We are sitting in the same coffee shop I fell in love with him in, but it is different now. I look up and he is still looking at his hands. Eyes are on his callused palms, twiddling his thumbs and I still love him more than I ever have. He looks up with an innocence that only a child could have. I think of how he is thinking about her. I wonder if he even sees me or just the ghost of a girl he almost loved.
"You know this isn't easy for me. You know that," he mumbles, looking down again.
"Do you think this is easy for me? I have to sit here and watch you fall in love with someone else when all the while I am having to convince myself that eventually things will get better, people tell me that eventually things will get better. I can't tell you the amount of times you would have received a phone call but didn't because I knew you wouldn't answer. I don't know what you expect. This isn't easy for me either, this isn’t easy at all."
We sit in silence for a moment. I almost cry but I refuse to show any more weakness than I already have, he doesn't deserve to see me hurting. He wouldn’t understand. The silence falls heavy on the wooden floors. And after a few long seconds of it all he can manage is,
"I'm sorry."

There’s that moment. Some people don’t know what I’m talking about and some never will. Alone, whether it be in the woods, on the bus, or at a populate dinner party, clarity walks right through the door with her menacing smile and she begins to scrub away these notions you once held so true to heart. Morals that your world revolves around, tilting on its axis avoiding these things that clarity holds in a basket, that she urges you to try. I find immense horror in the underlying truth that populations of people settle with what they assume to be the best version of themselves. Arriving at a destination and deciding, “This will do.” How dare someone claim that their journey is over. What a way to live! Clarity cannot sleep at night, she is much too busy endeavoring to wake us all up. She thrives in open discussions and dances with the allusion of unbalanced thoughts. She rest her head on your pillow and collects memories to distort. She plants trees of cognition and reflects daily on your first loves and the day you learned to ride a bike. Clarity sips coffee from your collarbones as you write a story about the one who got away. Again. There’s that moment. Clarity stares you in the face like she planning where she will engrave your new wrinkles. She takes your hand in hers and places it on your chest. She says “As long as this is beating, you are not finished yet.” Out of fear and humility, you nod your head, intently listening to the drum beneath your palm. The moment is gone, but that doesn’t matter now. All that matters was that it was there. How dare someone claim that their journey is over, you think to yourself. What a way to live.

It is years later now
You have run off to the grocery store that is just down the street
It is the kind of morning where the sun warms your cheeks as the wind bites your fingers
You shoes are laced crookedly and your glasses need to be cleaned
As you make your way up the stairs, fumbling around for the key in your pocket
The door swings open and you will see me dancing in the dim light of our apartment wearing your shirt, waiting for you to come home
Lingering in the sweet smell of lemon tea and cinnamon candles your mother gave you last Christmas
My lips curve to a smile in seeing you've made it back and I pull my hair into a bun
In making my way to the kitchen to pour us some tea, you stop me abruptly but more gentle than ever
I go to say something but before it can leave my lips you stop me
I've learned kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous
The music playing from the record player was suddenly all we could hear
Love has a funny way of turning kitchens into ballrooms as we dance in the soft light leaking from the curtains
Looking up at you, I wonder all this time how you have stayed with me
I am merely a box of broken words and silly heart scrabbled poems
And you have more light than any cosmo to ever lay a finger on the sky
I need you like God needs an eighth day
There is a kind of kiss you feel forever and I have been walking blind due to the impact
The way you touch me could dismantle the sun
So tomorrow when you leave to run off to the grocery store that is just down the street
Come home sooner

I have spent nights drowning in liquor and the language between us that we never learned to speak out loud
I have underlined the catch phrases
The clues, the insiders, the unspoken declarations
I have swallowed syllables, swallowed shots
Injected my body with the way you sound on the phone when you're tired
I leave my phone downstairs so I can't call you in my sleep
At night, intoxicated and stubbornly confused I am a little less broken
Numb to the humility of unrequited love
Shake hands with cupid in back seats
And talk with him about his aim
When it is dark out, somehow I can still breathe
The constellations hanging heavy over my head offer enough comfort to keep my eyes dry
But I always love you in the morning
More than the morning before
Somehow in my brief unconsciousness, you are still alive
I often wake up in a pool of *****
I am so tired of this endless spiral to no where
I am tired of spilling your name out all over my mattress in a drunken sickness in the middle of the night
Early hours of the morning, before dawn
I recognize my reflection by name but not by spirit
And maybe love is only easy before the sun comes up because it is so easy to find yourself
When you are dazed and drowsy
Worn and wavered
Your senses take flight in essence of the indispensable atmosphere gripping the tips of your fingers
Let the smoke rise, ashes fall
Let the clouds dance over the moon
And when the sun comes up
Dawn creeps in, shadows step out of hiding
I sit up, not quite sober, in recovery of trying to remember how to forget your name
I sit up, giving myself enough time to adjust my eyes
And in just the right lighting I can see the your tall figure standing in my room looking at pictures I've hung on the wall
The paintings, the posters, the letters
I look at my hands
Shaking, cold, fatigued
Fix my gaze on my veins
This is my skin, not yours, and yet you are still under it
I am unconditionally and eternally entranced by your haunting presence
You are a ghost in the night that watches me sleep
But you are only a figure of dust in the morning
Leaving again

