I can’t write this poem
I can’t write this poem because the last time I opened up to someone artistically they told me it was pretty dark and I should keep it to myself.

I can’t write this poem
I can’t write this poem because I was raised in a culture that was anti love and pro meaningless ***. I saw endless commercials about movies that glamorize a lifestyle in which your body is fulfilled but your heart is ignored and at that impressionable age I learned my heart came second but my allure came first and the less I cared that happier I would be and I carried that belief around with me the way I used to carry around a Bible as a child.

I can’t write this poem
I can’t write this poem because of the time that I opened my father’s phone to reveal a family secret I would hold to this day against my own moral instincts unraveling miles of insecurities wondering if I’m not a good enough daughter or if he stopped loving my mother or if true love was never real and although I had been taught marriage was my purpose, it was what I believed would make me happy, maybe rings aren’t enough to stay in love and maybe people’s feelings change and maybe no one actually has a “one true love” and that this purpose I had been taught was really an endless wild goose chase that only lead to broken families and lost souls.

I can’t write this poem
I can’t write this poem because sometimes I still wonder why I fell into an abyss of toxicity at such a young age. And when I say wonder I don’t mean a trivial ponder, I mean I contemplate every possible reason why the person who I once believed held the universe in her eyes would lie to my face, why she never kissed me in public and our love was always a secret, why she valued girls with blue hair but my blonde hair was not good enough, why I had to hide bruises from my family when I was still in high school or more importantly, why at the time, I thought I deserved them. These thoughts, this lingering paranoia that I am undeserving of healthy love, they muddy my interpretations of real life and distort reality and effect my relationships. My doctor would call these intrusive thoughts, my best friend would tell me they’re symptoms of PTSD, but I have come to realize that I’ve been burned and I am damaged and I hope to god I can recover.

But you,
Oh god, you
You can write this poem. You can be my safety net while I’m free falling in love. You can be the one to listen to my mental tilt-a-whirls, you can be the one that introduces my body and my heart, you can be the one that calms the storms in my mind when I’m questioning the love I’m deserving of. You are the one who makes sure I fall asleep in my bed after drunk nights, you are the one that still sees my value after acknowledging my flaws.
You can write this poem.

in the arms of a stranger, it's so long to 'how long,'
the ending-writ being composed in the arms of a stranger,
the surprise, the uncomplicated simplicity of a "yes, why not"

the normalcy of the out of the ordinary has a finery that's
abnormally kind in a peculiar way & a comfortable shiny finish of  a cry and a 'whew,' a laugh, a pause, a kiss on the nose,
that's familiar from a who knows me, who knows where, a silence,
a kindness to pass the collection plate of stored memory genes now
kickstarted hot and then a transition to the here and now of

hysterically funny bad jokes, a beer and a wine, and a Samuel Barber adagio that seals some of the open wounds and one can't stop thinking, thank god for the little things, the big ones never get resolved anyway, so the arms of a stranger, the long neck, tan shoulders, the eyes culling a list of unasked questions, looking for the crease in the pauses and an entry point to the decision of crossing the river of no return from the security of being strangers, whose bodies sang a two part harmony coming to a closing, last call from the barkeep lady tossing you your pants with an
awshit and the widest Mississippi River grin you've ever seen

and she asks do you like steak and laughs when the response is "with extra sizzle and Heinz ketchup" and the answer means the other questions will keep, at least for now and until

the violin weeping of a chest breathing hard but slow on the device
has played thrice, and the arms of easy are now fraught with the scent of risk, when the next the line is crossed with a followup of
"fries or baked potato?"
and it's too late, the memory machine has started recording and what is truly strange is that you can't recall what the day of the week tomorrow will be and if you have any plans that must be kept and that doesn't seem to be of any concern of anybody in the immediate vicinity of the her who's unconsciously humming the wholly appropriate, interesting choice, best love song, that  Dolly Parton ever wrote^

I have bedded these thoughts,
considered them in your absence
and in mine,
and still am.
I am busy untangling them,
forgive me for my distance.
I've done what was expected of me,
but it does not make a difference,
so how can I know it was
right
when all I have are the times before
to compare it to?

I've learned a few things,
not in your favor
or mine,
so I ruminate,
contemplate, meditate,
toss and turn these thoughts like
coins.
Heads or tails?

I'll write these words,
twist them just carefully enough
to claim plausible deniability,
or whatever that means,
and then write a more honest
account when my tongue
is not poisoned by alcohol.

By this account, and days, perhaps,
of turning it over,
I will decide what I must do.
You must know that I take
careful consideration of these decisions
which affect how I spend my
time.

You must know that I love you,
perhaps in ways that are
not in the ways that you love me,
but I know that you do.
I know.
But perhaps that is the
fundamental difference.

I've tried my best to reconcile,
but when evidence proves that I cannot,
I must deliberate,
I must decide.

The day you tried to live,
you could not,
and passed on to the
Superunknown
and let us fall on
black days.
You finally let yourself drown
in a way much
like suicide,
a spoon in your hand?
Spoonman?
You could never quite break
your rusty cages,
outshined by your own light,
burdened by your own hand.
You roll on like a stone,
the final hunger strike.
Someone forgot to
show you how to live,
and now you will be missed.