Metal pipes run
the length of the ceiling, where
rusted nozzles hang
downwards, morning glories of death.
What a relief
you must have felt when
only water fell
from those flowers, mimicking
tears of joy
on far too many cheeks.
What an irony
that an element that cuts off air
and drowns many
gave you the right and permission
to breathe freely.

I lost you purposefully,
dropping shreds of you on
every step I took
back for myself as
I walked away. First, the songs
you sang in the shower,
testing your lungs, dissipated
like the faint sheen of water
adorned you upon emerging,
a full-body halo. Next,
the songs you would hum to me
quietly, when I couldn't sleep, ends
trailing off as I surrendered to slumber-
I let their unravelings reach
the middles, now, until they fell from me,
the trappings of a life gone, threads
moths of forgetfulness gnawed
from around me, until I stepped
out of what was once
my only covering, protection,
and walked away. Finally,
I tried to reclaim the songs we
had shared, the songs I had loved
and you had loved me
with, the ones you had quoted
to try and convince me how true
how faithful you would be, the melody
I could always return to, the melody
I could always rely on.
I failed. They will always
remain yours.
I lost you purposefully, and with you
went bits of myself.

My skin absorbed your scent
when I would sniff myself hungrily
trying to lose myself, again

the smell of us would evaporate
too soon, I always thought
but I came to rely on this fact

after the summer ended for me,
the long winter months arrived
and left me alone to sink in limbo.

Please, believe me- I never knew
when I was drinking in your essence
that my softlywhisperbrush of a skin was, too.

And now, when the summer has returned
and it without you and with
my acceptance of your absence

you returned to a few of every inch of me I reclaimed as my own and
I started drowning in everything that used to be and wanting
to lose myself again, after all the battles
to pull myself back from the bonding I initiated and suddenly
I was inhaling my patch of skin so hungrily and then
it faded, and I was left wondering-
wasn't leaving once enough for you?

And after everything, I think
I can finally say I am beginning
to understand what you have been trying
to tell me for so long.
And after everything, I still
get scared sometimes, terrified that
everything I think I am understanding
is my own brand of idiotic hopefullness, or
worse, I have understood, but
you are feeding me empty sentiments, sugar cubes
to quiet a squalling baby.
And after everything, I see
in mind's eye, our figures
tied together, not mine
vainly trying to lasso yours, fine as shadow,
as I did for so long, and more
than that, I see us holding willingly
to this rope, precious more than gold
or anything anyone could offer me.
And after everything, I trust
not blindly, as I did before, but honestly
not the trust of a sun-dazzled fool
to her betters, but the open
and honest trust to a flawed human
who deserves it.
And after everything, I can say
we are not hurt, we stand
strong, I have predicted well
and we have survived, and your fears
were as unfounded as I said
they would be, (as unfounded
as my very own).
And after everything, I still
love you, and more
than I could before.

Is this it, is this
the final sign that I am
damaged beyond repair? Not
only am I now scared
of her blows, I'm sitting
frozen in the middle of all
the what-ifs. These cuts
you riddled me with in
great swathes of pain, aren't
healed as I thought they were, they
are now bleeding and
stinging me years later. Learning
that you are so much weaker
than you thought and so
much more broken makes
you ask whether
you will ever
be whole.

Today I thought, for the first time
in a while of apologizing
for my existence, and asking you to deal
with my own troubles.
Again.
Slightly shocked, I looked at myself, asking
how a person such as me has not thought
of a apologizing for her very being
in so long, and how you
have convinced me you truly want
to shoulder my burdens-
Yet again.
Slightly uneasy and in awe, I
trembled, asking the air, the
room, the world, the silence (but never
myself) if
maybe I truly am
enough for you, or if
I have convinced myself to forget
that I could never be, and so
cannot remember all the thousands
of unspoken apologies I am doomed to know
need saying to you and everyone
Again and again and again.

Though your love is a
truth, it remains one that I
need to hear from you.

When you are not here
to help me fight my fears, I
run from them- and you.

I am losing this
battle, the one to stay here
against my instincts.

You set off every
alarm bell I have ever
rigged up against pain.

Every alarm bell I
constructed against the world-
never intended

You got ready
for battle and you
fit yourself into
your armor and then
just in case someone
should try and sneak up
or get any closer
to you you welded
the sharpest spikes
you could find
to every inch, fancying yourself
a porcupine without the fragility,
no soft underbelly.
And I will brave
these daggers and come
forwards, into
your painful embrace
because all you ever
had to do was ask
and I
will
follow.

I don't think you understand
what I mean, when I say
I am a fifth wheel. I don't mean
I am always on the side,
I don't mean
I am completely unnecessary,
I don't mean you don't want me here.
All I mean is that, much like a car,
where the fifth wheel is backup,
I am your insurance
against having less than four.
Essential, but not inherently an essential part
of the basic structure.

