I buy candles
just to blow them out
because I love the smell
of things freshly burned,
and you thought
it wouldn't hurt?

I claim to have elastic skin,
but I'm more like
the world's deepest sponge

you're my only friend
who hears I love you
each time you leave,
because your sunken eyes,
that empty stomach,
those shrinking thighs,
have got me suspended
in perpetual fear
until next time.

I managed not to flinch
at your gilded dismissal,
but even rain drops feel like bullets
if they're delivered with enough force.

A dark room is the best oasis
from pounding bodies and too much bass,
so we lay on your bedroom floor
gazing up at 99cent cosmic stick-ons,
misshapen galaxies illuminating the ceiling
we’re looking for heaven you explain—

Until your phone lights up,
LED screen erasing constellations
and John bursts through the door
hollering about a lost ****.
You push off the floor—
Heaven is closed for the night.

The universe spoke
with me today
over sugar-free danish
and self-doubt--

I responded gratefully.

Baie dankie—thank you—
Surrounded us as we shared our lunch
With empty-handed children,
And we heard it again painting
The tiny playground for Sister Catherine,

Though my head focused on the “bye,”
Gracious and dismissive
To the nameless Americans,
Taking pictures of their town.

Baie dankie* said the woman
With liquor on her breath—
*Back to your selfies and indoor plumbing
Your clear conscience, your noble heart.

We take what we want when we need,
a motto I thought we shared
jumping around your living room
singing out to our favorite song,
But you forgot to tell me what you took
and who you took it from.

As you change into the black top
you prefer to wear out,
I sneak a glance
to check the status
of the skinny scars
inflicted by the blade you keep
tucked under your mattress,
Old wounds mingle with new
across your gaunt olive skin,
a permanent morse code
telling the story of a pyro-botanist
who can't let herself grow.

I glance back up
at your now-empty smile
and ponder the irony
of a middle name like Mirth.

I saw you out tonight,
and you had on that terrifying mask
of “I don’t miss you”
and by now it’s molded perfectly
to the shape of your face,
it didn’t even get in the way
when you leaned over to kiss her,
as I sat across the room
longing for my mask too.

I breathe in deep
and feel the moment
glide between my lips
across the short distance
measured by sideways glances
and finger-tip brushes,
Stevie Wonder trickles
through the dancing speaker
next to your foot,
always tapping along;
I smile at you through the haze
filling up this tiny car
as we’re burning more than fingers
and singing along with all our hearts
*signed, sealed, delivered, I’m yours!

The moon shone like pizza,
spinning in the endless sky
above the four forever friends
lying on a scratchy striped towel,
trying to navigate the stars
and find their way back
to Milkyways and pick-up games,
screaming out Part Of Your World!
desperate to turn 21 back to 5,
and the distance roars.

Fresh-picked blueberries still remind me
of sun-kissed afternoons and you—
my teeth sink into the rich sweetness,
the fresh zing of skin on skin.

But too soon the tang leaves  
my empty hands with nothing left
but stubborn stains,
a sticky mess of black and blue.

Still sated from spring blossoms
and a full summer
of multiple jobs well done,
lazy September bees
aren’t supposed to sting.

But here I am nursing my wounds
the second week of school
because you buzzed off with her
less than 24 hours after
pollinating with me.

Early June in Calcutta
means packed streets
of decaying carcasses
and forlorn bodies
pulling rich people in carts.
Record-breaking heat
amplifies the smell
of curbs doubling
as urinals,
and pungent sweat
soaks our shirts
before we even leave
the rickety roof
we called home.

But when I think Calcutta
I picture sunshine
and warm masala chai,
Suporna's smile as she chews
a mashed banana treat
and Rosie's tiny hand
twisting the gold band
on my *******.
I remember thank you songs
and walking songs
that we sang at bus stops
and busy streets,
where the glisten
on our skin
was only outshined
by the sparkle in our eyes.

We six souls
sip warm beer
from backpacks carried
across rivers and rocks
to the secret spot
we found as kids,
a lipstick-stained joint
gets passed back and forth
and Gabby's old blanket
hides shivering toes,
our secret hope
that tomorrow never shows.

