There is sea salt all over my hands, and I know I'm not the ocean.
So let's drink tea out of mason jars,
with cold porcelain shards instead of ice,
and let's cut our mouths on every argument we've ever had.
I hope you don't mind if I make a home out of you,
and I'm sorry if my spirit doesn't fit so well inside of yours, you see
I have been carrying dead weight with me like a terminated pregnancy,
and mourning the emptiness inside of me like a miscarriage.
Now it seems like I'm only giving birth
to the sorrow that my heart cannot hold.
Now I'm starting my mid-life crisis early, stating over, starting with you.
I'm writing my past into the sand, waiting for the tide to clean my slate.
So just wait a little but while I hold my breath hostage,
and I will wait for a ransom to come,
and I will pray that it doesn't come barreling down my door, looking like you.

MY BED STILL SMELLS LIKE YOU AND **** IF I HAVEN'T TRIED SO ******* HARD TO WASH THE SMELL OUT
BUT IT WON'T FADE AWAY. MAYBE THIS IS ALL IN MY HEAD.
MAYBE YOU WERE NEVER MINE TO BEGIN WITH MAYBE IT WAS ALL JUST AN ILLUSION
MAYBE I NEED TO STOP PRETENDING THAT WHAT WE HAD WAS REAL BECAUSE I'M STARTING TO REALIZE
THAT NONE OF THIS MEANT ANYTHING TO YOU. YOU KEEP LEAVING
LIKE IT'S ALL YOU'VE EVER KNOWN HOW TO DO. DIDN'T ANYONE EVER TEACH YOU TO STAY?
IF YOU'RE GOING TO WALK AWAY AGAIN DON'T BOTHER COMING BACK. I STILL REMEMBER THE WAY YOU HAD SCARS ALL OVER YOUR FINGERTIPS FROM TOUCHING TOO MANY STARS
AND HOW THE FIRST TIME YOU TOUCHED ME ALL I FELT WAS MY SKIN BURNING.
I THINK THAT WAS THE FIRST TIME I TRULY EVER FELT ANYTHING.
NOW THAT YOU'RE GONE I'M ABSOLUTELY NUMB
AND ALL I WANT IS FOR YOU TO PLEASE ******* STAY.

Change, for me, was always unexpected like how driving your family's station wagon into a brick wall at top speed might feel like;
like waking up one morning and stepping outside to realize that winter and the dark and cold and grey are finally here.
I shouldn't say that losing you came too fast because you were never mine to begin with. I don't know how else to say that your scent is the only one I want to wake up to but your smell is already fading from the sheets I sleep in.
My friends say I'm ridiculous for looking for you in so many places but I see you in everything. You always knew exactly what to say and when to say it.
Your words never gave me butterflies in my stomach, no, instead they were ******* fireworks. Shooting stars. I never minded being alone until you showed me what it was like to not be on my own.
Now, I can't stop thinking of how many things I was missing out on for so many years. This is to say I wish I had met you sooner.
I've captured all of our moments in a jar, and every night, I stare at it on my bedside table and think of you and the way you captured me.
But I'm so ******* scared that one day, this glass jar will shatter in my hands and I'll lose everything I've worked so hard to save.

while september cicadas
were singing my neighbors to sleep
i was up walking holes in my shoes
over love once lost
so many poems ago
that the only thing i remember
about the house at 38th & bluestone
is that it reeked of alcohol and is
as i'm sure of it
still saturated in perfume
and abandoned laughter
but that's not the point
give me a minute
what i'm trying to say
is i always thought god
enjoyed watching things leave me
it makes me wonder
what was on his mind
that night in september
when i stooped to cough
or tie my shoelaces
i no longer remember why
but i recall their trajectory
the way gravity cradled my hands
and brought them crashing back to earth like a 747
they landed inches away
from a scrap of crumpled loose leaf
folded in half like the smiles
of my relatives on a holiday truce
you see, lately i've been looking for scars in the newspaper
i find myself checking the obituary
for my former selves since the day i found your suicide letter
maybe that's why i can never explain my obsession with history
maybe archeology is just a funeral
in reverse
maybe hell is just rewinding home movies
or watching confetti
turn back into photographs
i never told anyone
the reason the doors to the gun cabinet in my family's house are locked not because they are afraid
i will take my life
but because sometimes
i sing them birthday songs
on the day you died
it makes me think
of how rooms only echo
when they are empty

*you know
i never echoed until you died

I've told myself that I don't miss you so many times, it feels like I'm starting to believe it. That's what they always tell you to do, right? "Fake it 'til you make it, baby."
I'm trying to be gentle with my words because I don't want this to be another angry poem. I've written far too many of those and they are always about you.
It's summer now and I'm loving you in raindrops. In swimming pools and stars. The thing is, I don't remember loving anyone but you.
Maybe this has gone on for far too long. It's been nine months and more than half of that time was spent waiting for you.
Waiting for your call, waiting for you to come back, waiting for you to love me half as much as I love you.
It has always been about what you want, and when it was most convenient for you. All of this has made me more vulnerable than I ever wanted to let myself be.
I remember someone once told me that love can be a form of self harm. I always loved hurting myself which would explain why i chose you.
Love is supposed to be gentle, and joyful, not full of sorrow and tears and pain.
Baby, it's always so dark when you are gone. I keep telling myself I won't let you do this, I won't let you leave and come back whenever you want to be reminded of us, but every time you do come back, I get caught up in the moment and the way you're so good with words and I'm under your spell again.
I can't function without you, but the feeling isn't mutual. I miss you the way I promised myself I wouldn't miss anyone. But I think I'm finally done waiting.