LOVE ME LIKE ART

1

하나
Imani L. Crawford

THEY CALL me Bambi.

Because of a presumption, the wrong one, that my darker-than-dirt brown eyes paint me as a canvas of sincerity. That out of the strum of my lips, I am this wallflower of grace, an emblem of purity. A woman whose words are marked with tenderness because my eyes purr to that colour.

I don't know where that misguided truth comes from.

They think that they know ole' me, behind whatever front I choose to wear that day. Me, soft? Ew.

Me, innocent? God is probably laughing at that insult in his high tower.

Me, a flower? I'd rather be a thorn, caught in a bed of grass and hands that are in pursuit of adventure, astray down a long and bendy seam of soil.

If I could find a word to describe myself, that encapsulates all that I am... I'd be a rosebush. And not the type that leaves you struck in awe, but one with blades of thorns that would dissuade anyone from touching from my stems.

You touch my thorns? Don't be surprised if you bleed, nigga.

Vicious, I know.

Uncouth, clearly.

I've never been the type to speak with polish, no matter how times my mother catechises me that I don't need to talk like I am not my plight.

But, I guess it is my eyes, big and round, coloured in glacial brown that give me my name.

They jut out wide and burn into a darker, corrosive brown once the juncture in between my thighs swells with sticky-hot heat.

I can't help that I lick my lips slowly in fond remembrance, against the velvet. Desire now floods on every inch of my skin like a rash, permanent in how it scars. And with it, my eyes are trapped between the compass of two worlds.

There is one underworld where I'm impatient Imani and have these dreams that are blooming quietly. The other is a world of vacuous sex where nobody asks nothing of me or would even dare to. It is also where my breath hitches, my eyes wheel in a desperate stupor and my lips, tremble.

It isn't out of fear. I am not scared of no man or no nigga, I promise you that. But, the trembling emanates from traipsing up to the apex of desire.

"Bambi, take." These stripper stilettos give me stupendous heigh. His bellow is stiff that pulls me out my own head. There is also a bit of bass to his voice, like he is wielding an attempt to strong-arm me.

Does he know that this won't work here?

He should.

The corners of his mouth are drier than the plains in the Sahara as he wets his lips, to give him some moisture.

The contours of my lips crease in disgust.

His manner is rough as he stuffs crinkled pound notes in my bra-cup, running his unholy eyes in a hard scan on my plump breasts. I don't buckle beneath his death, as my fingers scoop the ridges of the doorway in support.

He looks down at me, like he can't imagine that I'm real.

I am real.

Real enough to be stood in front of him but I am also the realest motherfucker which I guarantee he won't like.

He has never liked pocket rockets with lips as loose as mine, which is ironic given how frequent he taps my line.

Mr. Roswell curls his thin lips as he trails down my pierced waist in perfunctory silence, trying to nip his impatience. There is no verbal blow of words but just by the way his eyes tweak, I know. He is sinking before I've even plotted.