I’ve kissed her in my mind
A thousand times

I’ve kissed the hollow of her throat
Followed to the path between her breasts

She's seen me at my most bare
tremblings . clinging 

I’ve broken down on her doorstep
In her arms, I’ve sobbed 

I memorized all her stories
And wrote new ones with her as well

All the words we wrote
Sweet and heartbreaking and full 

We fell together
The way one sinks into a couch
During an anime marathon

we sat three feet apart
Whispered thoughts, My eyes strained
 to memorize the glow of her eyes in the dark

I clung to her
With a glee for hiding, desiring
to be unseen by everyone but her 

We spend days, weeks
measured in ends
In her bed 

Yet we touched with an unease
I reached for her in my sleep

She still pulled away

I told her I loved her
To get her to stay
Even as she was far from my arms

I lied when I said I loved her

But I didn’t break her heart
When I finally told the truth

She said “I never meant to hurt you”
When I begged her to beg me 

I wanted her to apologize a thousand times
Two years later, still craving some lie of hers in return

Zora Satchell is a 24 year old Black queer poet who writes about mental illness, family, and friendship. She believes that poetry creates space to explore and heal from trauma as well as  allow us to imagine new worlds. She is a member of the Estuary Collective and holds a degree in Ethnic Studies from Colorado State University. She also serves as a reader for Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review.When she is not writing she is obsessively consuming pop culture. She loves good dance music and watching movies. You can find her on twitter @thecasualrevolt where she lets her typos run wild.