You are the open textbook on how not to fall in love
You are the hand-written love letter that no one gets to read
You are broken glass vase with a stained memory of where flowers used to live
I know that you are not good for me
You're a liar who feels no guilt in lying
You are a desirable gift that never last very long
You are the reason for when my palms get sweaty I immediately wipe them dry
You are a runaway train that no one can easily get off of
And I do not have time for bumpy rides
My heart refuses to wear a helmet
Today I am saying that no matter how hard you pull or push
I will never go back to the empty train station again

There is something so intoxicating
About fooling around with someone that you love
Who does not love you back
It sounds ballistic and ludicrous
That you could give your body away so easily
To someone who isn't careful
With how he takes it
There is no genuine gentleness
There is no slow rhythm
Only anticipation and hope that he does not drop you
I am only giving myself away because I love the way your hands hold me
You do not grip or restrain
I am free to leave whenever I want
And so are you
And that is the most freeing, yet heart wrenching thing of all

To everyone who has dealt with unrequited love
Lived with heartache and constant confusion
You were never sure if they meant what they said
Always second guessing every movement
Every phone call, text message, kind gesture
Always wondered if it went a little deeper
To everyone who has dealt with unrequited love
Walked through valleys alone, holding your own hand
Looking at them standing on a mountain
You wonder if they are looking at you from up there
You wonder what the weather is like
But more about the feeling of their lips on yours
To everyone who has dealt with unrequited love
There is a tornado in your throat
And you want to tell them at you miss them
That you need them with you
That this is no ordinary type of love
This love turns my stone heart into vats of molten rock
To everyone who has dealt with unrequited love
Raise a bottle to all the years that we will regret
Waiting on someone who we thought
We would always love
And would eventually, when they were ready
Love us back

I'm sorry
I'm sorry for smelling like cigarette smoke around your mother and for staring at you all the time
I'm sorry my voice is shaking when you speak to me and I'm sorry for the burn scars on my hand and I'm sorry for hurting your ego
I'm sorry for taking new routes to get to class just so I can see you
I'm sorry for bothering you in your busy life that has lost desire for me to be in it
I'm sorry for losing sleep thinking about you, I'm sorry for losing touch
I'm sorry for not loving you like I should have
I'm sorry for loving like I should have now that you are gone

I often dream of dancing in thigh high socks
To music playing off my cellphone
In a hotel on the edge of town with you
I think of lying next to you in white bed sheets
I want to be with you when the curtains open
And the sunlight is twisting patterns across your skin
I want to make you coffee in your t-shirt and my underwear
I want to almost spill it bringing it over to you
I imagine us laughing about this
You will grab the coffee and put it aside
Pull another things to your lips
That will not stain your breath
I want to be the one to kiss you in place of your coffee
We can sit in this hotel room and watch cable TV
And I can recite all the poems I have written about you
And I know that you never wrote poems,
but I knew you loved me like one

Days like today make me reminisce
On the times where everything was simpler
When boys were only like bees that we chased on the playground
Not the sweet honey that we now crave, risking the sting for the little bit of sweetness that never lasts too long
The times when lunch was a sandwich and juice instead of cigarettes and cheap ***** that doesn't even burn going down anymore because you are so numb
I have been thinking about the days before these
When the world revolved around being happy instead of the constant stress of trying not to feel anything anymore
I still dream of the days when I did not love you
Days when you were not my constant thought
Days when I could go about my day and not worry about you at all
Days unlike today

There is nothing poetic about the way I am hopelessly in love with you
It may sound beautiful to be so infatuated with someone
That you can't sleep, and all you can think about is them
It may sound pretty to see them with no flaws at all
It may look like something that you want
To have someone stimulate your well being
To love someone so much that you feel as if
You cannot live without them
But it is not beautiful
Especially when you do have to live without them
Especially when you have to watch them feel this way
About someone else

