i’m a thin sheet of paper, hand-binded into a red leather notebook, ripped out to be alone.
i thought i had been freed, freed to stay as i am, but instead i’ve been taken out for the advantage of both your own.

you’re a jet black gel pen that bled ink right through me, engraving scribbles of letters and words of pointless things.
pointless things to fill your lack of self-validation, a need of self-emancipation, and a selfish care of presentation.

the writer’s hand smudges your blood across me, so dark, they know it doesn’t belong.
yet they continue to write on me, scrape on my skin, even when they know it’s wrong.

but i’m left with no choice, they all force me to stay here
force me to feel
every
stroke
of
pain
and
tears.

i was just a thin sheet of paper, once hand-binded into a red leather notebook, waiting to be filled with stories to share.
but they vandalized my being with your meaningless ink—ink that can never be erased—and instead ripped away with not a single ounce of care.

i’ve been torn into pieces and crumpled up at once, while the pen that you are, the pen that they hold, continues to write.
though ink bleeds out of you, it bleeds through thin paper like me—paper intentionally made to be written on, torn away, ripped out of sight.

—while you both get to keep writing.

–k.t.