Cheater
By NOELLE MALDONADO
A scarlet letter pinned to me,
lips sealed, eyes glued shut
I am a cheater.
I am cold
I am shaking
As I write these words,
Exposing what I am too scared to spit
What I am too afraid to admit.
I am a liar.
I am cruel
I am without a heart
As I move my lips against his, moaning lies, breathing in his sighs, too high to recognize that I am
Vindictive.
I am manipulative
I am too proud to tell anyone the truth about how I lied to boy 1 and boy 2, how I told one I
loved him and told one I didn’t.
I am ashamed.
Too ashamed
to even write on paper what I have done
Convinced a divine eye will catch my lies and will strike me down and let them loose and they will skitter away and I will
Spiral down
Into the pit of hell I am
Already descending.
Did I really think it would go any other way?
I only see judgmental eyes
Don’t look at me.
I was confused
I was tired
of being pinned down
of being muted by the one person
who was supposed to let me be
So I let the substance and the
Stranger take me away
I fell
Am I wrong for tripping or
Am I wrong for getting back up
to find my way back to you?
About the Author
Noelle Maldonado lives in Chicago Heights, IL and recently graduated from Homewood-Flossmoor High School. This particular poem is very personal to her and deals with the idea of having broken up but still feeling as though you’re cheating on someone because you are still hung up on them. Noelle creates to connect, to vent, to process, to live. Writing is her passion and her lover who always comes running back to her.
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