Traffic lights change colors
but only range to three
The sky changes colors
and we can not count
the vast majority of colors that it paints
I think love is more like the sky
We start off in our life
and we see love looking either
lame, painful, or beautiful
Red, Yellow, Green
Three colors
But as we grow and fall into it, we walk out
looking like a sidewalk rainbow
Nothing can wipe off this kinda love
Nothing can die you back to your original color kinda love
This love is one you will discover
if you have not stumbled upon it yet
and it will be lame and painful and beautiful
and it will also be scary and confusing
and it will be overwhelming and sweet
and it will make you feel alive
And one day you will find yourself at a red light
wondering how you ever could have been
a blank canvas

It is the sixteenth of November
I am clad in ripped black jeans and the same black t-shirt I've worn every day for two weeks
It's a Monday
I am weary, worn from the weekend
On the precipice of regaining my pride by sleeping for 3 days straight
I am so tired
Fatigue is now a new code embedded in my DNA
There are few things you can do with a body convinced it has no soul
I haven't felt this empty in years
Vacant and desolate, I am an abandoned house that no one has returned to yet
I am still waiting for a knock on the door
But he never comes
The wind outside blows harder now and I never venture outside without a jacket
But I frequently forget to wear shoes
There is something about running on cold concrete that makes you feel alive
And maybe I am too accustomed to getting the seasonal cold because I refuse to cover my toes
I refuse to let the things that offer me freedom be incarcerated
It's so cold out
Chills strike my arms like lightning bolts, I tremble at the thought of you holding her to make her warm
I hide behind my fabricated contentment
I would rather freeze to death in your arms than live beneath layers of blankets
You see there is a distinct difference between cotton material and a silk body
They say that when someone is freezing, your body heat is the only thing left to save them
And I fear that if I ever were to be perishing due to frigid temperatures
You could not bear to lay a finger on me
Only cover me up
And it is hard to appreciate an effort that is only buying time

My bones are hollow like a baby birds
I cannot hold much weight on my shoulders
Due to the burdens that have already made their homes there
When I see you my bones shudder
Sidewalks shivering inferior to an earthquake
Trees shaking in the midst of your hurricane
Your presence alone in the same room as me
Turns my once still body to a constant tremble
I do not want you to leave
But I do not want to perish either

The truth is that no one will ever be able to truly understand you. You are a carefully sculpted stone, an exterior complex and individual to their personal thrashing and erosion. A painting entertained by change and chance. You are unlike any other, don’t you see? In the end there doesn’t have to be anyone who understands you. There just has to be someone who wants to.

He tastes of the city
Lights laying down skyscrapers on the tip of my tongue
Sidewalks tracing my skeleton body
My hands crept into his shaggy hair
Tracing mountains on the back of his neck
His hand ventures down my back
And I empty my breath into his lungs
He breathes me in as if he is running out of oxygen
It is a beautiful kind of survival tactic
That only the lovers and lustful know of
I have fallen into his hurricane eyes
Wrapped up in his arms of rope
I am tangled in his shoelaces as he steps onto a subway train
Stumbles over to a seat and puts in his headphones
I have learned you need to find someone whose favorite song
Complements yours
Someone who makes you a little less tired
As he steps off and lights a cigarette
His lips curl over the inhale of toxins
I sometimes wonder if I were deathly
Perhaps someone would be addicted to me
He walks down the street to a small bar
Where everyone knows his name
But they do not know him
He drinks and drinks
To the point where he cannot see straight, but he can make it home
He makes small talk with strangers
I collect the words he slurs and tuck them in my pockets for safe keeping
He slips the key into his door and I cower at the sound of it unlocking
He crawls in to bed just after stripping his jacket
Dawn is not so far away, he sleeps like an angel is guarding his door
The night changes, washes it's skin in the approaching sunlight
Picks off the stars from its shoulders like stickers
And in the morning he will call
But we are not love
We are not love
We are something
But not quite love
Not quite yet

I will be with you when the downfall of your ceiling fan makes you head spin, I will catch you when you are too dizzy to stand on your own. I will dance with you when your knees can't keep still, I will remind you that everyone has days when their strength fails them. I will hold you hand even when it is sweaty, I will cradle your thoughts in my arms and listen to you when you feel like rambling on about the way clouds are taken by the wind or you wish you could fly. I will help you do the dishes and fold blankets, I will help you make our bed, I will help you when you are in need. I will let you rest when work is getting to heavy, I will play your favorite song on piano. I will be with you when the curtains open and the sunlight twists patterns across your skin. I will make you laugh with my corny jokes, I will wrap you in my arms when you body feels vacant. I will love you with all that I have. Whoever you are, I will wait for you. Whoever you are, I will love you.

