I'm sorry.
I know it
doesn't really
matter anymore,
though.
you're kissing
other mouths,
tracing other
hips - and I
only have myself
to blame.

I took too long
to unbury that
love for you I
thought I'd lost.
I found it in
mouths I
shouldn't have
tasted.

the only
difference is
I found my
way back to
you, and you
made sure to
destroy every
route home.

sometimes I think
I don't want to be
alone. but then I
realize I'd rather
be alone than
with anyone
but you.

and you'd rather
be with anyone else
than be alone,
and you'd rather
be anything
but with me.

I was always the girl
to leave before she's left -
but when I left us, you
locked the door behind
me, and it's a different
kind of ache to realize
I had to leave you
behind just as much
as I had to watch you go.

sometimes i wonder
if ideas like fate and
soul mates are just the
clumsy words for things
that are tangled together
for awhile until they
are eventually unraveled -
if soul mates are only
together for as long as
they're together -
until the cords are
cut, the ties are
severed. until the
bath tub drains
and all that's left
is the filth, the rot,
the longing.

got a hundred
a thousand
a million
little thoughts
bouncing
around in this
broken little
brain - tell me
you don't love me,
tell me I should
feel the same.
it's hard to let
go when you're
everything
I know.
the only thing
that's ever held
me down on
these two feet,
even on the
days you knocked
me down
the hardest.

the silence between us
is heavy, kind of like
the silence in a cemetery
between the widow and
the buried. home isn't
home anymore, and
you wash your hands -
try desperately to scrub
your skin of any remnant
of the feel of me,
watch the sink empty,
watch the water drain,
wishing it was you -
wishing it was the
idea of me in your mind,
wishing you were anyone
else, wishing i was anyone else.
and i wonder if anyone
else has felt you the way
i have, if anyone's body
will fill the hole I left
in your mattress,
the gaps in the closet,
the hollow in your chest.
i wonder how you miss me,
if you miss me in afterthought,
like misplaced things you've
given up on finding.
i wonder if you miss me
like the drowning miss air.  
i wonder how i settled
on you, in your mind -
the ache of a years old
injury? freshly opened
wound? thick, naked scar?
maybe i'm more like
the pain of a phantom limb
lost to disease - something
you'll always ache for,
something you know you'll
never be able to reclaim.
and there are nights when
i walk all the trails i walked
with you, stop at all our
spots. and i feel you, but
maybe it's just the ghost of you,
the ghost of us, when we still
loved each other in all the
right ways. other nights,
i sit on my porch rail,
watch the streets, watch
for the boy that loved me
once to come around the
corner, be the boy
who loves me still.

the lull, the longing,
the ache  just before sleep
and just before wake -
the quiet, rhythmic
shushing, the weight,
the heaviness.
it's too dark, but
it's too bright, too
much, not enough,
too warm, too cold.
always too something.
never quite enough.
it's the swell of the sky
just before the rain,
the stillness and the hush
around midnight just
before it snows. it's
the creeping feeling
of change, of danger,
of letting go, of giving
up - it's how the winds
change, it's the stack
of papers blowing
away in the sudden
gust. it's the boys
who promise to
never hurt you while
they're untying their shoes,
unbuttoning their pants.
it's how they sneak out
after you've fallen asleep,
the cancer in the way
they kiss your forehead
just before they go.
it's your father holding
your small hands, and
your father's weight
after he buckles under
too many beers. it's how
no matter how many times
your he disappoints you,
you'll always call him daddy
when he finally comes around.
it's your father being the first
man to break all the promises
he made you and it's your aching
little girl's heart believing
him too many times. it's your
mother telling you to be better,
but never showing
you how to be better.
it's the way your mother tells you
to be safe but never teaches
you how to say no,
how to tell the boys when
enough is enough -
how fingertips creeping up too far,
how hands slipping down too low
should never feel like a debt to be paid.
she doesn't tell you how that sudden
vacancy in your mind is a warning
sign, how it's a quiet no,
and that maybe will never be a quiet yes.
it's the teachers telling
you that boys will be boys,
telling you that girls are mean
and to get over it and handle
it among yourselves because
there's no referees in real life.
it's lies that sound like promises
and words like forever and love
and ipromiseillneverleaveyou
hitting your heart like a brick.
it's empty beds and empty
houses and empty cupboards
and ghost towns in your chest
and abandoned homes in your
head and it's the way ghosts
never leave the places that
harmed them the most. it's
how falling asleep every night
feels like the battle and waking
up every morning feels like
the war and it's the way that
no matter how many times
you fight, nothing's ever won.

A day full
Of passing fads
And great lies
Time, space, boredom
Pain, worry, sorrow
Now deep Bordeaux with body
And a body full of ecstasy
Reading Hemingways short stories
And Poetry by masters
And strong breezes
Hold no unsettling power over me tonight
I contain multitudes
I go to far destinations
I follow rabbit trails
    To their inexhaustible ends
I dissolve here now
A peaceful allow to joy
Hold this not against me
I give in completely