apart from the rent that's 12 weeks overdue,
the 7 missed voice memos,
the special midweek lunches you have
that you pass perspiring paper boxes of
respectably uneaten quesadillas that
christen your laundered floors,
that i refuse out of fasting as an excuse
so as to not add up to—
what i owe you:

the music, the rawness of Vancouver Sleep Clinic
and The Psychedelic Furs at two in the morning
when i can't sleep, so you wouldn't either.

the good dreams, when you told me if only
nightmares had brakes, i wouldn't suffer another.

and you were my other,

what i owe you:

all the wrong reasons to the right ones
i never meant to say,
out of fright of out of fright of out of fright
of love,

a sober kiss good night,
half asleep a giggle and
awake on a morning that only smells like
waffles, some borrowed French cologne and you.