ill
    at
        the
             thought
of
   her
        head
                 in
                     the
                          spot
where
           mine
                    ought
                               to
                                   be
but
      is
         not
                 -

i miss the old wooden swing in my backyard
where i used to sit and think and write for hours

i miss being lazy on the living room couch
and watching cartoons with my youngest brother

i miss sitting in my room, hearing footsteps from the floor above
and being able to know exactly whose they were

i miss waking up late on saturday mornings
to the smell of breakfast cooking in the kitchen

i miss being able to tell my little sister she looks pretty
every morning before she goes off to school

i miss sitting on my mother's bedroom floor
and listening to her tell stories about Tennessee

i miss hearing my father constantly whistle and sing
while he walked around the house doing different things

i miss living four minutes away from my best friend
and sleeping at her house for days just because i could

i miss talking to my brothers at 2 o'clock in the morning
about absolutely nothing and positively everything

i miss taking pictures of my backyard, even though nothing
about it has really changed in the past twelve years

but i think that i miss home the most at mealtimes

- m.f.

E,

  i don't know if this is a letter or a rant or just a bunch of mixed up thoughts that i've been keeping in my head for far too long - so i'm just going to ramble for a bit. i firstly want to say, i would have loved you so well, and for a while that fact haunted me to the point i lost sleep and the desire to eat. i'm better now. i'm better than i've been in a long time. and i don't blame you even a little bit for all the things i chose to do to by my own hands. but for a really long time, i was angry at you for leaving me. that's as simply as i can possibly put it. just, angry. so angry. you came out of nowhere - and swept me up into the most intense whirlwind of emotions i had ever experienced in my nineteen years of life - and then, just as swiftly as you entered in, you departed, leaving me with not much more than feeble lines like, "it's for the best" and "i'm so sorry". i was very angry, and even more so confused. i think the problem was that you thought i would fix you or complete you or give you a purpose or something - i don't know. maybe none of that's correct. like i said, i don't know. (there are lots of things i think, but few i know).

  you nearly loved me (i say nearly because we never quite got that far). i seemed to be your answer; or some kind of beacon that maybe you thought could be a guide. but the moment my cracks started to show, i think it scared you. i don't think you had ever loved a sad girl. or maybe you loved a sad girl and she hurt you. (i don't know). all i know is that i tried to talk about the train, and you told me no. i wanted to tell you about the things in my head and what they wanted me to do, but as soon as i tried, i was met with, "don't be stupid." i understand that you didn't. as much as it hurt. i think what made me angriest was your initial reassurance that you were different and you were staying. i knew better than to put faith in promises formed by hands of human flesh, but i had a lot of hope. so like i said, i don't blame you. and i've grown a lot since that time. i'm learning more about myself every day, and it's easier now to keep my head above the waves.  i do not resent you for your inability to stay.

  i think that if i had tried to write this all those months ago when my wounds were still fresh, i wouldn't have been as composed as i like to think i'm being now. i'm actually sitting here, as i type, thinking how ridiculous i'll feel if this entire thing is off and i've misread it all. but anyway, this isn't necessarily something i need you to read. but should you choose to, or maybe someday stumble across it, i hope that you understand. and i hope life treats you well.

warmth,
- m.f.

my mind moves faster than my mouth could ever hope to
and i so often find myself in self-inflicted messes,
embarrassed at my painfully apparent lack of finesse
when it comes to crafting syntax in a way that  actually makes sense.
endlessly i stumble, desert-throated, over meager words
that could never accurately convey the hurricanes inside my brain;
no matter the conviction with which i speak them.
the war for stillness rages on in the chaos of my skull,
shaken by tremors of memories like atom bombs.
my mind is screaming but it's all in a language
that i can't understand no matter how hard i try.
reduced to heaving sobs and irrevocable disgust for my inability
to to speak due to the lack of air inside my lungs.
thunder crashes and lightning flashes through my synapses,
looming in the form of opaque storm clouds above my bed.
i am sinking, no, i am absolutely drowning,
but there is no water around to be found for miles -
so i guess that makes these waves my thoughts,
and that must mean i waved goodbye to sanity's shorelines long ago.

- m.f.

i'm a broken compass and a delayed train and a set of faded curtains that don't quite keep the sun out and the glare they make in your eyes, but i love you in ways i don't know how to say.

so you can spill your guts to me and i'll clean them up with rags made of "sorry's" and that won't make it better but at least i'll have tried. i made this mess.

you are gasping for the air that i took from your lungs and my betrayal-bruised hands are much too slow to fill them at the same time i'm trying to patch up the holes.

eventually we lay together in a swallowing and somber silence, too many ******* miles apart, until i break it in half with not-good-enough words that serve as my version of an apology.

but i swear that i will shatter every bone in my legs before i run from you when you need me most and curse at the doubt that plagues my mind like black death.

i will shake my fists and scream obscenities at the uncertainties and banish every "what if" that begs access to my consciousness.

i will slit the throat of yesterday, and watch it bleed out - know you're more than enough for me, and hate myself for the pills in your body.

for you, you, are more than oxygen and no amount of salted regret that pours from my eyes could ever convey the thoughts my lips can't seem to form.

so i am shrunk to a pitiful half-whisper, muttering over and over and over and over, "i'm right here. i'm right here." and somehow we manage to be okay.

- m.f.

this is a poem dedicated to distance.
to every time i have wanted to kiss you, but couldn't.
to every time i looked at my empty hands and thought of yours.
to every time i was in a crowded room and secretly hoped that i'd find your face.
to every happy couple we see that inadvertently mocks our inability to be near each other.
to every time i've played your laughter over and over in my head to drown out the silence.
to every time you just wanted to hear my voice, but i was busy.
to every missed call and every undelivered text and every time your internet was down.
to every miscommunicated statement and every typo.
to every time that one of us was asleep when the other needed them.
to every time you wept and i wasn't there to hold you.
to every self-destructive tendency we share.
to every pill your mother has hidden and every razor blade i have flushed.
to every worry that plagues my consciousness whenever you take long to reply.
to every night we have been together through a screen, but alone in our beds.
to every, "i miss you" and "i wish you were here".
to every broken-record apology that never makes it better.
to every makeup stain that mars the sweater you sent me so that i could
feel like i was sleeping with you (and to the fact that it doesn't smell like you anymore).
to every hour, every minute, every second of difference in the time between us.
to every dollar i don't have, and every time i wished for your chest against my back.
to every, "why are you even with me?" and "you could do better".
to every spectator and cynic that has told us we'd fail.
to every doubt of mine and to all your jealousy.
to every ounce of water in the pacific ocean.
to every ******* mile between my head and your chest (i checked, and there are 9,752).

you will not win.

- m.f.

every achy bone inside me a relic
of the former self still inhabiting this shell.
exquisite fossils of the life once lived
my silhouette, housed in rock,
yet the softest part of me rotted out.
the vacancy in my expression
mirrors the hollowed out spaces
between each rib and every "what if"
my lungs carry haunted cries
apparitions you forged in my memory
phantom fingers singed the word
“remember” into my paper skin.
i am still smoldering.
chambers of my heart filled with cobwebs;
every strand of silk an unfulfilled wish.
we are still tangled up.
the spiders have crawled from our throats
but the dust is settling.
your fingers have intertwined
with the segments of my spine,
fists taking root in my chest, cradling a stone heart.
knuckles bent comfortably around each vertebrae,
your hands are cold.
the weight of all my sins is crushing me,
i suppose i should have noticed
when you read the lines in my palm like an obituary.
forgive me.

- m.f. & j.a