You don't really need a car,
do you?

This here is my home,
metal sides of cold.
Death drips,
from the roof and mold.

This here is my home,
I run away far with my car.
To find myself parked,
staring through the dark.

This here is my home,
the walls mutter judgement,
charred with abandonment.

This here is my home,
It's gone now,
Burnt to the ground.

This here was my home.

You told me you loved me amongst the crowd of a Steelers game while we were searching for a hot dog and soda. Not the most enchanting, but perhaps I watch too many rom-coms for my own good. I think I've always just romanticized each aspect of a relationship and all the major moments based on what media told me meant the most.

Opening my eyes now, those special moments aren't always at a candlelit dinner or by a fireplace, many times they are at a cookout with your friends or the zoo with my nieces and nephews. The beauty of feeling something so deeply that you just have to say it, even if it's in front of a porta ***** at a church festival or the stoplight on your way home, that's the real love that people feel.

So when I tell you I love you while sitting on my couch on a random Monday night, know that I mean it. Know that every muscle in my body wanted to tell you because I didn't wait for candlelight or an array of stars, instead I told you in the most real way, our way.

We will still have those romantic moments on a boat under the moonlight or the fireplace of an old house, but we will also have those passionate moments where we couldn't keep our feelings in anymore and the most appropriate place just happens to be a crowded train on the way downtown and an airport bar. I love you and I'll say it anywhere.



-t.s.

At 15 she had her goals in her mind
To get her high school degree,
then her bachelor's
and then her master's
and maybe even her doctorates
She wanted to own house with a nice back yard
Despite the house crisis
She wanted to adopt she knew she was planning far ahead but didn't mind
At 18 she got her first degree
Then her second, third and fourth
She worked her *** off having ups and downs
Her world ending then starting again
She finally got a house at 27
And at 30 she adopted a 13 year old boy
She fell in love with him immediately of course
And did her best to give him the world
And in his senior year of highschool she gets him a car
She wished she hadn't
He got into a crash a few months later
He never recovered
Her world ended at 35
And it didn't pick back up again

You rest your head on my shoulder, as the sun holds back the night,
The roads are firewood behind us, the front seat blocking the light,
We’ve had warm feet all morning, our shoes cast to the sea,
And when we got tired of water, or your parents call us to tea,
We go.

Our legs are sore from the breakers, the sea preventing seat,
We walked to the end of the real world, where the lines between us meet,
And what we found when we got there, our walk under the moon,
The stars above us breaking, they whispered until soon,
We arrived.

I was screaming.
It was like
Smashing my fists
Into a brick wall
Hoping it breaks.
I was screaming.
And you just kept driving
Like it was nothing
Like you did this
Every day.
I was screaming
And looking
At the speedometer
To see if you
Were speeding,
If you let this
Affect you at all.
You weren’t
And you didn’t.

I was screaming
And you didn’t hear a word.

As you drive
taking me, we- on a ride
from the suburbs I grew up in
to the City
Down the same streets
Ive always known, driven myself,
the same route
that leads to Toronto.
Splitting, the fork- takes us,
Arching
flying around the circumference of the city
The sun, golden orange,
begins to set.
Iridescence coating the skyline –
as each reflective surface
momentarily
becomes stained glass.
“Eric-I need GPS direction” …


& Its after I've arrived at my destination
& then home again after it all;
do I re-open & Re-read this scribble in a note book-

Recapitulate, & end.

One day
Driving in the car
Her hand in his
She started to cry
“What happened?” He asked.
With happinesses in her eyes
She smiled and said
“You did”

i stand at the pedestrian crossing
white parallel lines aged by rubber
i wait for another person
and i cross

my brain goes white with parallel lines
i stop
in the middle of the street
for a second

sometimes i wish a car would
take me then
sometimes i wish a truck would
knock me out
is it worth the trauma
of gradeschoolers?
is it worth the clean up of city hall?
and how would they portray me?
a suicidal maniac who gets people in prison?
or merely an idiot with nothing better to do
other than cause chaos?

scene of the crime
outlined in white chalk against
white parallel lines
brain matter splattered on an SUV's windshield

funny

they can't find my eyes.

cold breeze
the ticking heat off a parked car
has summer resigned ?