Onion Love Poem by Amerti Paul

I pull one hand from behind my back,
To the front, and I straighten it palms up
I know what am doing, and what is being done
Waiting for him to strike.
Woop,
The lash tears into my pauper skin;
I grin and gulp in pain of sweet sour.

I await until the next lash ascends with power
And to collide with fabrics of my soul,
Between each split of a motion, I try to make sense of it all.
The moments between each strike are moments of bliss,
Moments of Zen and pure self-reflection.
The anticipation of the intense sensation to come,
And comparing it with the one that's fading away,
Each time it gets easier but each time it felt different
And I forget the logics that I made.
But it is the bliss before a new strike
Where I try to tie up meanings between the lines again
Killing the giants between my heart
After all, the numbness on the skin from pain is better;
than the numbness of the heart that's left untouched.



And up his arm fly again
with more force than the last,
in his eyes of anger,
I see the peace of love,
I see him and I see me
And the hidden hand behind my back, that is as ready as he
Or maybe more
Holding on to a striking stick.

But tears pour down from both our eyes
One of joy, one of confusion
Why do we dance this dance until our fingers bleed?
Till we have no hands to strangle each other
And the only thing standing is out stripped souls exposed through our open wounds
Naked as we first came to the world
As we strike each other back-to-back to back.