Don’t look like you’re asking for it,
Stick to the buddy system,
Stay sober and on your guard,
Groups of three or more make it to the door,
And watch your drinks for any slips.

Avoid dark alleys, strange cars with strange men,
But also—short skirts, mixed drinks, red lips,
Full moons, plaid shirts, polka dots, and anyone named Rick.
Carry mace and don’t forget to scream,
*Make sure he gets the other girl.

Creativity can't appear
from some small recess
in your record-shattering brain,
it must be sparked
by a quick phrase plucked
from a passing conversation,
or the one-handed clock
striking two above the perfect
circle puddle filled with giggling
children breaking in new boots,
and the fresh scent left behind
by the retreating storm
sends you back
to the crowded backseat
of Pappy's Crown Vic
heading down the shore
for the best trip ever
Nana promised,
so you start to write
about first days of summer
and joyful anticipation,
because creativity demands
to be lived.

Here, where it is so easy to dance,
the whole street moves in solidarity
with the silver-haired couple performing
a living room waltz across a public square,
feet crossing and twisting and crossing back
to the sultry sounds of the swaying cellist
and his violin friend, playing not for money
but for the love of it, and of these streets
nestled below the chiming bell-tower,
where fountain water rushes out,
flowing onto marble steps pulsing with life
while old ladies in matching scarves shuffle by
in time with skipping school children
laughing in harmony, and even the prison next door
pounds out La Traviata because here,
where it is so easy to dance,
the whole street moves.

You and I collided
like fog over ground,
one solid and firm--
utterly immovable.

The other lightly
misting over
and through,
caressing this blade
and that one
before swirling away,
and above,
and beyond.

Wrinkled hands relentlessly search
For the missing partner
Of my yellow striped sock,
Our daily game of hide and seek.

A timer dings! and she takes a break
To shuffle her way back to the kitchen
And stir the simmering pasta ***
She is no longer able to lift.

Seventy years of cream pies,
and mended sweaters—
La dolce vita she always says,
remembering Naples.

At a milestone where many lose hope
Grandma knows her mission is not yet finished
Because the gravy is almost ready
And that sock must be around here somewhere.

My life has become a series of fragments
seperated by cups of coffee;
stacks of dog-eared books fade
to lecture slides and surprise tests-
flash forward to scratchy nylon polos
and "please hold, Jeff is busy"
until the lights turn down
and I hit empty,
only to refuel with a lukewarm cup
of the house blend.

My mom always told me
I was a possessor of happy tears,
so there must be something beautiful
in the pathetic irony of the girl
who pushes you away all month
and misses you on day 32.

I’d rather watch you run barefoot
Through the summer grass, chasing fireflies
And pulling a monster face
To make your little sisters laugh.

Show me the way your eyes light up,
Your breath skips,
And your whole face is transformed
When a kiss catches you by surprise.

Let me see your persistent heart,
Chipped and broken,
Stopping and skipping,
But relentlessly beating back against it all.

Yesterday you picked
up the candle
burning by my bed,
this smells like a memory
you said, and my breath skipped
because the last time it glowed
was the night we learned
how to touch in the dark
while my mom slept upstairs.

Its shadows danced
across the walls
as we caught marshmallows
in our mouths,
and laughed our way
through 16 almost kisses,
by my count, fueled on
by the intoxicating smell
of our only light.

We watched the sunrise
through the tiny window
in my inviting basement
before I helped you sneak out,
full on promises of "tomorrow"
but it's been three months
since I've seen you
in that candle's light,
and I watched you sniff it
one more time before handing it
off to her--
*does this smell familiar, babe?

Fly away into the sun, she told me,
spread your wings and take-off
twisting and turning, dodging drops
and veering left to brush against
velvet clouds and sparkling stars,
up, up, up,—always up
and away from eager hands
reaching out to clip wings.

I lean back against the too familiar
coarseness of a British Airways chair
and recall those words,
up, up, up, she whispered,
runway wheels lifting off,
fly away into the sun, my darling,
close your eyes and never stop.

