Peaches

The memories feel hazy, but isn’t everything when you’re torn?

The confliction is relentless, 

a never ending cycle of dissension. 

I lay in two pieces, twins. 

Except the tightening in my chest. 

 

The air feels different, a thickness that weighs heavy in the back of my throat.

It couldn’t be farther from the dryness that assaults my skin.

I sweat, sweat all the same.

 

The physical duress evident in the perspiration clinging 

to the nape of my neck, hair sticking.

A cold cloth against my forehead. 

I never could handle the heat. 

 

The faint sounds of the city filtering up into my apartment, 

a witness to the heady air I inhale. 

It hits my bloodstream like the rush of the cigarette 

I find myself grasping for something, anything, 

to bring back some semblance of then. 

 

The remembrance of sweetness upon a naive tongue,

an innocence of childlike wonder, 

transported back to a time of simplicity. 

 

I can’t bring back gentle eyes and soft beating heart

without the cold, smoothness 

of a fresh peach in my hand. 

 

I tighten my grip in hopes of saccharine permanence. 

A familiar flavour, a familiar memory between my lips,

devouring my prize. 

 

When the nectar on my taste buds contradicts itself. 

The taste is forgotten. 

Permanence is unattainable.

The tear within my fragile body may need more mending than I realized. 

 

These peaches in my hands are no twins at all.

The one in my right is too slick, without a slight drag when my fingers move against it. 

The other, I cradle in my left, 

its appearance nearly stripped of pigment 

but the honeyed flavor is unparallelled. 

I feel subjugation in the way I taste, smell, see, touch 

It invades my senses. 

 

If I had known that two simple peaches 

would make me question who I was, 

I never would dare touch the beloved fruit. 

I know I shouldn’t anymore.

I should’ve stopped at one.

 

Desperation often overshadows control.

I bite.