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my mother's eyes still hold the shape
of my father's fists.

people say i'm the one of my parents' children
who changed the most,

but what's change
when the bruises remain

the same shade of purple
as the summer i learned
to swallow my name?

to me that's what life's about,
not the becoming
but the unbecoming,

the slow unraveling
of the threads that bound
me to their expectations.

i'm an intarsia of frayed ends,
a sketch of all the places
i've been lost,

and found,

and lost again.

people say i'm the one
who changed the most,
but they don't know
the shape of my skin,

the way it still remembers
the weight of their hands,

the way it still whispers
their names in the dark.