• Shards of my teeth leaked from between my busted lips

    mixed in some salty liquid that belonged to

    either my broken body or this cracked road

    you beat me

    spit in my face

    and stepped on my throat

    screamed at me in a language

    I could not understand

    I just laid there

    and I could not find the strength

    to stop your bloodied fists

    because you told me one blue midnight

    when we were tipsy off cheap beer

    about how you hated people touching you

    you beat me

    took my keys

    and left me gasping for life

    a torn tendon suspended me

    between a life without you

    and a death with yesterday’s you

    you beat me

    cried hatred

    and ripped my shirt

    I could taste your dreams of my death

    (they were my favourite ones)

    they tasted like hot iron and asphalt

    and I croaked

    and kept croaking

    because I had started crying

    you beat me

    kicked my stomach

    and pulled my hair

    a shattered rib

    an eye engorged with purple

    I could not feel the icy stone

    I bled upon

    coldness invaded

    and I buried my face

    in the road’s jagged teeth

    then I ground it

    because even the sound of my shredding skin

    was more comforting than the

    hauntingly angelic sound

    of your repeating voice

    screaming that

    I was not

    your

    friend.