The rings on my stove have always been there.
They grow with every over-boiled ***,
Every spill, every mistake,
More indelible with every morning coffee and fried egg.

Today, I soaked and scraped and scoured until the rings were gone.

Maybe the other black and baked-on parts of my life
Aren't permanent either.

If I could get the right words
And the bait to bite,
If I could find the phrase
If I could say it right,
I'd search my thesaurus
And my dictionary
Check out every book
In my local library
For something I could say
To get you to stay
With me.

You be the raft
And I'll be the rudder.
We'll cast off unfettered
Unmoored but together
Till we reach the other side.

I look good on paper
Because I'm so two-dimensional.

My heart doesn't pound,
It 𝑣𝑖𝑏𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑠.

I write a lot of poems to you.
You are the one who loves me
And you are the one who abused me
And it's strange
How both those yous
Get bunched together and mixed up
In my poems
And in my dreams.

The world went to hell
But together
We found heaven.