Canon Female

I awoke on my eighteenth birthday

to a sun I didn’t recognise.

Reflecting, refracting

kaleidoscopes of possibility -

A bright, promising future

A vessel of vulnerability,

wolves invested in my naivety,

exchanging looks,

a damsel of desire

dressed in adult attire.

Adorning ignorance around my neck,

a prize pig, pretty and pink

batting eyelids and blushing

while he slips sex in my drink.

But before I could blink another day

the wolf in sheep’s skin swept me away.

He’d been shaving straight lines since before I hit puberty,

I swear I’d never meet anyone that knew me like he knew me.

His confidence contagious,

I was brave on his shoulders,

his love - courageous,

bold and undefined.

His smile lit my

empty halls,

his eyes could melt the icecaps

and drown us all.

But, the rosy haze always fades.

Now, I cower under his gaze.

A tower of guilt he built for me

to bear the tide of yesterdays pain.

Gripped, stripped naked of my integrity,

my innocence,

he had that - hunt and kill

put a baby in me kind of

primal masculinity,

you see, he’d been cutting snorting lines

since before I hit puberty,

I learnt to live

quietly.

I existed

silently.

Bleeding, keeling,

beckoned downwards

towards

the depths beneath,

beneath the waves of his command

his hand -

holds me.

Left lying within an inch of my sanity.

But still I stand,

I weather the storm,

from the depths of his wrath

a woman is born.