HATE

I hate you truly. Truly I do.

Everything about me hates everything about you.

The flick of my wrist hates you.

The way I hold my pencil hates you.

The sound made by my tiniest bones were they trapped

      in the jaws of a moray eel hates you.

Each corpuscle singing in its capillary hates you.

Look out! Fore! I hate you.

The blue-green jewel of sock lint I’m digging

      from under my third toenail, left foot, hates you.

The history of this keychain hates you.

My sigh in the background as you explain relational databases

      hates you.

The goldfish of my genius hates you.

My aorta hates you. Also my ancestors.

A closed window is both a closed window and an obvious

      symbol of how I hate you.

My voice curt as a hairshirt: hate.

My hesitation when you invite me for a drive: hate.

My pleasant “good morning”: hate.

You know how when I’m sleepy I nuzzle my head

      under your arm? Hate.

The whites of my target-eyes articulate hate. My wit

      practices it.

My breasts relaxing in their holster from morning

      to night hate you.

Layers of hate, a parfait.

Hours after our latest row, brandishing the sharp glee of hate,

I dissect you cell by cell, so that I might hate each one

      individually and at leisure.

My lungs, duplicitous twins, expand with the utter validity

      of my hate, which can never have enough of you,

Breathlessly, like two idealists in a broken submarine.

—Julie Sheehan