after Safia Ehlillo 

I swear to god I’m trying to let it be. But she 

lives here, scabkneed 

on all fours in my kitchen, as if I’d also leave her

pulling up floorboards 

with her milkteeth, crumbs on her cheeks, blinking from beneath 

me. And how hard it is to be gentle 

about saying “get up”. And did you love them? 

Her spine ribboned when touched.               She’s peering over my shoulder– the thousandth poem for 

a teenaged body newly womaned

or the trillionth if you count

all the ones not for her.

Each one of them had touched

with parted lips her every bony disk. 

Their dishes washed and dried. Clean sheets. Their hands 

always so much softer than she thought they’d be      

when they moved from her mouth to her temple. 

They never hurt                                     the unwilling.  Even as she asks,                            I won’t leave

                                                                                                                  out the mattress drug beneath 

                                                                                                                       the window on the night 

                                                                                                                    she goes home alone 

Here she was: on her floor with streetlights

slipping through her blinds, ribboning across violet skin. See?

I’m trying to let her be, but yes.                                                             Yes you did. 

                                                                                    Please, child. Please get up.