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Back-Handed Benediction
I hung on, like a battered wife
blaming myself for manifold
injustices. You severed me from
my dignity, but I was haunted
by my true identity.
You warned me to shut up and sit down
but I stood up and sang—
if only in poetry.
While fault lines deepened
between my eyebrows,
and worry pulled the purse strings
of my lips in a kiss-my-ass pout,
re…
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