I know you are not in the burgundy SUV that's sat unmoving in the parking lot of my apartment building for half the year. But it feels like the only place I can go to be close to you. 

What I mean to say is, I don't know what happens when we die but in case you're still hanging around I make sure to keep the interior clean. 

And by that I mean, I know people do not remain in the material things they owned but those are the only pieces I have left of you.

And I guess this is just my way of admitting I haven't washed the shirt you were wearing before they rushed you to the hospital. It's hidden in the back of my drawer. 

This is just my way of grieving or maybe it's my way of refusing to move on…

More often than not
the White Knight's armor
is spray painted
and he couldn't even spring for the glossy coat.
His trusty steed
is a bicycle with training wheels
because he doesn't know the first thing
about saving himself
let alone a Queen
whose crown has threatened to topple.
He is a boy,
masquerading as a man.
Don't buy his lies,
candy coated sweet temptation.
He's lacing them with arsenic,
and hoping you'll slowly die
reaching for him to save you.

You are the sun.
Celestial perfection 
burning with resplendence. 
Filling the room in every space where something doesn't stand in your way.
I cannot look at you directly 
for fear of being blinded by your intensity.
But without you I am off kilter.
I need your warmth,
I need to feel your rays kiss along my skin.
When the darkness sets in,
and grey days become plentiful,
I mourn your absence.
I ache for brightly lit days.
But you cannot hold the sun in your hands,
you cannot make it stay.

I have written so much poetry about you 
that you will forever be living, 
among the pages of my notebooks,
with the greatest loves 
and sorrows of my life. 

And it's funny, 
in the way that it isn't funny at all, 
that you are both. 

I'll never regret the time I spent 
falling in love with you, 
loving you, 
being loved by you.

Knowing how it ends, 
I'd do it all over again.

For one more minute 
trapped in your gaze,
for a flash of your knowing smile, 
I would do it all again.

So now I fill my pages 
with future plans we made, 
ones I've had to let go of. 
I fill my pages 
with memories that I tightly hold on to. 
I fill my pages 
with our story so that it will never die. 

My pages overflow 
with love 
whose name gets read as loss. 
And among them you will live forever.

With a rabid snarling maw 
frothing with bloodlust, 
and long skeletal claws 
digging into the wooden floor, 
pulling up gashes of fiber.
Eyes pierced through her own 
like daggers trying to chill her to the bone. 

But she could not be bothered 
with this dramatic fanfare of threats. 
She was too exhausted, 
her skin felt as if it was wilting off her bones. 
Her muscles throbbed with each heart beat 
as blood pulsed through her veins. 

But the physical pain was nothing
compared to the war of her mind 
and the storm of her heart. 
Her sigh exposed every unspoken feeling 
raging inside her.

His lust for violence faltered. 
In the stretched silence 
only her heart break could be heard
and he realized 
he was not the only monster threatening her. 

The ones she was fighting inside 
were much deadlier.

You cannot understand how I feel 
until you are swallowing the scream 
of just wanting to give up 
while telling everyone it's fine 
and to have a great day. 

I'm exhausted. 
To the core of who I am. 
I am not just drained, I am weary in my bones. 
I am depleted in my soul. 
I do not know how I keep rolling into tomorrow 
but it's all I know how to do. 

Every day I gaze upon the tangled web that is my life. 
The map of half charred lives I planned for myself, routes I abandoned half way. 
And every day I try to sort the pieces 
and create something new
sitting in the rubble of lives half lived, 
half dreamt to reality. 
But getting nowhere.

But please don't worry about me. 
I've survived a hundred battles 
and they tell me my resilience is part of what makes me special. 
I would give anything 
to not have to be strong just once. 
But some people are born to fight. 

So please do not pretend you understand 
until the smile of being okay starts to crack 
and all they can say is 
"You look tired".

When I tell my therapist 
I'm writing eulogies in my sleep,
trying to piece together 
the perfect slideshow of pictures. 
Ones that show all the best parts, 
the parts everyone loves and admires. 
The things I love and admire.
She tells me they call that 
"Anticipatory grief".

I tell her,
I'm praying to a God I've never really believed in but have always been too much of a coward 
to claim doesn't exist at all. 
Maybe I'm praying to someone else's God 
when I beg "angel numbers" to heal 
with unspoken pleas to the universe. 

I tell her,
I'm signing papers to make decisions
I don't want to make,
should that become necessary.
I'm looking up environmentally friendly ways 
to bury someone 
because we always preferred the idea of 
returning to the Earth again. 

I tell her,
I'm horrified I'm thinking of any of this, 
terrified that dwelling will speed up some 
unseen clock I'm powerless to slow down. 
Like a final ******* from the universe, 
like one big cosmic karmic joke. 

I tell her,
I'm begging for a miracle, 
hoping if I'm attentive enough, 
if I am there enough, 
if I'm willing to sacrifice myself enough 
somehow I will be able to change things. Somehow I will be able to fix it. 


She tells me, 
that's normal.