You always told me I reminded you of red roses

And suddenly I’m nine years old

Dirtying my favorite white dress in a garden I’d sneak out to

Picking petals off of sunflowers

Playing “he loves me, he loves me not”

A game I always lost at

 

I’m seventeen now

I have nothing left

Except the footprints marked from my cheek down to my ankles and everywhere in between

All of them scars from when you walked all over me

But I told myself

Flowers still grow after being stepped on

 

So after you left I over-watered myself

With liquor and booze

In hopes I’d bloom again

I told myself

Over and over and again and repeat

That these bottles taste better than your lips

But it didn’t bring me back, no

It made me sicker than the thought of Us

 

And just like the bouquet that sit on my windowsill,

The ones you gave me last February,

I am falling apart

Intoxicated and thinking

I should have seen it coming

You always told me I reminded you of red roses

But you only ever picked daisies

---------------------------------------------------------------

Three months later:

A dozen roses met my doorstep

They’re not from you

But from Him

Who is an epitome of walking sunlight

I thank you, dearly

For showing me the difference between sunshine and a hurricane