LOVE Poem: , by Dez Queenan

Our whole relationship screamed the landlord special
Stained tubs, mold decorated ceiling
foolishly disguised with caulking and well-placed lighting.

Ignorance and neglect hidden beneath the adjacent crooked fixtures
Underneath the paint on paint on paint
Conflict avoidant
-C h e a p s k a t e-.

Not sure if I’m talking about the apartment
Or your retained love;
They both looked the same
A revolving door of “for rent” signs
Without proper abatement

Cleaned, scrubbed and furnished twice
But it never made this patriarchy redeeming
Divorcing the Freudian sense
Women aren’t meant to be buildings
Housing, and healing

The exploitation superseding
a clause of symbiotic exchange
surreptitiously written in the cracks of
the linoleum peeling

You no longer have the desire to copulate with your building
you’d rather manipulate her into modern slavery
because fucking her is a lot less enticing
attraction lost with heritage mislabeling this dynamic
as traditional work ethic.

Who’s really the one fleeing?

Hope was built on the notice to terminate
Desperately scribbled through dissent
the only constant
-v a c a n c y-
Left in every one of your sentiments

Terminating a lease has never been so easy
When your foundation is unsafe
And was nothing but frustration and poor heating
It’s easy to escape-
A building that crumbled so long ago

The pattern is already repeating
And I just hope that;
Those in line
To become your passive income
Don’t sign the lease without reading
And become your new found
Condemned building.