smelling your back
as i hold you into my body,
loving you quietly,
rubbing your shoulders
as you fall gently to sleep.
picking up the lint in the morning,
and folding your laundry.
remembering your sisters
birthday from last week,
that you forgot a gift for,
like the flowers i wanted
for my masters acceptance,
was your love lost in the mail too?
i gave you safety and comfort,
you gave me distain and distrust
with a twisted sense of humour

i am a firecracker,
once lit i am sent
into the expeditions
of fanatic joy,
turning and spinning,
spectacular to watch,
hot to the touch.
burning up into
pieces of carbon
which we are all made of,
but sometimes forgetting
how beautiful we are
before we crash,
rather than upheld,
we become a spectacle.

i write to you when i forget
how my feelings work,
and when their nicotine addiction
curves into lost sentiments that break.
they don't know who they are,
so i was born with a strong sense of self,
and the assurity of my next breath,
despite my chronic asthma.

people think you need to be sound,
so he plays spooky guitar noises
to silence the idea that life is quiet.
we are always running for safety,
looking for constance,
some find it in a glass of control,
but i've made peace with not knowing
practically anything at all.

waving hips with you to Machine Girl,
drinking terrible mixers of orange juice,
and whatever ***** my friend left last,
sometimes i let my head rest too long.
kissing my sunburn from Sunny Side beach,
trading my iPhone over tasteful r&b,
chasing memories of being loved,
tonight, you kiss me like i am.
your friends are all way cooler than me,
i’m awkward, preppy, sitting in my flaws
with excessive layers of honestly,
but still they never want me,
how can an onion put back on her layers?

your the one to blame,
for my frontal lobe spinning,
for the jack of trades tipping
the waitress twenty percent

to show me you are solid
teaching me boundaries
i sit patient and still
for the drawing of cards

when i packed up our apartment,
and said goodbye to final memories,
ones i lived in alone for months,
i noticed all the little things i gave,
to make you significant.
the things i bought for our love,
that i thought we’d do together
from the pan set, to the rug, to the vaccum,
i cared so deeply for you,
anything you needed i provided you,
i gave you my future,
and that’s a reflection of my love
that made you seem so special
surrounded by neutral items,
turning into a person,
i no longer believe in.

you felt like my cabin,
when the wood sank under.
loyalty doesn't take time,
it takes character.
seeing fallen branches
crating to one side of it,
like rough patches,
which I saw him through too.
and there i sat with you
with 3 drinks too many -
and saw the way you spoke to
strangers under the canopy.
did you notice me watching?
i knew it as soon as we sat down
and shared battle stories,
like coming back to comfort,
then into torrential feelings
i found parts of you in me,
shavings of pain and joy,
contingent to democratic debate
and i found parts of me in you
pairings of ego and art,
conditional to romanticising realism
did you notice me too?