken up residence

and calls itself an organ now.

I feel it, heavy like a wet, breathing stone,

every time I think of you,

every time you don’t think of me.

And all I want is to throw it up.

to feel it loosen and rip from its intestinal nest.

to look at it lying in the dirt in front of me,

a peach pit abortion of

blood and

spit and

sinewed roots

testifying to its presence inside of me.

testifying to the end of you inside of me.

—

Ashley Lorenzana

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