In a spur of curiosity, I read about Vincent Van Gogh
His life, death, and all that lay between
And in stumbling upon the knowledge of my sudden interest
I see that his last words were,

"This sadness will last forever."

The ache of them resonates all too well and
an overwhelming sensation of familiarity fills the cavity of my chest

I think about all the things that could of been said and
decide none of them would probably be sufficient to save him
But I still mourn the unspoken

If only I had the chance to tell him
No, it won't

If only I knew him to say
No, it doesn't

This sadness is not permanent, I promise
Yes it remains,
Yes it is still there always, living comfortably in the shadows of our figures
But you learn to see past it
I wish I could tell him that permanence does not exist
That it is an idea man-made
And we are simply living for today

It's funny, how someone who created so much beauty could not find any in himself
In painting a future, ending seemed more promising than hope
So in that wheat field his chest kissed the bullet of a relvover
And he walked patiently towards death

Van Gogh,
Didn't anybody tell you it gets better?
Didn't anyone say that even if it doesn't, you can?

Van Gogh,
Don't you know that nothing lasts forever?
That we are merely existing to make it to tomorrow?

Vincent,
I know this world can be cruel
I know that eventually flowers turn to dust and the sky turns black at dusk but even you could see stars in darkness
You made an entire galaxy out of the night and we are still finding ways to admire its beauty

Vincent,
I know the sun can be harsh some days
I know the air can be too cold for motivation on others
I know sometimes getting out of bed can be a battle with yourself, seeming impossible
I know how it feels to be heavy with the weight of too much
And I am sorry that you couldn't bare it all

But this sadness wasn't made to last forever
Flowers will regrow and bloom again even brighter than before
The moon still shines against a dim canvas
Winter is only temporary and the gloom will pass when the seasons change
Before you know it spring will be here

I wish you could have stayed to see it come,
It is the only certainty in this eternity.

When he shows up at my door at 1:30 am, I do not hesitate
Instead invite him in with tired arms,
Make a conscious decision to sacrifice a night of sleep
to lie in the body of a boy on my too small twin sized bed
It was not made to hold another but
this heart was

His smile is summer in the marina and feels too much like the sunsets of
red and
purple and
pink

I want to bury myself in the sand next to him beneath
A sun too harsh for our pale skin to meet, one that
will leave us burnt and peeling and laughing at our human turned starfish bodies
I want to be surprised by the freezing that comes from
running into the ocean bare and unbound but
for now all we have are the sheets we are in
so we sink further into the memory foam

Too delicate and slow for my eagerness to grab onto,
He mentions the softness of my lips as they trace his
I laugh and say
“I try”
What I really mean is
“I hope I am enough for you”
His limbs stretch across the length of the mattress, mine fold to fit his
Our cohesion in this lack of space is a packed box and
I don’t mind the suffocation

I think to myself that
this intimacy right here
is exactly what I need,
to be touched like I am important even if it is just for a moment

I decide that this hour of holding before
his eyelids fall together for the remainder of the night
is worth the 10 hours I will spend not sleeping
His breath, heavy with exhaustion, overpowers the sound of my starving heart
beating for the music of his and
that’s completely fine

I am running out of ways to
tell him he is exactly
what I want

So I let him stay as an unspoken declaration of always welcome
I let him make my bed a home with the hopes that
in turn he will make one out of me

We are hungry lips and eager hands,
Reckless teeth and touching
It is 4 am and we are too much alive to care about the consequences of later
I can only wonder,

Will you regret me tomorrow?

It doesn’t matter how many times you fall
Or how many times you get let down
It doesn’t matter if it’s done gently, swiftly, all at once
The force of gravity and the role it plays in the situation is irrelevant
And it doesn’t matter how hard you hit when it finally drags you down

It doesn’t matter how many times you fall
And it doesn’t matter how many times you get let down
It will hurt every single time
Maybe not the same, maybe even worse
It can range from scraped knee to broken wrist to bleeding mouth
It can be mild, it can be severe
It can last for a moment, a month, a year
But it will always hurt when it happens

It isn’t about preparing for the crash
You could be parachute-ready, eyes open, waiting
You could be practicing your jump, grace, descent
You could prevent yourself from building up too high and planning
But the impact of the landing will still be there

It’s going to hurt
The first time, the fifth, the tenth
Nobody tells you that it will, but it will
You will say to yourself,
“I’m never going to let this happen again”
“I’m going to be more careful next time”
“I’m setting my expectations low from now on”
You can tell yourself that you’re not hoping for anything, that you never were
That it is your fault for not bracing for the disappointment
You could say that you’re simply floating out the ride
But when it comes to a halt,
You will still **** back

It doesn’t matter the circumstance
Or how many people have dropped you before
Whether or not you were holding on tightly enough isn’t a factor
It’s still going to hurt when you hit your head,
Your hands will still crack from the friction
And it’s not going to be pretty

You’re going to feel it in all of your being
You will pull the splinters out of your eager heart one by one,
Leaving behind holes as you do
You will push the bones back into their sockets like routine
And you will bandage the wounds of led on

Maybe hurts
Almost hurts
Heartbreak hurts
Memory hurts
It’s going to ******* hurt

But you’re going to be okay
You will fill the gaps with cement stirred confidence
You will pile back the bricks high with pride
You will learn to hold your heavy head up even when it feels like too much to carry
You will paint a smile on in permanent ink
You will barely make it through some days, but you will make it
You’re going to be all right.

I interpreted your language incorrectly
I thought your beautiful meant stay
I've learned that words can have a million different meanings and
I will never know them all.

I colored you into an image so bright that I could see you even with eyes closed. I painted you loud enough for the noise to keep me up at night. I made you into something you were not; a masterpiece.

I know you won't read this
Your eyes will meet my name and take on the role of ignoring
They will do their best to avoid its presence
And eventually it will be a skill done almost subconsciously,
Forgetting me

I know you won't respond
If I ask you what happened
If I were to wonder aloud what changed enough to make you do the same
I'm not quite sure you even know the answer
And I'm quite sure I'll never pose the question

I wonder how it is that no one ever told you not to love a writer
Or worse than that, pretend to
These word-wringing hands belong to a body with a heart made of glue
Attachment forms if you get too close,
I am telling you that you did

It's clear that no one ever taught you caution
To be careful with the girl who cares much more than she should,
Who will love you more than you ever asked for
You crossed a line written in red and the footprints are still there

I know you won't remember
The way your lips met my forehead when you said goodnight or how the same ones told me I was beautiful
Your hands formed craters in my back and now I don't know how to fill all of the empty
I am used to an excess of space,
Of vacant but this
Is just too much

I know you won't understand why it is that
People like me always let strangers inside
We open the door without looking through the peephole
And take in whatever the wind blows with open arms
It is a mistake I am not sorry for repeating
You were just one of many

I know you won't read this
I know you won't try to
You will probably see my name and move on the way I probably should have already
You will laugh at my vulnerability like being bare isn't something that takes strength
You will remember my thighs, the unsteadiness of my laugh, the freckle I pointed out above my cheek, my warmth
You will hear my voice in the title
You will see the word poetry and immediately say no thank you
And I will continue keeping the idea of you alive in a language you don't care to comprehend

I know you won't read this
I know you won't try to
But if you do,
Know more than anything else,
I didn't write this for you
I wrote it for myself.