In the middle of June, we wake up to the light peering through the blinds, it's 10 am
I squint my eyes just enough to map out where you are
I remember I am wearing your white t-shirt and smile
You are already awake, lying there looking at me
"How long have you been up?" I ask
"Just a few minutes, not too long. How'd you sleep?"
"Wonderful, as always with you," I mumble the last part, "Breakfast?"
He smiles and sits up on his elbow, facing me
"I got it, you just make coffee. Deal?"
He gleams with a smile that could give a blind man sight and all I can manage is a nod.
He kisses my forehead and throws the sheets off his body
I sit there, gazing at him, trying not to fall more in love with him than I already am
I check my phone and my mother called, but I decide to call her later and succumb to following the trail of french toast coming from the kitchen
I hear him humming and walk towards the record player
Digging through out box of records, I choose our favorite, Work Song
I look over at him and his skin almost glows at the melody flowing through the walls
"French toast?"
"Problem?"
"None at all," I grin, "How do you want your coffee?"
He gives me a stern look as if I am serious
"I'm joking, two sugars, one and a half creams," I say kissing his cheek
The thing about love is it can be playful and sweet and reckless all at the same time. We have managed a perfect balance between them all. Love wears dark blue pajama pants. Love has burnt caramel hair and candlelight skin. Utmost of all, love makes the best french toast.

I dreamed that you didn’t hold back
We were standing in a restaurant bathroom
Dim lighting, black walls, tile floors
You were wearing a blue button down shirt
Your hair was tousled and you had bags under your eyes
You were tired of waiting on me
I let my arm around you, stood on the tips of my toes
I remember saying your name, water falling you with compliments
Overwhelming your insecurities, telling them how I love them
Despite what they have learned to believe about themselves
I do not remember all that I said, however, I do remember the ending
I whispered, "Landon," taking a breath, following it with
"You are so sweet and so bitter, you are bitter sweet. You are sweet because…" midsentence I was interrupted by your lips
I did not see this coming, I never would have had it not been a dream
It was so real it was like I could feel my comforter being ripped off of my body
I was pushed against the wall
Wrapped my hands around your neck
Ran my fingers through your hair
You set me on the bathroom counter top
And kissed my neck like you used to
Teasing in a different light, it was not the same feeling
It was rough and I was scared
Because I woke up thinking about
How you might have done something similar to this
With her

Your first love gets you raw, open, and naïve
Your first love sits with you until you head finds a home in the crevice between their neck and shoulder and you want to stay, more than anything, you want to stay
Your first love carries you to the car because your feet hurt
Your first love will dig up the secrets you kept buried, your first love wants to know it all
Your first love will listen you’re your favorite song in place of their
Your first love will levitate your well-being, make you float and flutter
Your first love will tell you that you won't fall
Your first love will introduce you to heartache, loneliness, what goodbye feels like
Your first love makes breaking an arm sound like a walk in the park
Your first love is the one that you convince yourself that you are over but you never really are
Your first love promises they won't forget you and you believe them until you see them kissing someone else

You tried to be careful
Stepping away when feelings swooped in
Hid from cupid
A dangerous game of hide and go seek
You were scared of loving someone
And it's not that you were scared of loving someone
You were scared of being love
And it's not that you were scared of being loved
You were scared of being love and then not being loved
Scared of the common cold feet
A disease that spreads and you never really see it coming
One day that just don't anymore
The laugher sinks back into the chest
They kiss is wiped clean from your lips
They have already moved on before they tell you the news
And love is something beautiful
We blame love for all the heartache and pain
We blame love for the loneliness and depression
We blame love for fixing yourself a plate of food and not being able to eat it because you had too many unspoken words already lodged in your throat
We blame love
When the only person you thought wouldn't, did
It’s a strange game and the only winning move you can make is not to play at all
I wonder if it is even possible for someone to stay in love forever
If it never got old even when we grew old
If the love never got wrinkles or weak even when we did
If the love stayed the same
Grew stronger
We could look back in photo albums filled with vacations, graduation ceremonies, birthdays, first day of school, our wedding
We would make our child's favorite dish every time they came back to visit
Dance in the living room to the sound of music coming from the record player
Fix you coffee in the morning
Take care of you when the cold weather came in, close the window, open the door
And it's not that you're scared of growing old, or dying
You're scared of doing it alone

