We happened in the wrong margins,
a misalignment of ink and paper.
You were trembling,
a violin string pulled too tight,
and I pressed my palm to your spine,
a counterfeit comfort.

Whatever I was, I injected into you—
calm in a syringe,
love like a scalpel slicing deep.
Your trust slipped through my fingers
like mercury,
gleaming and treacherous.

You believed in me,
poor saint with a paper halo,
too thin to shield you, too sacred to tear.
I gave you splinters where there should have been balm.
I tore through you thoughtlessly,
like frost biting into a rose,
its petals blackening under the slow, deliberate burn of my touch.

I was born crooked,
a misprint in the factory line,
where hearts were handed out,
and mine was just a cavity—
a hollow space where love got lost.

I’ll never be sorry.
I wasn’t designed for regret.
But in some draft of heaven,
there’s a version of me
who holds you gently—
who doesn’t leave you bleeding.

Lucija Lotus Mlinarič