my sister, with cherry stained fingertips, breaks herself open at the jaw.

she says she is afraid of open water, but i know of the sharks she keeps in jewelry boxes.

 

moth wings pressed under her tongue, she finds her home in swimming pools and girls with nectarine flesh.

she presses flowers between her lungs with every breath and she only finds softness in hostile acts

 

i

only know how to rip myself open from the inside out (splayed belly and uneven slices) but

my sister’s tragedies are oil paintings (like she only knows bleeding if it is pretty)

 

they say my sister and i have the same voice, but i keep mine wrapped in tissue paper and shoved up my sleeve. she’s poured hers into tiny glass bottles, screwed shut and lined up on her bookshelf

 

we were both raised on splinter&marrow (but i’m the only one of us who can digest broken glass)

we are both stone hewn and ruin bound (but she has built herself of a different skin)

 

we know each other 

through unlit whispers and shadows on unpainted walls, we find ourselves in each other’s negative space, and i know somehow that one day, we will break ourselves apart (like our father taught us to)