If pennies could buy us time I wonder how many wasted presidents I would spend throwing into fountains wishing for a revisable proverb
Fold love letters into paper airplanes and send them your way
Walking backwards into something beautiful and try it just one more time
We could fall in love all over again, the sun is the same but we can see things differently now, take a little more time
I have come to realize that pictures cannot hold a memory as well as a heart can and storage on some cell phones run dry
And despite the undermining feeling that maybe we were meant to separate, I cannot help but wonder what would have happened
If things never ended
If I didn't have to waste so much money on fighting for something I know in the end
I won't win

After it all
I can really only think of one thing
You didn't fight for me
You said that there was nothing left for you to say to me
You didn't fight
You laid down your weapon
And watching me walk away
I would have preferred a bullet in my back
Than something as tragic as pain
With no wound to show for it

my love for you was a thought
a careless one in fact
that I placed inside beautiful picture frames
and hung around me on the walls
I'd built up

those simple ideas of old movies,
soft blankets, quiet breathing,
and late night coffee
the very thought of you
kept me awake

but the picture frames began to crumble
to fall off the walls
the shatter inside it's glass
the painted pictures fell
patiently to the ground
being walked all over by the
hard footsteps of reality

you would never guess that
a simple thought could travel so far
a simple thought could
leave you alone
a single, simple thought
could tear you like a thin sheet of paper
what a tragic thought, indeed

I find myself wanting to get in a life threatening accident just to see if you would come and visit me in ICU
If it would even cross your mind to see how I was doing
Or if you would go to her house instead and talk about how tragic it must be for my parents
Find your solace in her lips
Wrap your arms around her body like putting on a seatbelt
Fall into her kiss like falling out of a passenger door
Lay next to her in her bed having no trouble breathing at all
I wonder if you will think of me
How my lungs are gripping air in its palms pulling it in with every ounce of strength they have
How they are fighting to keep me alive
Blood pumping, adrenaline running up and down this highway
Heartbeat faster than the day I fell in love with you
Mind racing, body aching, a tornado of agony awakening within me
And you will be comfortable, sending a text to my mother saying that you were sorry for what happened
I wonder if you even would be sorry
I find myself risking everything for just one more miracle
But sitting behind the steering wheel of a car
I can never bring myself to swerving into the other lane or into a tree or off a bridge
Because although I am curious what would happen
I cannot risk dying without knowing if maybe one day you would come back without me having to be on the edge of death first

I will swallow poison before I admit that I miss you
Though it is a woeful truth
I cannot bear to say it out loud
I think back on the time you once said you loved me but came to later find I was far too heavy to keep carrying in your pocket
I did not fit as well as I should have
I still do not understand the way you think
But I hope you think of me often
Remind yourself of our song we listened to on repeat
Ponder on the feeling of my fingers sliding into yours
Funny how easy it was for them to slide away
A light breeze could separate them
Lately I have been bending my fingers backwards until they break because I am slowly realizing I am incapable of holding on to things anyways
I swore I would still be standing by your side right about now but something happened somewhere along the way and I watched those plans disintegrate in the palm of these fragile hands
I will not admit that I miss you, though I dreadfully do
What I fear most however,
Is that you will wake up in the middle of the night missing me
And it will be far too late

Like thieves, we are all in love with stolen hearts
Trespassing on private property
We are always crossing boundary lines
As a part of human nature, we do almost anything to get where we want to go
Where we feel we belong
Something stirs inside of us, makes us itch, ache, thirst
For a spoonful of affection
A syringe of love injected into our forearm
Entering our body like the holy grail that preachers used to talk about
We have never made smart decisions in the name of love
Cupid laces his arrows with the most dangerous drug out there
And the craving grows faster than the hair lining his jawline
No one can truly explain nor comprehend the vast existence of love that dwells within every lucid person
We are looking for love as if we have the ability to find it
There is nothing more hopeless than attempting to create something with no materials to do so
When you want to love someone but they do not offer you the opportunity
When the road that you are walking on comes to an end
At the precipice of distraught perspective
It is understood that love is not easy
It is understood that love is not a fairy tale
Picture frames fall off of walls
Wooden floors scratch when glass kisses their skin
And we hate asking questions
Because we are afraid of the answers
And how are we to explain the magnitude of fear
Measure out the anxiety
Weigh the uncertainty
There is no way to determine an answer
To a question that is nailed to the tip of your tongue
Like thieves, we are all in love with stolen hearts
Invading foreign territory
We apologize for such actions that we cannot control
We ask forgiveness for such reluctance to speaking up
We do not mean to do the things that love violently enforces
We do not mean to fall in love
But we are searching regardless of the understood failure
We are experimenting with our own blood
As if we have so much of it to give

