My fingers unlaced your skin like ribbon,
flowing warm satin down my palms into spine

When you pulled me closer, your hands
became part of my hips, unmovable

The way your thigh was an extension of my
clenched fist and my legs and yours tied in
a messy bow,
cold feet and scalding chests
and fixed jaws

In a singular moment from you changing
to my back against the wall and vague texts
canceling dinner plans

We could not go out when we were more
conjoined twin than happy couple
the only double date that night was our lips
exchanging moans

Maybe tomorrow night we will see friends

I let different boys touch me
Because I wanted to know
Even for a second
What it felt like to be loved
Even if the love was cheap
And it tasted like ***
Like the punchline to a joke
I never got because it was me

I let different boys have different parts of me
Parts they didn't deserve
But I offered up willingly because I couldn't give anything else
after you broke me
I was looking for different fingers
to place different pieces and hoping  the outcome
would be a masterpiece
Maybe one of them would find a way
to cover up the handprints you left all over me

I let different boys touch me because I had to prove to myself
you wouldn't be the only one
that these scars marking my body wouldn't define
my worth to be loved
I am not entirely sure  
you aren't the only one who could ever touch me without slightly  flinching

I let different boys touch me because that is all I have been taught
To be a joke
To be silent
To be ready to give until you have nothing left
- they keep leaving me and I am to scared to offer up anything more than my body to get them to stay

My happiness found a
new home in the clouds

It taunts me that a drought
is here and will be long

The rain will not come
for many months  

I am alone in the sticky
cold sadness of the winter

When I write to you,
I imagine you are laying in my bed
reading over my shoulder
I think that maybe you would be
sad to know how hard my life can be
You would rub my arm
Proclaiming "How dare she talk to you like that"
Or "You're better than that new boy"
Sometimes you apologize for hurting me
Or sit in silent solidarity for the hole in my chest  
Today I watched the you that is never actually here
count my veins and arteries perfectly arranged on the floor
Turned to me "Why do you hate me?"
I told you I could never
You hold the vein that belongs in my hip
"This is where you loved me, where my thumb fits,
where I held you"
The vein is empty
I ask what you expected, you left me months ago
Your eyes make me want to apologize
I ask if you still love me
But, you are always gone before I get an answer

The clothes on her floor are always covered in regrets
Maybe that's why she walks over them when she flops into bed

The ones that smell like heartbreak are unfolded in the bottom drawer
She sleeps in them, the scents fueling her dreams

A pile of his shirts that look like him and smell like home
Sleep next to her like a missing person

When I visit, I borrow the hanging dresses that remind her of happy she will never feel again
They feel like her skin is on mine

I listen as she cries about  missing him
I tell her about how much I love her only when she sleeps