Tonight,
Sleep is almost as elusive as you

Our love was nothing
more than faded letters
kept in a drawer,
eating dust to survive.
We pretended it died
out of famine
as we discreetly moved on
free of guilt.


But...


I still have the scars
hidden under my sleeves;
begging for attention,
like a kid in the aisle
of a candy store,
eyeing a bottle of gummy bears
and a pack of Reeses.


What is there to miss?


I don't even know
the curve of your smile
when you said a cryptic 'hi'
almost a month ago.
When you pulled me close-
but not too close
because you were afraid of love
more than losing it.


Our hands
weren't made
to touch;
a curve and an asymptote
always r e a c h i n g,
a depressed biology
of 'crown shyness'
moving from trees
to human fingertips.


And so i
planned to leave...


only to see
your addio note
and spare keys
sitting comfortably
on the breakfast table,
having a pep talk
with a cup of cold coffee
and a stale egg omelette.


You won
in our race
to goodbye.

Without all my lovers
I would never enter the realm
of the fully human.

Each and every year, a million moments.
Offered by time, accepted gracefully.
Burned kindling, look the children in their eyes.
Accept not a truce, but a compromise.  
Ladle the broth, quench your thirst thankfully.
Fall in line, work, sleep, repeat in sequence.
Remember, forget, live, softly demise.
Mad men always hold onto life's surprise.

it smells like limes,
like salt and not pepper,
and like the ocean and like
everything that i have ever
thought was comforting.
like my father's kisses at
2am because he is going
to work his second job
and it will not be enough.
it smells like fighting. it
doesn't ever smell strong
enough for it to end. And it
never ends. It won't stop anyone
from yawing loudly in public.
It won't stop you from taking
advantage of her. It won't keep
you from being the person you
are. I think sometimes it smells
like the expressions we never
have enough courage to say
but i think that sounds cliche, too.
it smells like limes, it smells like the
illness that haunts the people in their
beds. It smells like limes. It smells like
life.

Loneliness isn't the feeling
of being empty.

It is the ache
that follows
when you try to fill
a broken vessel.

The numbness
of watching yourself
seep through the cracks,
reaching for something
that's long since
slipped away.