With any new space in life comes isolation
Coming out with quiet steps and low voices
Walking in circles to get used to the whimpering images
Of where you came from

Like wading in the ocean, you are lifted off your feet
and left bare when the waves pass
humbled in the reeling tides
washing footsteps away

In time we all run in circles,
remembering what it felt like
the first time you treaded there
hoping to not trip on the quick flurry of memories

how it unravels,
I have no
explanations

it’s drive lingers like cold wind
clouding judgment
grazing skin

it will never go as planned
but it is as entertaining
as it is indecisive

we started the way we ended
you were still dating someone
when you slept with me


I don’t know if anyone knew that
or would believe me
but I remember the afternoon before your birthday
and that white dress you still wear

I slept with another young, redheaded girl
I didn’t have a reason why
but I remember breaking up with you
the next evening
watching you cry,
I was ashamed, and ******


don’t act so adult, you might miss out
on being a fool like me
the yellow sign had crime written on it
and I let it go, trying to its memories

I have my mothers hands
Bony fingers, veins visible to the forearm
Circular scars around the elbow

I don’t feel right drinking, doing drugs
Mom always in my head,
Grey and black hair
Wrinkling slowly with red gums

I hold my girl close, the same silky bedsheets
spotted comforter I spent Saturday mornings in

I hold her tight when we ****
I don’t want her lap to leave mine

When she leaves in the morning I can’t help it
Laying naked with messy hair, alone
And my black hole thoughts run between my ears

I can hear them between walls
Voices telling me to give my life to something else

staying here where the roots grow
or parting when the leaves blow

She gives me everything
A bed to sleep in

I’m only human,
I want to own you, make you property
I can’t help it

Our lives are parallel
But the gap is quickly narrowing

I stick her like a needle,
when I pull out I’m bounded

Pants tucked into boots,
rolling cigarettes on the front porch as storm clouds form
******* german shepherd,

I haven’t seen anyone happier yesterday morning
you're my brother,
talking up a revolution

we’ll leave this behind soon,
Chasing hopes for a different life
Or survive the collapse of this one

‘Do you think this plastic canteen is dissolving from the inside?’
‘I wouldn’t worry about it,
you know how lead killed the Romans?’

if I knew
another language
I would tell you everything


I hardly know this language,
but I feel you know what is meant
even if the words don't make sense

I want you to fall asleep,
dream of something that will stay
call you by your name and
love you more genuinely than I could


I hold you like no one else
(honestly) I can't remember
what anyone else felt like