The disembodied voice said:
“If you don’t expect it, you can’t be disappointed.”

I nodded like a fool and lacquered my wounds
with gloss so thick it cracked when I breathed.
Plans are cheap when hope is costly.

I planned to want nothing.
To sand down my ribs until the bone shone pale,
a polished, useless ornament for a life I never got to choose.
I planned to answer your silences
with my own, colder ones.

You sent meaningless kindness stitched in rough thread
I wore it badge-like until it bled.
You carved your love in the walls with blunt nails,
I painted over it in shining coats,
a museum of things I’d never touch.

“Smile, and it won’t rot you,” the voice whispered.

But even lacquer peels under the wrong weather.
Even marble shatters when the veins grow too wide.

I was never your masterpiece.
I was your unfinished thing,
your “maybe if” you left gathering dust,
a child painted in colors you didn’t stay to name.

I packed my plans in a box of wet promises,
and set it afloat on a river you would never bother crossing.
I shut the door before you could ask if it hurt.
I kissed the floorboards goodbye with my cracked lips.

Poem written by Nadeen Assaf (Third Place)