while september cicadas
were singing my neighbors to sleep
i was up walking holes in my shoes
over love once lost
so many poems ago
that the only thing i remember
about the house at 38th & bluestone
is that it reeked of alcohol and is
as i'm sure of it
still saturated in perfume
and abandoned laughter
but that's not the point
give me a minute
what i'm trying to say
is i always thought god
enjoyed watching things leave me
it makes me wonder
what was on his mind
that night in september
when i stooped to cough
or tie my shoelaces
i no longer remember why
but i recall their trajectory
the way gravity cradled my hands
and brought them crashing back to earth like a 747
they landed inches away
from a scrap of crumpled loose leaf
folded in half like the smiles
of my relatives on a holiday truce
you see, lately i've been looking for scars in the newspaper
i find myself checking the obituary
for my former selves since the day i found your suicide letter
maybe that's why i can never explain my obsession with history
maybe archeology is just a funeral
in reverse
maybe hell is just rewinding home movies
or watching confetti
turn back into photographs
i never told anyone
the reason the doors to the gun cabinet in my family's house are locked not because they are afraid
i will take my life
but because sometimes
i sing them birthday songs
on the day you died
it makes me think
of how rooms only echo
when they are empty

*you know
i never echoed until you died

do you ever wonder
about the difference between
looking at something
and the hallucination created
when looking past it?
if you look at your hand
it's all you can see
but if you look past your hand
there are now two of them
sometimes it's hard for me
to remember which is real
it gets me thinking
about how my father
used to wake me up
in the morning by rubbing
his stubble across my face
i spent my 11th birthday
under the assumption
that he might come back
if i drank his aftershave
like maybe if i could turn blue
if i could be his favorite color
on our bathroom floor
he would forget why he left
the paramedics were all sobing
as they pumped memories
out of my stomach
i coughed up the day the post-it note with your new address on it
burned a hole in our refrigerator
coughed up the day
the divorce papers came
and my mother
took a baseball bat to the mailbox
i've been choking on the splinters
for 17 years
it's been 17 years
since the last dinner plate
exploded on our dining room wall
17 years since my mother
started accidentally setting your place at the dinner table
17 years since italian night
at the restaurant on the corner
where the juke box
spat tired music
and like so many other things
it stopped working when you left
i guess it's no coincidence
since the juke box went quiet
that the cds in my car
only skip on "i miss you"
i've been hemorrhaging memories
for so long
and now that i'm looking back
i can no longer tell
the mirage from the truth
sometimes i swear
you showed up to my graduation
and last time
i was at your apartment
i can't remember
if the imprints of my hands
are in clay hanging on your wall
or if they were left in the mud
the day god had the audacity
to let it rain
or maybe it's like the time
i saw someone crying on a bridge
now that i think about it
i can't remember if it was me

and here i am again
at the intersection
of pedestrian language
& old wives tales
swallowing gum
like 7 year memories
opening umbrellas inside
cause i can't seem get away
from all of this rain
i ******* with my left hand
cause i was told
back in highschool that
"it feels like someone else is doing it"
it gets me wondering
about the difference between
losing you and finding out
that some one else found you
or my sleep
or lack thereof
its starting to tear me apart
i keep having this dream
where you are in
an unfamiliar body of water
trying to wash my poetry
off of your hands
or the one where
something happens in my chest
every time you sit
on someone else's bed
i'm tired of feeling like something you've misplaced
but don't have the heart
to look for anymore
tired of you saying my name
like you're trying to bury it
i'm tired of wondering
if you can tell the difference
between the absence
of my voice & silence
the other day
i almost started sobbing
at work when a woman
asked me about
our equipment
i was explaining how
things come apart
and almost mentioned your name
it made me think
of how you used to say
things like "what would you do
if i showed up on your doorstep
one day?" now, i haunt
the windows in my house
i don't leave for weeks at a time
i sit on the porch like the dog
you didn't shoot behind the shed
the one that refuses to die
until you come home again
i told somebody once, that
you didn't even know
what my voicemail sounded like
i wonder if they thought
it was because you
are so important that i never
let it ring that many times
before picking up
or if you dont know
what it sounds like
because you've never called
you can't be the ****** weapon
and the search party
i'm tired of all the seats
to the ferris wheel in my chest
being empty
tired of your voice
being the one i look for
in abandoned places
that one sound i beg
to bounce back
down vacant hallways
i just seem to stand there
in all of that quiet
like someone looking for a mistake
on an eviction notice
so i guess the hardest part
isn't letting go
it's forgetting
you ever had a grip
in the first place
and since you've been gone
i wonder if when
you pushed yourself away from me
you used your left hand
so it felt like someone else did it

I grit my teeth, I feel the pain
The blood courses through my veins
The sweat rolls off my brow
And the tears roll down my face.

Where is this place that I am in?
Deep inside my thoughts
This desperate place of longing.
To feel the touch of your embrace.
To gaze upon the most beautiful face...

To crack a smile, and part your lips,
is now my ultimate goal.
The beauty of your smile and laugh
Makes me complete and whole.

But part of me is still not sure,
if you feel the same.
Would you care if I took a plane,
and never came back again?

My arms are open, walk on in
These arms were made for you.
I long to give you a warm embrace
And show you what I can do.

If you show me more of an interest,
I will be more motivated.
That way I know that I belong to you,
And nobody else is trying to steal you away.

I want to be your anchor,
your foundation on solid ground.
You are the only woman who can stop my heart with one quick look,
Can I be the man in which you confide?

That answer is killing me, and so is the time
I have to be patient, and show you, in time,
I hope that you will see me again,
When the dust settles, I will be your knight in shining armor, and your best friend again.

I could do it boo, you know that better than anyone.

So I beg of you,
                                        
                   ­           Come back to where you belong.
                              My arms are open, waiting.
                              My Dreamweaver, get me through these lonely nights.
                              Come, and make me whole again.


                                   Give me another chance.

I don't know but when were together... when were talking... when were in each others presence I feel some type of meaning, something which I can live for and be happy with as long as I live... but when your gone. When your gone its like im drowning and you and God would be the only persons to save me... it looks like its just God alone here then. I wake up with my first intentions being you, I cant go through my day without exchanging words with you. I feel so worried because I don't know if your okay or not.. and usually i'll be there to change that.. I call and it goes to voicemail at that time im like okay your not by the phone, where are you then.. Your surely in my heart, in my mind, you run my soul. I feel like I'll die and not even get the chance to say bye.. and if that ever seemed to happen there's no way I could forgive myself.. well not for a long while. I really do... miss you.

I knew this was coming for a while, I just never expected it so soon
you know they say a woman's intuition is always right and it just proved to be true
there was always this feeling in the pit of my stomach that kept on telling me
"he'll find someone better than you", "you're just not enough"
but I ignored it, I wanted to believe it was a lie
cause honestly I love you man and I wanted us to work so bad
I saw so much in potential in you, in us and what we could be
but you broke my heart and the house I had in you
cause lately there's an emptiness in my chest and I'm homesick
but tell me how am I supposed to move on?
but how do you walk away from the one thing that held you together?
before you I was those dead brown leaves on the ground
being stepped on after I was already dead
You filled my hollow heart with happiness and laughter
your smile was enough to light cites on fire
and it's already burning me alive too
but part of growing up is learning how to save yourself and walking out that fire alive and conscious
my last words to you were I hope you're happy and you said "no I'm not"
well that makes two of us

I guess you're getting tired of my drunk phone calls at 3am.
I guess you don't care about my slurred sentences begging
For you to come back.
And I guess you're happy laying there alone when you know I'm just breaking into peices without you to hold..