Something has been going wrong with me for a long time now
My life used to be overflowing with potential
Nothing could stop the greatness I was heading towards
But something did
I wasn’t always a hollow thing
I was once overflowing, abundant in joy and hope in all things
Life was sweet and I couldn’t get enough
But now everything has changed
People talk to me like I am dead and I have to remind myself that ia m not, that I am still alive
Life crippled into unfinished meals on the table
Languages dried up
Seeing old friends that only loved who you used to be
I am an empty vessel that no one wants to touch
But I have reached a unmarked line
Crying out, begging me to try again
Revive my old self that was stolen by intoxication of the wrong things
Light the candle and watch it burn
Inhale the scent of lemon cherry blossom
And begin to hope, begin to make myself believe
That second chances are real
And that maybe this is mine

I was a canvas, the side of a building, a vacant bedroom wall in a new house
Love painted over me
Each kiss, red
Each smile, yellow
Each fight, dark blue
Every look, green
Every touch, mix colors, purple
Swirling in constellations for astronomers to decipher one day
Splashing on flaming sunsets for children to gaze at all of its glory
Sketching trees for lovers to carve their initials in under its shade
I was the sky beyond the clouds, I was the ground beyond the soil
I had it all when you held the paintbrush
I have never known someone to love me like this
And now that it is over
I am having a hard time
Putting up this new wallpaper

You are the evident piece of love that everyone wants
like the slice of cake with the most icing on it
You are the sweet candy that everyone craves
and the one you wish most to get on Halloween
You are the favorite book, the best seller, the one with words that you have to look up because you are not easily deciphered
Your voice, so delicate yet firm, reverberates in my skull
like a hymn in an empty church
You are the painting in my hallway that people have to ask about because, though it is beautiful,
they feel the edging desire to know what it is
The truth is that I don’t know how to describe you
Words will never be enough
I could write until my hand cramps and refuses to move the pen in rhythmic swirls to form letters and still it would never be enough
And for that I am sorry

I saw you today
The back of you
Standing straight talking to a girl who was not me
I didn't wait for you to turn around
Only kept walking out of pure reluctance
I wanted you to see me
Notice my heart on my sleeve
See the hurricane in me
I didn't want you to see me
Notice the heart on my sleeve
I didn’t want you to see how this hurricane in me
Has gotten so bad
It is getting so hard for me to play along
The white flag in my hands is itching to be held higher
I am resisting out of pure reluctance
I want to give you up
But I just can't

One day you will wake up
The bed will feel colder than usual
You will reach out your arms in hope to find someone
You won't
Lying in bed you will remember every girl you once claimed to love
And in that comes my part of the story
You will hear our whispered phone calls
The softness of them will weigh down on you
You will hear Hozier playing on repeat
It will resonate in your mind like hymn in an empty church
Suddenly you will remember the part where I stopped calling
And you stopped noticing
When dry messages became the norm, when you didn’t miss me
You remember the world conducting it's choir
It was so sweet
Like the "I love you was" reciprocated when you meant what you said
It was something that hung on a thin line
Unraveling of thread, it was always a risk
One day I know you will wake up
And think of me
And wonder if I am still asleep

Welcome to the desolate place of feelings and being a fragile, wounded, human who doesn't know any better to stay away from cupid but really when did arrows get so **** appealing?
I guess love has its way of fooling everyone somehow into thinking pain
Into thinking that feeling something will somehow revive the numbness of your chest
Where your heart once held a pulse, where you knew for sure if you were alive
I often wonder if maybe I am only a ghost who has forgotten where her grave is
You were my home and now I am an abandoned carcass of unsent letters and unwritten songs
And there's nowhere to begin to explain, nowhere to end this madness
Every place of solace has been swept away to trespassed territory,
Your haunting presence follows me everywhere
And I have come to the likely conclusion
That maybe you are the ghost
You are the phantom of a boy who once knew love beyond such uninhabited stories
A spirit who enchants my dreams with who you used to be
And maybe I am the one who is alive, just a little less conscious

