tangled in my bed, you’re holding the bits of my smile that i didn’t even know fell out.
there, in the the gravities of messy sheets and intimate eye contact,
we come upon the part of the story when it reaches a climatic point of dizzying anticipation,
the type of expectation
that whispers sweetly on my skin as if it had the plot of our collision written on it.
here is the precipice of something scary; my tentative hands outstretched—
a coincidental incident; your hands reaching back,
folding me into your body.
everything is the same: the sun still came up to light our faces and
this little town hasn’t changed.
but everything is different, oh god.
the day i sat down in a mostly empty hallway
was the day that i realized i am the worst of unintentional catalysts.
the blush of borrowed luck stains my knuckles and i clench my fists in hopes that it will stay
before i let a safe house like you shelter a storm like me.
i’m so afraid of breaking you.
i’m afraid of my own vulnerabilities.
i’m afraid of letting people into the places where there’s still some wholeness to me. i know—i’m a walking contradiction.
touch and go,
stay and leave,
everything seems to fold.
what is that saying.
“the best laid plans of mice and men, often go awry”?
  never had a plan when it came to things like us but please understand
there are certain fragilities i can’t fathom in me and that i’m afraid of my destruction as i am of my own creations.

      but for now, this is the first chapter in our book.
this is the first day I wake up.
this is where we start.

he's the saddest story i ever read,
a walking tragedy written with spilled blood of innocence
on pages of stolen youth.

he holds forgotten chapters of words
that he never got to speak, a novel that holds his painful secrets like a requiem.
he knows death intimately as his first love
and has bruised knuckles and empty hands to show for hardships.

but still, he smiles.
even when the aroma of
perfume lingers and
the ring she never got to wear still shines.

America the Brave,
did you ever look beyond the porch, and see the smoke?
I have felt each gunshot wound and bookmarked each media news story
and even catalogued some photographs
for you to look over again.
because it seems you have a strange habit of forgetting
all the times
where places that children should be learning and laughing
began to look like cemeteries, the doors closing like a cruel purgatory,
when another **** maniac rages in with a legal firearm –
“mommy, I’m okay, but all my friends are dead.”
red crayons will never look the same—
I’ve found that bleach does not clean out
the stains on the carpet and words alone do not console the masses.

America the Free,
have you heard the terrifying orchestra of screeching tires on pavement?
didn’t you learn that running away is the same as running to meet a date with the reaper?
America, please tell me why
I cannot look for safety in a blue uniform, tell me why
the word “police” inspires more fear and pain
than it stands for justice?
there, in the empty streets, are the echoes of the voices in the night that you failed to hear when the sound of
sirens drowned the world in shades of wrong--
“I can’t breathe.”
“I don’t have a gun, stop shooting.”
“please don’t let me die.”
I stand at the gates between crossroads but nobody looks each other
even if there’s the unspoken truth
that some of us are more likely to be studying obituaries than studying to
be finishing our high school and college degrees.

America the Bold,
  please listen when I tell you that there is a pain you cannot hide
beneath IPhones and reality television,
when all I see is hallowed eyes,
empty hands, and
more parents that shouldn’t have to know
what it’s like to buy caskets in mass production, before they even knew how to read, before they could sing praises of your liberty, before they even had a chance to pray for a different fate, one they actually deserved.

America the Beautiful,
for all your Spacious skies, and amber waves…
have you looked at the ugliness of your ****** palms?

in love with so many people and beautiful songs and sunsets i've witnessed--
pieces of my heart on every street corner and welcome mats where
i am able to feel human,
adorn the sweetest of tragic heartache.

there is no point to any of it. but there doesn't have to be.


i just do.

All I can remember though is the taste-- skin and sin and the way you made me shudder your name, oh god, such fire.
But maybe it wasn't enough, because as much as I loved the burning, maybe you just felt the aftermath.

Was my love the taste of ash to that archaic soul of yours?
You love your smoke though, breathing in my burning.

Baby, I'm a moon and you were a killer asteroid that left craters with the immensity of your short lived love.

But the hurting never felt so sweet.

(i miss you so much, i wonder where you are.)

i miss you the way someone misses a step on the stairway, a sharp jolt of realization, followed by a falling and crash.
i miss you the way birds miss winter, when they migrate to a perpetual spring.
i miss you like hot fudge sundaes in summer, sugar and sweet and all gone.

(i miss you so much, i wonder if you're happy)

i miss you like a favorite library book that has to be returned.
i miss you like a forgotten holiday.
i miss you like a lost love letter that never got sent.

(i miss you so much, i wonder what you're doing)

i miss the way your strong callused hands would wrap around mine, giving me strength. i miss your forest eyes. i miss the smell of aftershave clinging to my clothes. I miss the smell of us clinging to my sheets. i miss the way i once  kissed you gently, but you grabbed my face, hey, and made me kiss you more thoroughly, that's more like it, with a smug look on your face. i miss the feeling of your hands on my waist while you held me as if i was a tiny doll to your large frame. i miss the intimacy of our faces pressed close together and you tasting my smile as you touched my lips to yours. i miss your **** smirk. i miss your tattoos and tracing the indent of your spine as you let me explore you closer. i miss taking pictures with my old ipod and you'd kiss me with your eyes open and i would open mine and all the sensations that came with being around you.

and all of this is a stupid run on sentence and i am a stupid pining fool and you're somewhere, but i've been nowhere
ever since i started
missing
you.