Poem: Wine Colored Nail Polish

Wine Colored Nail Polish

Chanel #18

Vamp

It was mine but I let you wear it

It was so much more your style

A deep burgundy polish

with a gothic darkness to it

It even looked better

against your dark skin

It only made me look more pasty

and like I was trying too hard to be an adult

 

It was way better suited for the oval shaped nails

that I remember dancing along my forehead

to ease me to sleep as a child

The same long red finger nails that aimed at me 

like the barrel of a Smith and Wesson

when something that I did or didn't do

made you upset

 

Your style never really changed

Your nail shape

always long and rounded

Your nail color

always RED

matching your temperament at times

 

But this red was slightly different

it had a certain gloom and bitterness to it

It was a richer and deeper red 

than the blood lost while under the knife

Or the blood that slowly trickled off the wound you received

after falling down at the entrance of the bedroom door

with no recollection of how you ended up there

 

No this was a different red

more of a wine in fact

It covered the poisoning of your body

that begun to show through

A testiment of your quiet strength

along with the weary veins of your hands

Proof of the battles you fought

both emotionally and physically

 

In the end I held your hand

hoping to feel whatever energy 

that might have been left in it

I chose not to lay your wine dipped finger nails

out flat across your tummy like I had been told

Cause in that moment I could not imagine

your hand being anywhere else

other than in my own

Dedicated to my Mom, cause cancer sucks!