All mothers will warn you not to play with mouths, but they never tell you about the shift. So I played it safe and stayed away from the weapon, ignorantly afraid of the pain it could cause, not knowing the danger of its user. So that day we met, I agreed to all your advances because I was unaware of where I would end up. When you held me and set me apart from my peers, it made me feel so special. I could not possibly imagine that moment when you cut me open. Cut me open with one chop. Right in the middle just cut me open. Remove the dry leaves that protect my moist layers. Cut me open. Put the two halves next to one another and examine them, not wide open but cut in half, so examine them. What used to be an asymmetrical sphere covered in brown skin suddenly has more to it. Because you cut me open. Take note of every layer, embraced by the next layer, notice the alternating rings, the subtle greens, whites and transparency. There is more to me when you cut me open. You cut me open so notice, take in my chop, send to the one stinging your eyes since you cut me open. You can run me under cold water with the hopes of diluting my scent, my sting, but you cut me open so inhale it and stay right at my two halves. Then chop. But just one half. Chopped until I'm finely diced. Store the other half in the fridge only to forget it, and only remember it when I have lost my crunch. You cut me open. Gather my dismembered parts with that knife. The one you so gracefully told me apart with. You cut me open. It's a part into a bowl while you warm the pan based with coconut oil, then empty me into this heat. Fry me with a low flame and watch me sizzle, releasing my scent for juices. This is what you came for. I am an onion after all. Move me around with a spatula to make sure I cook evenly. Add yellow, green, red peppers and mushrooms, let it simmer. Stir us into a bowl and add whatever, because even when I let you cut me in half, I am never good enough to be enjoyed just by myself. Never good enough in my bare form, but a meal is missing something without me. Then it's over. You are fully satisfied once you have consumed me and the others, the mushrooms, the peppers. You forget all about my other half and nothing in you is moved until you embrace your love's face. You will ask what the smell on your hands is. Then you will see that it takes more than a thorough hand wash to rid your hands of the proof that you laid them on me, cut me in half, handled, then ate me.