one yellow leaf floats
in the blue tiled, sunlit pool
rippling the grid

I'm getting along
without you verywell yes
I am except when

I moved,       and I found,
a dusty tennis ball of
the dogs under the

couch       that he forgot
accidentally. His dumb snout
is what I do miss,

it's not you, though I
could use a hand lifting the
old blue couch, true,

but other than that
I'm getting along without you
very well as I

catch in a damp rag
flakes of tawny onion husk.
     Fridge drawer corners

     full of our old crumbs.
I'll clear that skin away,
and just kid the moon.

The body remembers, though it has been
four years since the summer you shattered your
knee but still limped out across the continent
to Boston to see him you idiot and
this is the fourth summer you've placed between
yourself and the last pin and the last *****
your body remembers, though in the
torturous lengthening of fused and toughened tissues
the bad leg is finally catching up,
and the scar with its ten numb inches of
puckered track has come to fade bone white
against your skin
but it’s still stored somewhere
in your sockets or cells and when you fall off your bike you still cry
Though you’re not really hurt your body remembers
So that when you’re confronted with their engagement photo
(you didn’t even know he was seeing anyone)
the darkened garden at the Plymouth Plantation
begins to bloom up around you before you can stop it
like a seizure or a vision, and you’re there again
trespassing after him through shadowy pines
and night-damp atlantic air
to where the white chairs encircle the altar.

here's how it happens
the morning after
you reach into the drawer
where the your t-shirts live
to find it austere
you'll shrug because
you're still drunk
& you can't remember
when last it was
that you had something wet
or how long it's been
since you made the floorboards blush
or why the carpet is upset
who wouldn't be
the contents to the upended ashtray
strewn around the apartment
resemble the aftermath
of the smallest war
to ever take place in norfolk
some midnight thief
must've made off with the lighter
because it isn't in
any of your favorite spots
maybe you chucked it
along with a hundred other things
that make noise when they land
in the neighbors yard
you won't remember putting
the refrigerator's belongings
in the bathtub
or scrawling a buzzard
on the bedroom door
but then again who would
you'll pretend it's spring again
before putting on your winter coat
to go out front with a cigarette
in your mouth
you'll hope for a passing stranger
to *** a light from
or drag yourself to the corner
with couch cushion change
to buy a new lighter
and on your way
you won't bother looking back
this is just another day
on eggshells for no reason
another november
choking on birthday candles
on your way home
you step over beer cans
the kind you fell in love with
and wonder who
had the last laugh last night
or if anyone said a word at all
it might've been another
moment of clarity
it might have been some idiot savant
any adjective that feels like home
anything that keeps you thirsty

i can only write poems about whatever things dishearten me;
i can never bring myself to write anything about you.

we are
a rough draft
covered in eraser dust
and pencil shavings.

you and i
are an exciting almost
and a thrilling what if
with so much potential
yet sketched
with so much
uncertainty.

probably one day
when the time is right
and we both have worked
towards being
the best versions
of ourselves
the marks we make
will remain
permanent.

but until then,
my hands tremble
as i think about
inking in
the light outlines
left by lead,
for i might ruin
our perfect maybe.

i am thunder, and my cries are ear-splitting
because she will always be your lightning.

i am golden,
and i choose to dance
through this fire
even though the blazing heat
continues to scorch my skin.

each step i take
is more painful than the other
for my feet burn
as i walk
on this blistering crucible.

i am surrounded by
unbearable hotness;
my lungs are being filled
with soot,
but i will rejoice in my suffering
for i know
i am golden
and that i am being refined
through the flames.