I keep finding bullets stuck between my teeth
The same ones you bought the day you decided the ceiling would look better covered in blood.
Maybe that’s why everything I say
sounds like it’s is trying to **** me.
But what do you do
when you stand in front of a mirror
with a gun to your head
and your reflection smiles back at you?
What do you do
When you stand in the middle of a busy road
And every driver is a different version of yourself you’ve tried to ****.
Every version of yourself
No one could love.
My mother used to get in fist fights with the mirror and expect to win
She says I look just like her
Maybe that’s why I wake up and can’t recognize who I am.
I checked the obituaries this morning
Trying to find myself again
It’s a habit I picked up from you
But I never thought your name would end up there before mine.
Sometimes I imagine what death feels like
Sometimes I imagine kissing you instead
By now it feels like I’m imagining the same thing.
Someone once told me that begging you to come home
Isn’t the same as praying
Maybe that’s why God stopped listening
and started smashing the windows of every place I thought we could be happy in.
Your smile looked a lot like the light at the end of the tunnel
Right before the train hits you.
I used to squint my eyes when I looked at you
Like I was looking at the sun
Or a car accident I wanted to be part of
I’m sorry I ever thought you could be anything ugly to me
You were the only beautiful thing in this hideous place.
I couldn't look at you clearly,
because I knew I would see my own face staring back at me and
your eyes were the only place I never wanted to be dead inside of.
You can only break your knuckles so many times
Before you cant hold yourself together anymore.
My hands haven’t stopped shaking since you left
I don’t know how to tell them you’re not coming back.
See, I used to say I never wanted to end up like my father
Now I have to say I never want to end up like you,
Which means I can’t leave without saying goodbye
But I tried to write my eulogy last night
And realized it's hard to write about someone I never knew.

I remember when I looked
into your blue green eyes
and saw you staring into his:
sky blue.
I used to imagine us gazing at
the pale blue of the sky
as it turned from amber,
to orange,
to red,
to purple,
to black,
and then watching the stars together.
Counting out I love yous in the constellations.

Then I looked up and saw you;

And I realized the only sky you'd ever see
was trapped in his eyes.
(And ******* were they pretty.
But ******* did it hurt.)

You don't need ocean eyes
to drown someone.
When I looked at you
I wondered,
*Why drown in blue
when I can look into your
forest green eyes
And suffocate on branches
and leaves
as they sprout from my throat?

Love was a concept pressed
against the pocket of my mouth
like a tongue in my cheek,
and I kept it tucked away
between broken teeth
and cracked lips.
Love was a thing that always
kept me parched,
and though it sounded soft
coming out of his mouth,
when I bit down
it was as hard as stone.
We didn't know how to love.

I used to whisper stories to the asphalt,
wanting to be anywhere but the city
I lived in.
Passing overhead green signs became routine to me,
I saw them more than birds swooping across civilian streets.
I would drive until I felt at home--
no wonder I still feel unsettled.
I am a modern nomad.
A human vagabond.
As I drove,
counting time in white lines passing
and days in rearview mirror sunsets
I'd beg to the roads,
"Find a life for me, freeway."

We started this in summer

When it was warm and fresh and free,

And our skin shined gold

Because we are

The gems of our generation.

 

But you left.

 

And the seasons changed.

 

It is now winter, and my heart is freezing cold.

Our romance has turned into

Nothing more than a

Light snowfall:

Slow and steady,

But when it settles,

It leaves the ground heavy.

Hearts heavy.

And our kisses are like

The cold, bitter wind:

They can travel

The distance,

But when they reach you,

It’s no longer a gentle

Breeze to caress your face.

Rather a hard slap that brings

You to tears when it

Hits you head on.

 

And I’m hoping

 

Since the next season is spring,

That we can crush everything we were

Into the dirt.

Grind it with the heels of

Our sneakers

Until there is nothing.

Then we can use the tears

I’ll bring--

From realizing that I’d

Rather have an ocean between us

Than three measly states--

And maybe the showers

That spring will bring,

That the angels will cry for us

When they see

Their two broken soldiers

Walking away from

What they could've been,

To sprout our romance from the dirt

And pick up right where we

Left off

Just before summer starts again.