I remember getting on the plane, remember packing my bags, leaving behind picture frames and old love letters, I remember closing the door behind me as he lay in the next room
I remember the distinct sound of the hinges hitting metal, seatbelt buckle clicking
The sound of my heels hitting the steps, walking upstairs to a new home
Thousands of miles away from him, I remember leaving
I remember sitting in a bar room, dimly lit with blue lights
I remember ordering my first drink and then my second and then my third
I do not remember ordering my fourth or my fifth
My bank account does however, the always brutal morning reminder when I didn’t have enough money to buy a black coffee
Lost love, I have found, will steal a lot of things from you
Comes in the night, creeping in, the thief of all thieves
Comes in the day time, and still with the light shining on his face, you are unaware
I remember the weeks that follow, sluggish and stagnant
By week four I had forgotten about the sound of hinges, seatbelts, zipping up suitcases
I have visited the same bar quite almost every night
I have started to collect memories of my fourth drink and my fifth
As my memory grew stronger in other places it weakened in important ones
I do not remember his taste, do not remember the color of his eyes
Green or blue, not brown not green not blue, maybe green, maybe blue
I do not remember breakfast, or lunch, dinner under blue lights
I remember the knocking on wood, my old green door vibrating
I had not known anyone in the city for so long that they would come to visit me
I remember standing, remember grabbing a jacket, remember the sound of a zipping it up
I remember the door swinging open
There he was, standing, very cold, pale, eyes a deep greenish blue
I remember getting on the plane
"I came to Boston to find you."
I remember packing my bags
"I knew you'd be here, you talked about it so much."
I remember closing the door behind me as he
"I'm sorry it took me so long."
I remember walking up stairs
I remember the blue lights
I remember standing very still, frozen in place like an ice sculpture
I invited him inside, I made him fresh coffee
I remember this
I remember this

And that’s just the thing, now isn’t it? I’m not lonely because I don’t have you. I don’t have a you. There is no one that makes my heartbeat accelerate. My dreams are filled with strangers I pass each day because I have no real place to land.
Do you understand how frustrating it is to have no one to daydream about? To be completely and utterly free of love and pain. I’ll tell you. It’s quite miserable and it feels endless. A person looking for love is in much more danger than those who have already found it, whether it be requited or not. We are dancing in the rain, hoping to drown because at least that gives us a chance to be enveloped in something. We throw ourselves into exciting situations and chairs of coffeehouses in hopes that someone will look and say, I think I ought to go say something, and yet no one ever does. It makes me start thinking of my past lovers. Suddenly I’m on the verge of calling them just to see what their day is like. I feel like I’ve lost my mind. It’s like my life is being portrayed through a lens where all I can see is all of the people who are in love around me.
I often have dreams that I am being chased and I approach an end to the road. The cliff is steep and I have no map to safer ground, but I can’t jump. I don’t. Because I remember, I am not being chased at all. Everything feels very confusing. There are no borders, there are no lines to trace. I am freehanding my life, unrehearsed and unprepared. How do you give directions to an unknown place? That seems to be the question I have placed before me.

December 7th
It is Monday morning, 3:12 am
I'm sitting on my window sill
Smoking a cigarette
Outside, the air is frigid and wind blows on my right cheek
I can hear music playing faintly at the Fountain Motel
And cars racing by
To God knows where at such an hour
And I wonder why I'm awake
What is it within me that has caused such a stir
That my body cannot find rest
Though my mind is eagerly looking for it
In and out of focus
My eyes are like a camera lens
One minute things are blurry and colors differ
And the next I am seeing more clearly than I feel I ever have before
And maybe it is all in my head
But I keep hearing noises
Like someone is walking on the dead leaves that scatter the sidewalks
Or a stray animal moving amongst the trees
Or perhaps an imaginary figure haunting me
My throat is dry and my hands are cold
My legs wrapped in a blanket
And endless ideas, theories, misconceptions are running around me
Circling me and I feel as if at any moment I will be attacked
Annihilated by my own mind
There are plenty of ways I have pictured myself dying
This, this is not one of them

I remember all of the secret places that will never be secret again in life
The inside of my playhouse, up the ladder and through the wooden door
Talking about boys, laughing about TV shows, discussing our birthday parties that came too quickly
Never thought growing up involved so much grieve
I remember all of the secret places that will never be secret again in life
The rooftop of a house under construction at the end of the street
Smoking cigarettes, telling jokes, gazing at the world we thought we'd never lose
Talked about our future like we were the ones controlling it
I remember all of the secret places that will never be secret again in life
The front seat of your beat up truck, the middle seat in particular
Arms intertwined, singing along to the radio, talking about life as if we were sure of our future together, as if we were sure it would last
Along the way we tripped up, fell over, and now you are standing and my laces are still tied to one another
And each time I try to revisit these places that were once so beautifully hidden
I fall right back on my face when trying to walk into it, because the past is the past and it always will be

