i don't believe in much,
but you said maybe we met for a reason and that
maybe the reason was to keep each other alive,
and it seemed as true as anything else i'd ever heard
and approximately twice as beautiful.

i don't believe in fate,
but i have ****** the wild hope into my lungs
that some cosmic force could trust me
with something this important,
that some great mysterious power
sending ripples through the stars
could have loved me enough to lead me here.

we are not the beautiful and broken.
we are the wild and the wanting and
the howl that rattles hollow bones.
we are the wounded and the wicked
and unbound.
we are the things that learned to live in the dark;
from our bones crawl the faintly-glowing bodies
that will out-survive the sun.

your lungs cough out prayers like my lungs cough out tar,
like my hands clasp bottles like your hands clasp blades,
like our hands clasp hands,
like i had never in my life heard someone's stories louder than the stars
until you told me yours on the roof of the abandoned hotel,
until i saw the universe bend tight around your words
and for once the height didn't **** the air from my lungs and
for once i thought about something other than jumping.

nothing really feels like home these days,
but there's moments with you i feel human and
i'll take all the reasons i can find
not to step out in front of a train.
i want to watch you breathe
without some great shadow-hand holding onto your lungs,
and i don't ever want you to forget how sunlight feels.

you and i, we were born survivors,
and life has a way of reclaiming scorched land,
of stretching its great green tendrils
up through sidewalk cracks.
i don't believe in much,
but god,
do i believe in us.