We Survived Poem by Za7ra Sulaiman

My knuckles are bruised like wilting violets,
skin against the walls that held my silence.
I cursed your name between sleep-talked confessions,
tore your banners down, waged war in the dark.

Maybe it was pride that kept my fists clenched,
maybe it was her.
The echoes of battle still ring in my head,
a blur of wounds I swore were justified.

Bloodshed, crimson clover—
A battlefield disguised as love.
But my hand was the one you reached for
through every fire, every fight.
I wrote my pain in ink and tears,
vowed never to cry again
if we made it out alive.

You offered peace, but I locked the doors.
Drew the curtains, swallowed my own poison.
You told me love should be softer than this,
but I was gasoline, and you lit the match.

Maybe it wasn't you, maybe it was ghosts—
whispers of betrayal from wounds you never gave me.
So I turned my sorrow into sharpened blades
and cut too deep