![By Viviane Sassen](https://theoffingmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/StockSnap_YN0MGJ3JJQ-e1548224544851.jpg)
All I’ve ever offered up in prayer
Never came back as birds.
In my deepest fold I wonder
Lord—is self harm ever devotional or
Is it always a form of possession?
No one cares to make an unremarkable
Gown of their suffering.
Until now, I was so
Sure no one would touch me again.