MY FATHER CALLS ME A SLUT

 My father  calls me a slut

S_L_U_T,

every letter rolling 

in his tongue with ease

that surprises me.

S_L_U_T

every letter tattooed on 

my brown skin

in luminous red.

My vagina protests,

my chest pains 

but I stand,

calm as Madonna,

my face a starched kerchief,

my emotions the shell of

 a dead snail in the garden.

He curses,  fuming 

enough to make my 

tongue toll into a useless cloth.

How can I tell him 

that am not the child 

he prayed for?

the child he  once 

took pride in?

How can I say him 

nothing has changed and

am still in search of a hand 

to hold, a chest to cry?

Will he listen?

will I speak? 

Am not his child anymore,

afraid of dark .

But

a loser 

a broken heart

a stranger 

he will never love.

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