Where My Mouth Learned to Pray


 

i have long learned to write poems
with my mouth,
on thighs parted like unread pages
of a book i could never finish.
i have kissed countless necks,
salt and strange,
memorized sighs
that evaporated before the morning.

my nights are crowded
with backs i have ridden
like wild horses through the dark,
hands roaming over skin
like a sinner
counting rosary beads
with fingers that forgot how to pray.

they gave me the world:
skin trembling under nails,
hips breaking like waves in my palms,
tongues spelling wet verses
onto my belly
until breath collapsed.
a world of sweat and sweetness
which i swallowed greedily
yet never filled me whole.

and then, you.
with a breath that moved slow
and a gaze too honest
for a bed this unclean.
you loved me differently:
you did not bite,
you did not tear,
you did not leave me
crumpled at the edge of the sheets
like a dress too worn.

you touched me
as though i were more
than just a body to be crossed.
your fingers read me
like a prayer,
sewing silence into my back
with kisses that fell
one by one like gentle rain.

and when you entered me,
i trembled;
not from flesh
but from something deeper:
a soul folding,
a chest cracking
like an old mirror
finally seeing itself.

since that night,
every other touch
has felt hollow:
every body, a shell
with no music inside.
every moan,
just an echo that never arrives.

because only you made this body
forget itself.
only you loved me
until i lost my name
and became nothing
but breath
and wanting.

and now,
in every bed i lie in,
something of you remains:
a hunger for your hands,
which somehow knew
how to find
what even i could not.



j a k a r t a

july 5, 2025

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