You’re walking home late at night 

      thinking of the boy who bloodied his knuckles for you

      on the brick wall of the church.

Maybe he did it out of passion for you

  or maybe he did it out of passion for God–

Love and hatred are the same,

Are they not?

You walk with your feet bare through empty streets.

You walk with shoulders burned and

         mascara-stained tears on your cheeks 

         as your screams become arias.

(No one hears this)

So you begin to scream louder

To the angels with glass shards in their wings.

To the cherubs with broken locks on their doors.

To the prophet with another man’s breath on his lips.

I don’t know what love is. But I know–

I don’t love my neighbour when it is the man across the street using my sexuality as a fantasy.

I don’t love my neighbour when it is my lover wishing I was dead.

How many times have I prayed to a God who has forsaken me?

Crucified me to my bed

Flooded me in fears 

That I am unholy.

That I am sacrilege.

That I am sin. 

In the stomach of the whale,

           I am the whale and

there is someone inside of me cutting me open.

So pour worship down my throat.

Throw me against the wall.

Tie me down.

Carve me out.

Make a mosaic of my organs

Strewn haphazardly over the earth–

I will be more myself when taken apart. 

You’re walking home late at night

     thinking of the boy who bloodied his knuckles for you

       and you decide that from now on,

the blood on your teeth will be your own.

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Erin Staley is an emerging writer based in Montreal, Quebec, currently studying Creative Writing and Classics at Concordia University. You can find her on Instagram @erin_2411