can i be the bud of a new

leaf still curled inwards 

on the branches of a tree 

in the new family’s front yard?

can you turn me into a before?

a hope, a something free 

of a past that clings to its legs. 

oh, please, let me be

a new blossom, flushed-pinked 

with new life and little lungs

taking another first breath.

i will pay you for it with

the top layer of my skin, 

every hair on my brush,

old words from my lips.

i would offer you every

touch i have known,

every face i had loved,

every weight i’ve borne. 

i don’t need them anyway,

don’t want them neither.