My son runs, wrapping arms around
my nebulous waist.

"l love you, Mom!"  He squeezes tighter,
as if letting go would be his black hole.

"I love you, too, " I squeeze back, absent mindedly.  (Where is the cream? I need coffee.)

"I love you more!" he breathes, without pause.
He gazes into my eyes,
searching my planets.

"Oh no, that can't be true," I retort.
I forget the coffee, his eyes are starlight.

"I love you to infinity!" he exclaims,
staring harder.

He wants to sail the Milky Way with me.

"Me too," I reply, and remember oxygen tanks.

I'm speaking in light years, and I hope the sound waves will catch up to him.

His face cracks into a million years of forever, before he lets go,
dancing across the universe of our livingroom,
his solar system intact.

At least for now.

I can smell him on my sheets
      I can taste him in my dreams
             I can still feel every inch where he's touched me
I hear his laughter echoing in the walls
             I can still see him in all these pictures I saved for
           memories

But this bed is bare
My dream's a nightmare
       I can't hear
             His laughter
       He's not near
             Enough to touch
My eyes are blinded by tears
He's killed my senses,  
      I'm no longer aware

Everything around me,  slowly fading away
His face, his scent, his laughter,  his touch
Maybe I'll just pop a few pills and sleep away the day
At least he's in my nightmares, the pain of reality is too much

There was an army of ants in the plastic plants
So I poured light through a magnifying glass
And I created a fire on the artificial grass

They scurried and hurried
with flames on their backs
Like soldiers on a hopeless plain,
searching for invisible barracks

And I sighed as they died,
because we are all the same:
Scurrying and hurrying from invisible pain

i always thought
you were thru traffic
that you were just jet lag
background noise
the kiss in the rain
i've never had
but what if you aren't?
what if this
was the thousandth time
i have loved you?
what if this is just a fresh coat of paint?
what if god
keeps a handkerchief
soaked in the day we met
next to his bed?
maybe theres a reason
i reach for no one in bed
the way i would
if someone used to be there
you know, they say
the road behind us
is littered with things
we couldn't hold onto
i wonder how many times
you've slipped through my hands
like hour glass sand
do you know
how much erosion you've caused?
i heard cupid
stopped keeping count
of how many times
we came together
just to come apart again
maybe it was just a rumor
it makes me think
about how many times
i've almost had you
like if all this talk
about history repeating itself
endlessly replaying is true
i wonder how many times
things have happened already
like the time
i tried talking you
into loving me back
back fired
or the time i could have sworn
jesus & lazarus were playing chess
with my heartbeat
but it was only you smiling
how many times
have i tried to tell you
how many times
have you read this poem
how many times
have i tried not to meet you
in my dreams anymore
it's like sleep tries to warn
me of what's happening
before it does but
i keep having this dream
where i tell you bedtime stories
and each one
is a different way you die
and in every one
i can never save you
it's like you're this song
i have on repeat
and every time it starts over
i forget the words
it's like you picked up the book entitled "us"
and the back cover
said you'd leave
so you never bothered reading it
tell me you aren't
going back in that bookstore
just to do it again
or will you tell me tomorrow?
or is this the time
you don't say anything at all?
if this has all happened before
if we call it quits
before we begin
again
from the beginning
i just want to ask you
to be my fire
because i am tired
of these old lives
and i'd like to see them
burn

and here i am again
at the intersection
of pedestrian language
& old wives tales
swallowing gum
like 7 year memories
opening umbrellas inside
cause i can't seem get away
from all of this rain
i ******* with my left hand
cause i was told
back in highschool that
"it feels like someone else is doing it"
it gets me wondering
about the difference between
losing you and finding out
that some one else found you
or my sleep
or lack thereof
its starting to tear me apart
i keep having this dream
where you are in
an unfamiliar body of water
trying to wash my poetry
off of your hands
or the one where
something happens in my chest
every time you sit
on someone else's bed
i'm tired of feeling like something you've misplaced
but don't have the heart
to look for anymore
tired of you saying my name
like you're trying to bury it
i'm tired of wondering
if you can tell the difference
between the absence
of my voice & silence
the other day
i almost started sobbing
at work when a woman
asked me about
our equipment
i was explaining how
things come apart
and almost mentioned your name
it made me think
of how you used to say
things like "what would you do
if i showed up on your doorstep
one day?" now, i haunt
the windows in my house
i don't leave for weeks at a time
i sit on the porch like the dog
you didn't shoot behind the shed
the one that refuses to die
until you come home again
i told somebody once, that
you didn't even know
what my voicemail sounded like
i wonder if they thought
it was because you
are so important that i never
let it ring that many times
before picking up
or if you dont know
what it sounds like
because you've never called
you can't be the ****** weapon
and the search party
i'm tired of all the seats
to the ferris wheel in my chest
being empty
tired of your voice
being the one i look for
in abandoned places
that one sound i beg
to bounce back
down vacant hallways
i just seem to stand there
in all of that quiet
like someone looking for a mistake
on an eviction notice
so i guess the hardest part
isn't letting go
it's forgetting
you ever had a grip
in the first place
and since you've been gone
i wonder if when
you pushed yourself away from me
you used your left hand
so it felt like someone else did it

Out of body, out of touch
If I feel at all, then I feel too much
This poem is as shallow as my grave

But I'm still digging

If I want a God then I'll misbehave
If I want to be sad then I'll entertain
Just because I'm found
doesn't mean I'm around
Just because I'm growing up
Doesn't mean I can't be down

I'm sorry, mom and dad,
but if I want to be happy then I'll have to be sad
I'll write until my fingers bleed
Until my words are the blood that the readers need

She draws black wings to her eyes
in a green-wash reflection, light
cascading through the shutters
of the ceiling fan, whilst red lips
rehearse a smile for her lover.

He will hold her like a wallet as
they pay their way through town.
It has been months since she felt
human touch, mammalian warmth,
or whispers exchanged across the pillow.

His eyes are on the screen as she
undresses and then falls beneath
his weight on the mattress. An empty
thud, a hollow sound, as his night is
given purpose, and then falls to sleep again.

She lies awake and wonders where
her night went. There was laughter
across the table, drinks stirred with straws,
and UFOs painting pictures in the sky.
The sea roared in the distance like

a passing train, and so there must be
an escape to a far-off land for her
to start again. Start again beyond
waistlines, over coastlines, and all ties
to employment. To start again

with a half-naked lover, who will
watch as the wind kicks up her hair;
as her skin freckles once more
in the sun.

The Earth is the only thing
you can count on to never
let you go.

After that,
it's all up to chance.