The air around me is too big
without you to fill it and the world
is cold and bites at me, you
kept it at bay, as I wait
for the way away
from you I just want
to find my way back. Please,
say that that's possible.

The ***** of my coat still
smell like you and I want to crawl
back into bed, wearing your scent like
the choicest perfume, maybe
then my insomnia made of only
longing will stop long
enough for my mind to finally quiet
from singing its refrain of you over
and over and over and over and maybe
then I will be able to safely
sleep.

I can fly, standing, my
back *****, I can fly, holding
my arms aloft, I can
fly, speeding down the hill, I
can fly, swerving around cars.
I fly, dancing with death and
courting danger, I fly, laughing
loudly at my fear, I fly,
relishing the near-misses and almost-
impact of tragedy, I fly, I
spin, I wheel, I turn, I
soar, *(I escape
everything.)

Last year
you weren't here
for my birthday. I
understood, of course, even though
it hurt just a bit. When
we talked on the phone, you
told me when you returned, we
would do something together, and
I giggled, playing through my mind
the word you used, tasting
its heavy cream on tongue,
"decadent."

Last year
you returned
and you had forgotten
your promise. I understood,
of course, even though it hurt
more than just a bit. You were
busy, though time for criticism and
loud shouting matches and afterwards,
muffled sobbing into my pillow was always
made. In the back of my mind I
kept waiting for an acknowledgment,
maybe, if I was feeling optimistic,
even an apology. It never came. My hope, turned
decrepit.

This year
I look back
at what could have been,
and I understand, of course, but
memories of my blind faith in you hurt
the dying spark of optimism, the one
you haven't killed off, yet. Now,
I am the one who will not be here
for my birthday. You, wanting
only an excuse, will try and gift me with
your presence, commit actions
in my name, actions I do not want. Our love
lost, I do not ask if ever it existed, I know
the affirmative will only hurt me. We
are so shattered, we are far past
the point of being
Delicate.

Words like ants, running
up and down my arms, scrawled
blindly in the middle of
the night, when ideas come calling to tap
in my tired mind. Black ink, blue
ink, green ink, brown ink, colors
seeping through my skin in a rainbow
of painful letters until my blood
sings the lines of my poetry, mixing
with my ink until I think words
must flow naturally though my veins. If ink
is to become my blood, how long
until my ink runs out and my blood
starts to become only my red ink?

All the best nights of my life
have faded with time into the air I breathe
have solidified with time into the foundations
upon which I build my life. All the laughter
and sometimes tears, all the embraces
and the early morning chatter which is so abstract
and yet so real, I will never remember exactly
as it was, but they make me love you
all the more, nonetheless.

When I say calm down
I mean calm the **** down or
watch me shamefully

try and control all
of my impulses to run
or to brace myself

against the blows I
always knows are waiting right
behind shouted words.

But maybe you'll catch me
on a day like today
when the world is languid, when
the very air hangs around us, stifling all
words but mine. You see, today
I am glorious. I am filled with fire
and purpose. Oh, you
who I have not yet forgotten
or know, wait till you catch up
on a day like today. My laughter
is bright and my eyes are clear
and I am so full of energy you will
ignore the one off note
in my symphony, the one aftertaste
you can't quite place.
Dearest
on days like these I am
effulgent, magnetic, insanely, wildly tempting,
I am the siren call in the storm, promising
a safe harbor from the tempest you have
failed to notice I am creating.
On days like these I will beckon
and you will come, ignoring the bitterness
I leave on your tongue
and the clamminess I leave on your hands and
the dead look in my sparkling eyes.
On days like these I am running headlong
blind, willingly unseeing, heady with unspoken promise
to my distruction. If you want
you can come along for the ride.

Don't you understand?

Before you can make a change
you must first feel you are worthy,
feel you deserve that change.

Don't you understand?

I am a river-stone, swept smooth
by the currents of life around
and the hundreds of feet above.

How can a stone practice
anything but acceptance?

Years later, after you think
you've outrun all your past fears,
you will find yourself sitting
on the edge of your bed,
unable to stand up and face
the world. It's been years
since it happened, since she last
exploded and you let yourself
come close enough to feel
her shrapnel burn through you, but still
you're huddled on the edge
of your bed, scribbling desperate,
terrified words into your notebook
unable to go downstairs
because she is still there.

The safety of you
makes me realize just how
almost none else are.

When I talked to you and
you agreed right away
I was not prepared. I had been ready
to explain why I was right
to demonstrate and persuade
and flatter and wheedle until you
relented. But you decided
in your much greater wisdom
not to play
my game. I did not let it go, I kept
trying to prove my point.

Did you see what I couldn't? Did you
hear the desperation in my tone? And
did you know long before
I would realize? Maybe
you did. Because now I sit
watching reruns of my day and
the realization comes
It was never you
I was trying to convince.

