It's not fair. That you're not beginning to cry in the
stairwell of your apartment, too. Isn't it dreadful.
In the laundry room, in the Duane Reade, on the
steps of Manhattan School of Music. In the East
Asian Library. This city reaches down my mouth
until I surrender everything I Our Fathered
down. Subway smoke won't leave me alone. Never
ending pot. In a room of Filipinos I feel dark
and clumsy. So nervous I stop thinking. On the way
home I want my mom. I keep dreaming about
her at the piano. Young and bony. These days
she'll get off the phone with Nanay and aks me,
How could I miss it there? It's true. And my dad tries
to teach me words in Hindi and my tongue is stiff.
I am brown and Catholic and it's so wrong, isn't
it, so I stay quiet with the others, I stay so silent.
And Jesus Christ, I don't care about it, St. Paul's
is just another place to cry, anyways. So that when
she asks if I went to mass, I don't lie, I hate lying.
Confession: I am earnest. I am a lesbian. I don't
want to think about marriage. I keep my scapular
on during sex so I'll still go to heaven.
Confession: I know I'm a bad person, and I don't
care. I'll chase after what I want and get rejected,
I let it get to me every time. I self harm and I never
touch myself. And I touch myself more often these
days, often on the bathroom floor, knees spread
wide and head thrown back, holy. And everything
is minor chords and melodrama. Falling back and
waiting for texts. Convinced I'm not safe. I hate
lying. I know I'm a bad person. I don't care. Don't care.

Anika Agustin Malhotra (BC ‘24, she/her) is a Computer Science major; she listens to jazz; she is from the South.