the letter always bled for her for her eyes (brown as those old bottles in the medicine cabinet) bleeding words like teardrops yet without spilling onto the green tile floor those words always pure only staining the paper glossy black ink blood like muslin stuck to an old wound those words always strong yet blurred, obscure words only a scholar would find obscene

happy are those who die because they have returned to those first crumbs of dirt that fed us to that first hole to that soft black and smell of coal

She loves me.
She loves me not.
Does she really love me?
She loves me not.
Is this meant to be?
She loves me not.
Is this what we could be?
She loves me not.
Time isn't for free,
Wasted all my time just to be
Nothing to me.

Maybe it's not always bad to feel empty.
Maybe it just means you've given your love away and poured your heart out.
Maybe we should all be empty, of all our dreams, our hopes, our wanting.
Maybe when we find our one thing to pour our all in
Then we'll be glad we can be empty.

Or at least begin to be.

Alone with the mirror,
You stare into your eyes;
You look better than you thought;
Then you suddenly don’t;
You sigh.

Alone with the mirror,
You shine your teeth and stick out your tongue,
Run through your hair and push up your *****;
You try a few dances you saw on TV,
But you kind of ****.

Alone with the mirror,
You wish the eye bags weren’t there—
Your face would have been just perfect.
So you pout in a way that hides them;
Then you take selfies.

Alone with the mirror,
You practice what you’ll say tonight:
“You’re great and I like you but not just like that.”
With a smile you say, “Can we still be friends?”
You know this sounds terrible so you practice five other ways to say it.

Alone with the mirror,
You realize you are who you are,
And there’s not much you can do
But embrace it.