You texted me
that you wanted
to say goodbye.

Yet, I’ve been
saying goodbye
to you for the
past 21 days.

At night when
I’m alone and
can’t sleep.
When I wake up
and remember again.
Whenever anyone
asks about you.
When moving out
of my room because
it was built for two
and just reminds me of you.
When I’ve had
a good day and
want someone to
share it with.

We spent 17
hours saying goodbye.
We sat in my room
with an elephant
until there wasn’t
enough room so we
walked  on eggshells
around the lake,
played at the park
with clouds over our
heads watching lightening
dance in the distance.
Went to the pub and
cheered to a year full
of great memories.



After all of that
I still have to
say goodbye
to you.

I have to go
to all the places
we’ve made memories,
taking the paths
we took
like pushing
the ancestor
rock down
a mountain.

For 45 days
I couldn’t stop
saying goodbye
to you until you
said it to me.

Instead of living
in your goodbye,
I can live for
someone else’s
hello or mine
every night to
the moon.

We meet
in Spring,
but began in
the Fall.

Looking out
the window
of your car
I imagined running
my fingers over
cornfields like pages
of a book.

Watching the sunset
in the rearview mirror
as we moved forward
together, needing
two of my hands to
touch just one of yours.

Followed by 120 days
of realizing we both love
saltine crackers and both drool
when we sleep really well.

You loved listening
to my heartbeat and telling
me how it sounded and
when I couldn’t sleep  
you’d pull my head to
your chest and tell me
to listen to yours.

120 days of you guessing
my favorite flower,
complementing my favorite cardigan,
picking my favorite book off the shelf
and reading to me, and attempting to tie
my hair in a ponytail or a bun.

And you touched like
my skin was ice and
your hands skates,
but that turned into you
grasping at me like
the room is flames
and my body oxygen
On the 120th night
you crawled into my bed,
I could taste the alcohol
on your mouth when you
told me you loved me
and I became addicted
to the taste.

After a week
I was Rory and you Dean
and with that began
our 39-day happy hour.

Until the 159th night
when you took back
that you loved me and
I knew I never could again.
My skin regressed
back to ice and the next
45 days was our last call,
numb to it all.

On the 204th day
you were Summer and
I was Tom eating pancakes
in a diner.
All I did was stare
at the buttons on
your shirt and think
about the time we
saw the moon and you
asked for me to write a
poem but little did you
know I have been this
whole time:

       Iris Moon
       Marble Moon
       Missed Moon
       Monday Blues
       Button Moon
       Spring Cleaning.

And never moonstruck.

We lasted 12 more days
and when we ended my first
thought was that I can now:
cut my hair
       count again
       and write again.

You called me
wonderful
by the lake.

I had to strain
to hear the word
because you choked
on it as I was
choking on the rivers
rolling down my face.

As if the
wonderful
punched you
in the stomach
and took your
breath away
just like you
were cutting off
oxygen to my brain.

Well, I guess
I should be
glad you called
me wonderful
because I’d hate
to see how you
treat those who
are less than.

For the past eleven
days I’ve been waiting
for you
to get drunk.

So I could read
the words on
a screen that I
really needed to
hear from your mouth.

The night I knew
you were getting drinks
I waited up for
these texts from you:

I miss you.
I miss you so much.
I miss seeing you everyday.
I miss waking up next to you.
I can’t stand the idea of being away from you.

But all you said
the next time you saw me was:
I hope my texts didn’t wake you up.

They didn’t.

Nothing
looks familiar
anymore and
I want to go home
but nowhere
feels like
it anymore.

When bluffs
get boring
I trade them
for fields.

When two
lakes aren’t enough
I leave for
a forest of them.

Maybe it’s true
that home isn’t
a place but
a feeling.

Maybe
home
is me.

But
what if
home isn’t
a feeling,
but a person.

Maybe
home
is You.

For now
I’ll have to
carry all that
makes a home
in my bones
until I find
someone I can
unpack into

Words shoved down my throat
I knew you’d understand
choking on them, I can’t breath my own.
You don’t need anyone
Constantly being told how I feel,
I figured you wouldn’t care
and how to react.
You never get mad
I stop fighting,
You can handle it
letting these words
You’ll make it work
override who I am.

She doesn’t make eye contact,
or leave her pajamas on Sundays
and all the spoons in the house
are bent because of her.  
Playing it all off as the protagonist
in a coming-of-age story,
but counting the pages until the end.

Screaming but muted
words placed in her mouth.
Will anyone notice her hands breaking
under the weight of it all?
Anchored down by the person
others need her to be.
Not realizing they are
drowning someone else.

I always wanted to be that girl,
I don’t want you to go through this alone.
until she was the only one left to be.

I’ve heard that pupils
dilate when looking at
something you love.

After 116 days you
called and I didn’t
want to talk but
you insisted so
I interrupted and
asked what color
my eyes are.

I even told you I wish
I had my mother’s green
eyes envious of my sister
for getting to wear them,
and that on a lucky day a bit of
shamrock can be found in
the muck of my eyes.

After that I’d widen my eyes,
and ask what color they were
that day. You’d always say
green, telling me exactly what
I wanted to hear.

I could never forget
the icebergs you call eyes
because they never did
change in size.
So a week later
I called and told you
exactly what you didn’t
want to hear.

And I no longer mark
days lucky or unlucky
based on what I see
others seeing in me.