To my coach

I've taken everything you never gave me
and I've made it into armor
that I wear beneath my skin
to protect the smiling
from what my gut knows is right.

And I promise with all my teeth:
I would break my knees
and splinter my pride
and pray at false altars

begging for a second chance,
if I thought I deserved one.

Please hate me the way only you can
– with pain all your own –

So I can crawl out of my skin
and live again,

like a disease