I awake to my tired hands holding your body tightly against mine. The smell of you is something I will never forget, pleasantly refreshing almost like a hot shower. It's funny now to think that this moment is the last, the last time I will ever touch you affectionately. The last time I will gaze upon you with an infinite stare so deep that it still shakes me like the first shiver of winter; catching me off guard because I thought summer would never end. I can feel your heart beating against mine and I want to cry, what a terrible feeling to know this was fading and the reasons were all mine to hold. You drift back from your dream and into the daze of the living, you realize where you are and you ask me to drive you home. I get dressed and you do the same. Though we wore little, there was no passionate *** the night before. Just two bodies side by side seeking shelter from the storm that brewed inside of us. This is the end, we can both feel it but neither of us has the tongue to speak it.
I turn the key in the ignition and we idle for a short time in silence, now strangers again living different lives. This driveway in my beat-up Mazda on an early Sunday morning, this place is my purgatory. I make a stop at the gas station,  the E-light is on again. I ask you if you need a water or a coffee. You disdainfully say no. You hate me again, you have remembered I am a cheater, worse a liar and no matter how many times I apologize those truths remain evident. On my walk from the car I imagined you hopping in the driver's seat and driving off; if only the tank wasn't empty. I buy you water anyway because though you have declined it, I know that you need it, I always knew what you needed and it wasn't me or at least that's how I felt. I hope those feelings give you a little clairvoyance into my behavior. I never thought I was better than you if anything I thought you made me more. I pay the gas station attendant for pumping the gas, I hand you the bottled water and I drive you home.
My car pulls into the dirt driveway; I keep it running even though I want to turn it off, just shut up that loud lousy engine for a couple of minutes and tell you how much I hate myself for being such a miserable *****. Instead there is an awkward goodbye, do we kiss, do we hug, do we shake hands; I don't ******* know. You open the car door as to leave; possibly forever and you stop. You turn to me and ask a simple question. "Why didn't you do this when we were dating?" you hold up that plastic bottle now half empty "This is all I ever wanted!" I knew what you meant and it had nothing to do with water. I stutter for a moment and all my ego allows me to whimper is "I did". Wrong answer. I watched you walk up to the front-door and then I drove home; where I wept, quietly so my roommates wouldn't hear me because I was ashamed, not of crying but of who I was. Looking back I am glad that night wasn't about *** because it was always your innocence that melted me to my core. It was your smile, a cheerfulness that often left me confused. The world was a terrible place and yet you smiled when you looked at me. You were so beautiful and I so ugly, and because of that feeling I did ugly things. Today; I can say I forgive you. I forgive you for never forgiving me; leaving me behind was probably the best thing you ever taught me.

With love, always,
Jonathan R. Potts

An absent father's failure with an inhaler in hand

Insecurity seething from his skin

Manifesting it's self as bulbous red abrasions on his forehead

A heavy breathing child who's eyes were often aimed low

His expectations for life even lower

A little over weight but not enough to concern his pediatrician

He cut gym class a lot because of the showers

Now fourteen he had seen a few ******

He knew he didn't match up

It was better that no one knew he thought

He went on living like this

A pale shadow hovering in the halls

A faceless nobody in the background of someone else's group photo

A ghost who was only noticed by those who tortured him

Bullies like sharks can smell blood in the water

And he was chum

I still vividly see the feeding frenzy

I still remember the day we were told he took his own life

NO shrieks, NO cries, NOT even a whimper was heard

Almost a concerted sigh of boredom

That night there was a party

Not to celebrate his death

But an apathetic gesture of his nonexistence

I attended as was socially expected of me

Even wore a smile

But my mind wrestled with his suicide

I thought of how much I hated him

I hated the smell of his weakness

I hated the 'poor me' attitude

I hated him for taking his own life

Leaving me to feel guilty

That I had done nothing to help him

As if I was responsible in some way

...

I see her there
soaking in the bath
the water as warm as her flesh
she floats, suspended in emptiness
melting slowly as she gazes

I see her there
wine in hand, unfulfilled
by her intoxication
bored by reality, just jaded
by the whole affair of breathing

I see her there
thoughts of drowning
in a ceaseless sea
of forgettable people
with forgettable faces

I see her there
but she does not see me
I am the red stain on her teeth
the warm water inviting her to sleep
I am death, and oh so quietly
do I creep.

Love is for the poor,
and money for the rich
but wisdom is reserved
for those who caught the itch
of curiosity for the fact that they exist.


Those sparse few who dare
to put their faith into people
but expect not to see the eyes of god
inside of another man’s cathedral.
Knowing well that these lies and laws
could never guide us past the flaws
of good and evil.


Only believe in the dreamer
who refuses the role of a follower
and shuns the idea of a leader.
Be not deceived by status or acclaim
because it only makes you a disciple
of a product and a name.


Hold in high regard the tired hikers
born to the depths of the deepest valleys
and yet they rise before the light of dawn
like a striker to set ablaze the malaise
of these pedestrian days
that mock our souls
with monotonous toil.


This life is but an eternal recurrence
therefore every morn we are born anew
and that potential is a shot at transference
into something more eminent than you.
Become the bridge my friend
because there is no future
in being an end.

Streaks

from worn out wipers

dented cans, plastic wrappers

the glow of a cigarette ****

lying comfortably 
in the ashtray

white knuckles tight

on a weathered wheel

empty roads

cold and black

eyes tired but open

like trucker stops

or roadside diners

with the neons

still on

I keep driving

teetering between

my existence

and a sweet dream

I’d slip into that slumber

if not for the passengers

still fast asleep
in my back seat

So I keep driving

as quiet 
and as lonely

as it may be

I keep driving

because 
somebody

is putting
 their trust
 in me

Nimble fingers feed
plastic buttons
through fabric slits
then zip up zippers
and tie ties.
Raised brow,
steel eyes,
cannot help
but wonder why
I am incapable
of loving just one
woman at a time.