Darling,
this is how entropy increases. It's not in the loudness or the noise, it's not in the moments after when we're all shell-shocked and confused, no, because this world will not end in a bang. Entropy increases is such a fundamental concept, and yet
I had hoped and prayed and begged and bargained and pleaded and screamed and whispered and
until the air ran out of my lungs and my only words left were
not here not here not here not
here, darling, this, is how entropy increases. When I am too tired and you, you are too busy. We will not fall apart in glory, love, we will not burn out, this thing we call we will just
fade
away, until all that is left is the faintest glimmer of stardust coating my cheeks and clinging to what once was wet. We are drifting, heart, softly
and the space between where our gazes fall short is the void
that swallows our words. This
that you are reading is the only thing I have managed to rescue, fish out, drag through layers of fear and hesitence and doubt by sheer need to tell you something. You know, we are
celestial beings, stars, constellations, but even the glorious fades and only leaves behind the faintest of imprints on my eyelids, so I think I can almost just remember you but not quite because entropy has turned my memory
a rabbit-warren of twisting confusion and holey nostalgia oh love I'm sorry this
was never the plan you
were the sun and I was a star and we will not go out with a bang, darling, with the milky-way of our star-brains smeared across the space-wall we were not destined for such things
we were not destined for anything
maybe that is why the only thing
is to go out not with a bang, but my whimper.

They say He
is in the stillness. The calm
after the storm, the quiet
before the noise, any tiny
moments of rest scattered
throughout the day. Maybe He
is even here, right now
residing in the cool cessation,
calm silence, living where
no words will thrive, the deafening noiselessness
pressing down on me- maybe
I should be comforted that
in the absence of you, He
has come to fill the spaces
our words have left behind. Darling,
I must apologize yet again
for my consistent inability to perceive
the divine. Please, understand
when I try and tell you, here,
I see only emptiness.

Darling,
I honestly believe that once you tear everything down
what you rebuild can be stronger than ever. When we demolish everything
down to the very foundations
you're forced to notice the flaws from last time. And you did notice, you did know
better than I did
that though I have no practice at anything
other than giving up and walking away, I am capable of rebuilding. That knowledge, it seems, is only the latest in you proving me wrong, showing me
I'm better than I think, letting me know in the best way possible, exactly how
I have underestimated you. Darling,
I could go on, but I think
I need to thank you for not listening
to my urging you
my urging the world
my urging myself- thank you
for not giving up on me.

Darling, when I try
and write to you, all format
flies from my grasp. Haiku and ten
always too little, and prose
I would have to fill with beauty-
words I do not have to describe us
anymore. You see, unlike the family tradition, I was
never a good Scrabble player. Always
only 100 tiles and short, obscure
words never enough to tell a
story that should be rich, not sparsely
populated with only 1 Z, or
2 Ys or 2 Cs. With you I feel
I am playing scrabble with my words. As always,
my darling, (with) you I am losing.

It's days like this I wish most
your existence could occur closer
to my own. The wind is blowing itself
teasingly through my hair and the sun
is shining like rain was never even
thought of, the sky soft and deep and
so blue, with clouds like cotton buds
smeared across the great expanses. Today
it would be so simple to turn and smile
at the person you're walking with, walking
to nowhere in particular, and then
suddenly whisper in their ear, "Run
run run run run," taking off down this street, winged
feet pounding the indifferent pavement,
bright laughter trailing behind us.

Death made you a thief, love.
While in life you gave
everything, selflessly and endlessly, death
has made of you
a thief, stealing and taking-
back- all that you were

taking back everything you graced
to our world- your laughter
and angers, your happiness-

you take everything
I (never thought) was (yours)-
my sleep, my happiness
my heart.

Death made you a thief, love,
but even in death
even as a thief
you have my love.

Deck the halls in paint and pastels
Steal the nurses' hours of sleep.
Watch your heart-beat on the monitor,
Hear the slow, incessant beep.
Look away from other patients,
Say that you're the lucky ones.
Welcome to the childrens' ward, kids.
We'll convince you this is fun.
Ask the doctors how they're doing!
Take your wheelchair for a drive!
And hidden there's the IV forest,
For those that aren't quite as alive.

I am the prodigal daughter that
will not be returning. I have squandered
your forgiveness, if ever
it was, on small sins

that I probably
could have avoided. Tiny ways
Of asserting my individuality, my
independence, my unwillingness to follow
anyone blindly. The food

I eat, the friends
I have, the actions
I take, the people
I love, they
are not as to your
specifications. I am the prodigal

daughter, the one
that stopped believing in your
(supposedly) everlasting love, your
(apparent) watching eye and protection. I

am the prodigal daughter, I
have given up on trying
for your acceptance, trying
to hurt myself to earn
the warmth and love I never
saw. For so long you
made me feel unworthy

of you, ineligible
for your embrace, and now
I finally know that I
truly do not deserve
the iron bars
of your acceptance, disguised
as a structure to hold
me up. I now know

I deserve more.