Through stories we learn the moon makes monsters,
From ordinary men to howling wolves--the moon's to blame.
Under cover of the moon vampires come out to play,
Jekyl meets Hyde, and Frankenstein gets made.
Men become monsters that turn into nightmares,
And all because of the moon.

(i'm not sure if this happens to all men,
  or if the moon can pick and choose--
  all i know is
  that night in his bedroom,
  i discovered that monsters are real)

I lean up
to kiss your nose
and beg for more
of the cinnamon-stick aura
streaming around you--

Such tantalizing tones
could tempt even
the most reluctant soul

Messy break-ups
haunt song lyrics
and bitter poems
about unfaithful ex’s,
even history books
talk of jilted lovers
and the wars they waged.

But letting you go
felt almost too easy—
it just makes sense
you said one day
over the vanilla shake
we split each week,
and I couldn’t disagree
with logic like that.

Your mom bought me books
about mending things
I barely read,
because maybe
our steady love
was never really
a matter of the heart
after all.

Swampy sunsets,
sun burnt necks,
and the sweet smoothness
of  how y'all doin'
accomplished more in 7 days
than Dr. Gray in 17 years
for the northern girl
with the irreverent wit
and persistent stutter.

Underneath the ironically dim light
of the neon-inspired bar,
you line up for a picture
and struggle to disguise
a misshapen smile—
perfect, I call it
and you call me insane.

But your mirror can’t show
how my skin tingles
when your cheeky grin
catches me across the room,
or the perfect fit of your lips
pressed against mine.

Sighing, I look
at your close-lipped smile
and think of the gap
you painfully hide,
a small space just big enough
to be perfection redefined.

Is this what you imagined the day it snowed?
When you drove aware swearing
One day you’ll need me!
while snowflakes covered empty branches,
your lonely soul,
all else that’s bare.

I’m too full to finish* I whined,
After my last bite of Spongebob macaroni
In an Oscar-worthy toddler performance.
Granny reluctantly appeared from the kitchen
Reproach half-forming on her lips,
Until my near empty plate stopped her
And our laughter caused the frown lines
In her forehead to disappear
As she breathed a sigh of relief,

That first memory, so similar to my last--
In her final hour, Granny looked at me
And smiled, the crease in her brow
For one last time relaxing.

I scroll through my phone
and suddenly you appear,
a contact hastily added just hours before
you changed (ruined) everything,
Mikey (Last Name Unknown)--
and my thoughts are dark
walls and ***** breath
and the locking of the door
right before you

I never liked cigarettes
unless they were smoked by you,
during the breaks we took
from your crowded bar,
melting into busy Roman streets
to steal a kiss or two between drags,
but I think after half a pack
you could’ve stolen more than that

It’s s’posed to be ironic
You drawled,
Over a pale green t-shirt
With the faded stain
Of the letter “T,”

That syrup-smooth tone
Even the bees recognized as sweet,
Buzzing around me as if
To catch what dripped out next.

Who would’ve thought *crawfish
Could make my stomach flip?
And could anything sound more exquisite
Than fishin’ **-wels and gaytah tay-els?

And when you paused,
For too long,
To catch your breath,
I held mine,
And prayed that you’d keep going.

I'd call you both my North Stars,
but then Trish would point out
there's only one,
and Chaney would argue
that if that's the case,
it would have to be her
and I would pull up images
of night skies in Calcutta
and Jo-burg and Rome
to prove that different views
show different stars,
so you two could agree I'm wrong,
something we all know I'll never admit.

So I'll squeeze your hands
and keep quiet,
looking up towards the sky
for guidance and light,
a constant reminder
of how to find home.

Lately,
I'm battling winds
so strong they sound
like ocean waves,
and drowning
in gusts of love.

At the graveyard
Where six generations
Of my family rests,
A retired caretaker
Spends every Monday
Tending the flowers
Marking the graves
Fresh enough
For people to care.

Sometimes I watch
Him plod along
Bringing life
To the dead
And it seemed like
A sweet metaphor
For the way you
Nursed me off the edge.

