Ink on Paper

Author’s Note

This poem examines hate as an emotion that mirrors desire in its intensity and persistence. It reflects on how fixation, whether born of attraction or aversion can consume the mind and body in similar ways. By tracing the physical and psychological symptoms of obsession, the poem suggests that hate often reveals as much about the one who carries it as the one toward whom it is directed.

They say you know when it’s time

before it happens.

They say it starts with a quickening

a paraplegic feeling

that leaves you incapacitated.

A sickness that begins

at the moons of your fingernails.

A restless wanderlust

that keeps you up at night.

Like a cow in heat

you moan out hunger,

sweat dripping,

insatiable.

Overwhelmed by the strangeness of it,

you seek distraction:

a knot in the bedpost,

a finger in the eye,

a change of raiment.

Still, like ink on paper,

it sticks.

You can’t ignore

the gnawing feeling

that this will eat you alive.

Pretence seems secondary

and comes in waves.

Soon enough you’re able

to be in the same room as them.

You smile at their contradicting dad jokes

that never fail

to understate their intelligence.

You applaud four-fingered.

You see your little twitches and nicks

and still find no plausible reason

to stop.

Their toe against wood

is only evidence

of their schizophrenic tendencies.

They should have known better.

And sad enough for them,

they don’t have you

to teach them.

Now this, dear one,

is what the good old Book

calls Hate.

__Laurel