Sometimes I take the long way home.
I hope you don’t mind.
It’s just in hopes of spending a few more
minutes with you.
And I take every chance to switch
into the right lane, just to steal
a few extra glances when you’re not looking.
I hope you don’t mind.
I’ve cracked open my ribcage and laid
every piece of what’s left on the table,
even if it’s not much.
I don’t need you to put me back together,
I just need you to be okay with
broken pieces,
fragmented statements,
incoherent whispers.
We don’t need to be fixed.
We just need to grow.
And how can we grow if there are not
cracks in our minds and gaping holes
in our hearts?
I think your pieces are beautiful.
I would like to hold on to them for a while.
I hope you don’t mind.

Can you handle me on sleepless nights
after midnight when past regrets
turn into future fears?
Will you be able to calm that sea?
Because my teeth feel loose inside my mouth
and some days I worry too much.
Some days my clothes are a tad bit too big
or too small,
and my glasses don’t sit right.
I guess they still keep you in focus.
I wonder what you’d think
if you saw all the thoughts I had.
What if I’m not enough?
You’d think it’d be a question
but some days it just becomes a statement
that I bury underneath fearful eyes.
I guess I forget that it can be answered.
But what if?
What if I’m not enough.

My third grade teacher called me a word miser,
I suppose not much has changed.
Maybe I’ve just become selective,
or maybe you force words to
stay lodged inside my throat.
But maybe words really don’t say that much.
Because I see more letters in those
forest eyes than all the books I’ve buried myself in,
and your lips could write pages with
all the softness that they hold.
So we live in emptiness together
like we never want to leave.
They will have to drag us out,
if they can find us first.
I know you won’t ever let them find us,
because you grasp time within your fingers
and hold stillness in your bones.
It’s okay if you’re scared.
I’m sure it’s for the same reason I am,
and for the same reason you
place a napkin on your lap when you eat:
you don’t trust yourself.
But that’s okay,
you only need to trust me.

I woke up with a headache this morning,
I think I drank too much of you last night;
even if most of it was in silence.
But silence is what you make it,
and there’s no need for words
when I can hear your heart beating
from across the table
and your pupils are larger than the lids of
the two unfinished coffees that sit in my car.
I desperately search for something to grasp,
so I must avoid your eyes
because they’re far too much to handle.
So I find the freckle just above
the end of your right eyebrow,
and the extra hole in your ear
that you did not fill with jewelry tonight.
I pretend that every day I will see you,
and today you are the deep blue sky
filled with wispy clouds;
an ocean of reminders that
there’s so much more to find
inside of you.

I thought I would run out of words
when soft beams of light peaked past the horizon,
like the letters would sink down with the moon.
Because for years I’ve made the stars my ink
and the night sky my canvas.
I guess the sunlight just feels strange
when you’ve spent so much time in darkness.
But now it warms my frosted fingers,
pulsing liquid lava through my veins.
Sleepless nights becoming tired mornings.
But they are new.
And so am I.
I can write about hope,
even if I have so little left.
I can write about truth,
even though I lie right through my teeth.
I can write about peace,
even though I see none of it in me.
And I can write about love,
even though I haven’t the faintest clue
of what it could be.

I will never tell you that you look beautiful.
I will never tell you that (you) look lovely.
Because those statements hinge on sundresses
and too much time looking in the mirror.
After all, it is just a piece of glass.
And you (are) too,
because I see right through the beaming
reflections on your skin.
And you are deeper than the ocean,
calmer than it too.
As sweet as dripping honey,
and as (soft) as morning dew.
You’re that feel(i)ng at 2 (am), when the Sun
is asleep and somehow I still don’t feel alone.
And you are every gentle raindrop landing
on (quiet) rooftops in late July.
Your roots sink further than lofty White Oaks,
and your reach extends far beyond their branches.
You keep every beam of sunlight,
your eyes like glowing coals,
and every morning the horizon must borrow
from all the splendor that you hold.
They fill books with all your essence,
and it’s still never enough.
So I will call you what you are.
You are lovely.
You are beautiful.

I want you to be unsure of
the words you want to say,
because I know I sure as hell am.
I’d rather live half way in the past
than lose something I never had.
And don’t you dare call me a coward
just because I’m scared to write these words.
You can’t love me.
You’re not allowed to love me.
I won’t let you.
Because you deserve the ocean
and I can only offer droplets.
Slipping sand right through my fingers,
crumbling rock beneath my feet.
Every glowing star goes dim
when your eyes reflect their light.
And I can’t stomach hopeful answers
from even more hopeful lips, but I will try.
I will try.
I will try to grow new gardens
from ancient soil in my heart.
Perhaps this time it’s ready,
perhaps it will spread through every limb.
And you might say I’ve jumped
right into the deep end,
but it’s the only way I know how to swim.