I would like to slice my tongue off

I want to slice my tongue off. It speaks of nothing but this woman. In conversations with friends when asked about my favourite movies, I take her name, and then proceed to laugh it off, asking what the question was again. In reality, I just need a reason to take her name.

Peel my skin off where she’s touched me and I’d still be more of herself than I am of myself. My bones know the touch of her fingers and my teeth know the poison of her kiss. Even in ruins, my rib cage rattles and calls out her name.

Over the years, our memories became inscribed on the veins beneath my tongue and her name found its way inside the cracks of my teeth. I remember wanting to bleed her out of me, but now everything I say is laced with the flame of her breath, and before you tell me a love story, I’ve already imagined me and her in it.

I remember wanting to take revenge on her. Wanting to let everyone know how delicately she ruined me. But before leaving, she put me in a straitjacket made from her white dresses and sealed my lips with the wax of her red candles.

And besides, who listens to a broken man?

…