I was still mesmerized by you,
leaning against a faded brick wall
lazily flicking a cigarette
against the 90 dollar jeans
I believed you ripped yourself,

when your mouth opened and all I saw
were those perfect lips, that perfect mouth—
your words hardly registering,
some blasé speech
I bet you pre-rehearsed,

“you know, desperate time desperate measures
and all that jazz—”
with a non-committal hand wave
as if accountability was a fly in the air
you could swat away.

I stared at your hand,
suddenly hopeful you’d choke
on that Marlboro Red,
and realizing the problem with pedestals:
there’s no graceful way to fall off.

In the forgotten corner
of my junk drawer
I found the remains
of a love poem
I once tried
to write for you,
and I remembered
a different life,
back when you cared
and I said I did too.

Gathered daily along Via Longura
Over antipasto and a deck of fifty-two,
Surly men conspire with
The **** barista in Café Settimane
And the neighborhood nonna cursing from a window,
Even the resident pigeon lady
Atop her cobblestone perch,
But not with me, una ragazza Americana
On the 98th of a hundred day stay, and unprepared
For the faint buongiorno that came out of no where
Or the dealer who winked at me
I swear—And I settled in as a regular
With a smile on my lips, a grunt from Nonna,
My standard espresso waiting for me on the counter.

The perfect mix tape, you explain,
would contain equal parts 90s punk rock,
early 2000 club hits and a few
love anthems from the early rock revival
of Hair the musical--
a perfect combination of the best sounds
you've ever heard.

I think mine would include
your boyish giggle after you tell a joke,
maybe that Al Green song
we danced to all night,
your contented mmmm
right before we fell asleep,
and a constant loop of the first time
you breathed I love you.

Listing barbaric behaviors in class, for example (****)
It should be said first. It’s thought first (****)
But the list goes on and on: ******, slaughter, holocaust (****)
No one raises their hands to say it, never once (****)

“What’s missing?” Professor asks. The answer (****)
on my mind, on everyone’s mind, but no one says it (****)
Silence falls. He’s waiting. But still the word (****)
is left unsaid. Unspoken but echoing louder than ever (****)

Finally a girl raises her hand and says it (****)
But her voice drops on the word (****)
as if she can’t quite get it out (****?)

Why is it that we can discuss genocide, war, but never (****)
it, the word no one’s willing to say, to admit (****)
the crime, the word, that is too shameful to even speak (****)

Ripped shirts, bruised cheeks, eyes squeezed shut
Hands, stop, fists, no, screaming, fighting, giving up--
******.

This is where I live!
our youngest tour guide
proudly gestures
to a 6 by 6 tin hut
viciously reflecting the African heat

Inside, a sun-beaten woman rests
against four ceramic jugs brimming
with water that’s almost fresh
carried from the well we passed
a mile and a half back.

We embark on a two-step  tour
across the tiny space
where a dozen relatives sleep,
pausing at the single mattress
reserved for *ouma,
eldest in the village at 52.

Her call for questions
reverberates in silence
against the camera hanging
from my neck, and the Cliff bar
peeking out of my pocket.

Our guide kisses his mom
before closing the door,
a relieved sigh slips
through my teeth,
we march on.

Criminal Minds* was your favorite and I guessed
chase scenes and FBI agents held its appeal,
but you said what you really loved
was how I buried my head in your chest
at the first sight of blood,
and hid my whole body behind yours
when the masked man appeared,
squeezing you tighter than that little girl
who fell in love with you at the park,
until the credits rolled and I crawled off the bed
declaring I wasn’t even afraid—
a detail I forgot until
the last time we fought
and you complained
in eight whole months
you’d only seen me vulnerable once.

Long distance relationships
are easier in the land
of 30 dollar flights
and romantic street bands,
where three countries over
is only an hour-and-a-half
and the space between us
isn't a matter of oceans

Our favorite childhood game
was set to track #3
on Elvis's Lost Album,
Pops would press play
and Tony and I would close our eyes,
spinning around and around,
two tops twisting and turning
across our tiny den,
while Pops played
a more subtle game
of nudging us away
from sharp corners
and unblocked stairs,
while our closed eyes
robbed him
of the recognition
he always deserved.