Tell me I’m different and watch me fall for it every time

Tegan Barbara

15 Jul 2024 — 1 min read

I’m not intriguing.

I never consumed your thoughts.

I’m not captivating.

I never quite could keep you entertained.

I’m not indecipherable.

I never swept you up in my convoluted pages.

I’m not harmonious.

I’ll never be a song that gets stuck in your head.

I remember when you said:

“You’re not like the girls I loved before”

and my brain screamed:

“What a fucking shame. You are exactly like the boys I loved before”.

No, I’m not special.

But you already knew that didn’t you?

-She’s burning

To all the men I regret letting inside me

Men* say women are too fussy, too nit-picky. They say women have unrealistic expectations and impossibly high standards. But, I’ve never met a man who genuinely enjoys it when I take up more space than him, spread my legs a little wider at the table. A man who’s

You asked me to wear the lemon dress

The day I met you is imprinted in my mind. I remember every detail: the Verve playing in my headphones, the grey hued sky, the all-consuming conversations and the scent of coffee intermingling with rain-soaked tar. You were smart. You were soft. You were emotionally attuned. I wanted you, desperately.

So they say

They say you can’t fight fire with fire - becoming water didn’t protect me from third-degree burns. They say softness combats hardness - it made it harder to detect the lowest blows. They say it’s all in your delivery - speaking eloquently didn’t save me from

why?

They ask me: “Why do you love them?” I open my mouth to speak, but the words lodge themselves in the back of my throat, rendering me mute. In the silence, I hear the quiet utterances of my heart: how can you describe a love that burns, not flickers, pours,

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To all the men I regret letting inside me

You asked me to wear the lemon dress

So they say

why?