all parts are welcome

Andrés Hernández

White roses buzzing in the blue. Be my wet nurse, let me feed off of you. 

Own me once, own me twice, we don’t need a title. 

Push my buttons hard, love. Love me raw, come inside me,

introduce me to your friends and share your weed with me.

Cherry pop, cherry popped. Vodka the pain away, I ask of you. 

And when you say we love you, there’s a part of me that almost believes you. 

Sometimes, I want to move in with you. 

I want to cook you pesto pasta and banana bread. I want to pick the ripest peaches for you. 

I want to water your plants and feed your cat every morning.

I want to mop your floors and clean your toilet. I want you to kiss me to sleep every night. 

I want you to see that I’m no kid. I want you to see that I’m my own person, 

and that I don’t need you as much as I think I do. I want you to see that I don’t break 

every time I close your apartment door behind me. 

Sometimes, I wish you weren’t afraid to give me a damn title. 

Friend, pet, babe, baby, boo. You know I’ll settle for anything. 

Sometimes, I feel like I’m just another one of your threesomes. 

But if that were true, I think it wouldn't really matter, as long as I can have you.  

Sometimes, I think you think of me as less than what I am. And yet, I know you don’t. 

I know it’s all in my head. I hope it’s all in my head. 

But, if I can’t take everything you are with me, at least I will take your scent 

on the tip of my ring and middle finger. I will keep your teeth marks on my chest as

souvenirs, and I know I shouldn’t, but I want more, and it kills me, because I know 

you don’t need me as much as I need you. 

Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Don’t say I didn’t tell you you would get tired of me. 

The flame squeezed between your fingers: done, dead, dark. 

I fired, and you were in the way. The bullet cut through you, and I felt it inside me. 

Kiss my lips with your cock and set the doves free. Moist thighs, cum-covered bellies. 

I’m biting your hips. I’m sticking my tongue into you. I’m sucking you dry. 

Six legs intertwined over wet lilac sheets. 

Sunlight caught in between the curls of a raised arm and a hand placed on 

the nape of a neck.  

Parts of me in parts of you, parts of you in parts of me. Parts of ourselves inside myself. 

There are no ugly parts. All parts are welcome, even the ones we’ve disowned. 

Take all of them and keep them close. 

So, when the weekend ends, I will leave, but I’ll be back. 

And maybe then, somehow, someday, you’ll ask me to stay. 

Andrés Hernández is a student at the Autonomous University of Baja California, where he studies Translation and Interpretation of Languages. His work has appeared in WorldLink, Zeta, Linotipia.org, and several other fine publications. He recently presented his first collection of poems, Terapia (Saturno Editorial, 2017), at the Northern Literature Festival (FELINO) in Tijuana, Mexico.