A late July heat
can drive two teenagers
crazy

In the summer of 2009
when there is nothing to do
but lie around and whine

What better thing to try
than to envelope the warmth
into each other?

To forget about the problems
that five years from then
won’t matter

only closure I ever had
with the last I loved
happened in a dream

I wonder if
he had the same one
last night

because I woke up feeling
like it happened in real life

time will always be
my lifelong enemy

it will never find
a friend in me

Never had it. The  peach skin of an early morning move-in. Freshmen, fresh faces, awkwardly sharing smiles with those in the same boat.
Wondering what college will hold.
I have been stunted by the changing of the guards, never a need for an open heart.
Too many different places and not enough to settle down.
Never a chance to feel the feeling.
Regrets or not. I can't do much.

I recall staying out
until the sun broke
over the foothills of
my upstate town,
at the end of a warm night
in the starlit summer.

I remember sneaking back into
the house on tip-toes,
sinking into my bed at
the time my dad
begun to wake for work.

Sometimes, I pine for that time
in teenage life.

I am only twenty-one, and
I breathe my own life
into my lungs
as I wonder where the past has gone.

always waiting for that
fatal flaw

not a minor one,
but the one that ends it all

I know it will come
and I will give up

on anything new,
keep on reliving the past

after all, it's
the only thing that lasts

now I, back for good,
notice
you still give me
the very same look
as you did
when we sat on
my dorm room bed
nervous freshmen
anticipating
each other's next
move
and in this current June heat
I find that
time continues with you

Loneliness comes in many forms.
For me, it's a raging stream,
trying to pull me underneath.
It's a pillow I sleep with
that suffocates my lungs.
It's the sound of laughter
filling the room while I stand outside the door.
It's a devil on my shoulder, daring me
to cry some more.
It's a weight pressing on my chest
And no one is there to save me.
It's staring at the empty bed
and wondering when
someone will fill the space again.

I never noticed
That history repeats itself
Yet you remain the same

Said the same about my past
As I say to him now

He was different;
Or I thought he would be,
But I turned out wrong

Made false assumptions
And woke to the blonde in my bed.
Loved him plenty for two whole years.

He is turning out to not be the one,
instead he is a repeat of thoughts in my head

You are the constant
You can walk in, but
At some point

You must quit walking out.

You do this every time:
she is not any more special than I.
I have your words on loose-leaf paper;
"I love you, Sara" they read.
You always say
someday you'll make it to my
favorite place.
You make
empty promises with no gain.
And I, the liar, can see
straight through your ***** tricks
I can only hope one day
your true romantic fate
will wipe the smile off her face

I'd never felt that way;
instead watched
the boy whose first
innocence I took
emotionally invest
in other girls.

Time remains my enemy

Time's the reason
I couldn't see the future

to know the Timing was off.

Time doesn't care that it failed
from nothing but a broken clock.

the face stopped moving
but Time did not

It is not a competition;
but if this were the Olympic games
of wrecked relationships,
I would have the gold medal
while you sit in the stands

we made the agreement:
the second you drop to your knee
and take her to the chapel,
I will be running in like the
beautiful heroine
in a classic romance novel

A little lie here and there
years of trends
we couldn't stand
different rooms, separate beds.  
don't trust those two
alone together.
see it now
and tell the truth
say what they
would never hear;
we are
nothing but
two good people
who do bad things

I hear a young one
asleep in a bed next to me
At five, she breathes so evenly
Untarnished yet from the world to come
All sweet dreams except for some
While my half grown head explodes with thoughts
Of a dark future ahead

romance?
all I've known
for a while now
is a foreign touch
unfamiliar,
a caress of the neck
leads to nothing more
than a question:
'can you lock the door?'
for reasons I'm unsure,
this could be my fate
if I no longer
wish to wait
for the real thing,
to hold someone again

What I say bounces
off of you and back onto me
I reabsorb my own words
into my bloodstream

I begun painting my nails
so that when I am hanging onto the real world
with nothing but my fingertips,
at least my hands will look pretty
before I fall

we only see the black and blue
bruises that each of us made
on the other's skin.

we are both filled with shame
until the clothes come off.

was it a moment of weakness
or momentary bliss?

We pretend to be adults making consensual decisions.
Yet there is the underlying question:
What will our friends think?
The truth is that
They won't think a thing if you
don't tell them anything.

move on for good
from the romanticized
day dream about the
strawberry blonde who
never would be?

Am I ready to
throw the old towel in
and love somebody new?

I wield my new heart
as if it is
my personal body guard

I wonder if I'll ever feel again
a romantic touch, or if I'm stuck
with the heat of the ****
forever

A relationship based on
lies and deceit
is no relationship at all

It was already long ruined
and I ****** on the pieces

The only way to be truly whole
is if you fracture yourself
first, and learn to
pick up the pieces
to put the puzzle
back again

allow me to note:
I cannot give anyone
one hundred percent
when I'm still learning
that I must give myself my all
before I hand it off
to anyone else.

If only finding someone
to be with the rest of your life
was simply about their taste in music
or their choice of television shows

For the past year
we have been apart
yet your long fingers
tugged my hair
reminding me that
you were still there

now to let go of your hands
and breathe in the fresh air

getting over yourself
is a breakup in which
you learn to love yourself again