I promised myself I wouldn't write about him
But he taste like the city
Hot running bathwater in some apartment across town and the quiet hum of traffic
The steam rising from a coffee cup on a tall kitchen table
Or how the rain kisses the skin of this concrete castle sidewalk
I promised myself I wouldn't write about him
But he feels like coming home
Walking through the front door stimulated by the smell of cinnamon and burnt coffee
As if the last memory of comfort greets you at the door, welcomes you inside to stay for a while
He is the antidote to any and every poison in my life
I promised myself I wouldn’t write about him
But you just don't get it, he is so beautiful that he makes the trees blush
People say it is autumn because they had to call it something
I only meant to love him for a minute but you can't love for only a minute because there is not time in love, there is only eternity, there is only forever when it is really love
He has showed me a love that has made me forget the taste of fear
And here I am, now, wondering
How many beautiful things have we ruined by deciding to write about them
I promised myself I wouldn’t write about him because no way of description could quite measure up
I need new metaphors and paradigms, maybe a whole new language
He's too much for what I am able to say
That’s why I promised myself I wouldn't write about him
I just can't help myself

It is hard to describe the feeling of missing someone
Who is not missing you in return
They have moved on to a new home
And they have taken the keys to the old one
And you find yourself sitting outside an abandon house
Knocking on the door
With hopes that eventually
Someone will open the door
And invite you back inside

The way the world sees a woman today
Is quiet strange to me
It is survival of the prettiest in the hallways
Death of them on the streets
Playing the first game we learned how to
Twirling our hair to the boy with the cigarette in his mouth
Because the bad ones were always more alluring
Wearing a short skirt in the city is like driving without a seatbelt
Girls are taught to survive by using our bodies as weapons
We convince boys to love us the only way we know how
Because what good are words when he can't see your mouth
We know the answers but do not raise our hands
Let someone else take the victory
Male kindness is so alien to us we assume it as a cat call every time
And after you have given your body away to countless boys,
each one taking a piece of you
That is when you will realize how badly you needed them to see the whole picture clearly
You will greet the mirror like a criminal in a line up
Do not think that this is your fault
Do not think that this is his
Strip your clothes, get into your shower and wash off his scent
Let it linger for only a moment but not for too long
Wipe your face, comb your hair and let all of the crippled reasons bleed out on why you should give yourself up again
Remind yourself of your value
And get dressed

Pain is river inside my bones
The art of unrequited love is it paints with dry brushes
Cracking the valleys and bones of your canvas body
Careless in acting of one thing but being another
Cupid is ******* irresponsible
I'd swallow poison if it tasted like you
Most of the time I'm scared to death
But I'm quite a fool for love
Curled in a ball sipping wine about you
Staining my lips that yours have yet to touch
I talk to trees about you
How I wish our love would grow like vines
Intertwine our bones, reach up
Do not leave the sky so soon
My tears are all over this city
In every coffee shop, vacant parking lot, public restroom
I drown out these desert concrete streets with your name on my tongue
You're exactly the madness I need
But I am fire breathing, I will not tell you what I am feeling for fear of burning you
******* my words with stutters and cheeks so red you mistake them for roses
I know that you don't love me
And that I am frequently a bother to your active lifestyle
I am sorry for being the way that I am in ways that you do not favor
I would meet with every voodoo, black magic, magician, wizard, witch, sorcerer
If they could mold me into someone you would want
It's pathetic I know, that I would tear off parts of me that I earned and once loved because some love is stronger than other and triumphs if it means it will be returned for it is the greatest beauty in this world
Where one does not question actions, dig deeper into conversation, body language
It is something I have not yet experienced and I had hoped it would be you to make the change
This is the sound of a mind coming undone, the twisting feeling of a migraine mixed with a bullet and you grandfathers old bottle of whiskey
I do not take this lightly, and I need you more than I need another cigarette
This is not a love poem
I am not trying to make you love me, I am not trying to tell you that I do
I would hate for you to have to bare knowing that you are the reason someone's soul is breaking
Would hate for you to feel guilty if feeling was to be possible for you
I hate you for making me feel so barren, deserted, hollow
I feel if I trip over one more misguided assumption I will fracture the whole structure of my body
I am a ribcage with no sharp corners to trigger your concern
I never imagined love would be so painful
As a child, I would paint pictures on the walls of my bedroom with stick figure lovers and hearts booming from their embrace, holy and sacred, untouched with the truths of reality
I know that when we are young we are naïve
And I am still young and I am still naïve
I will believe you even if I know that I shouldn’t, I will not mark boundaries because it would make me want to cross them
I cannot see how far I've come
Cannot see the surface, cannot see the sky
I feel I am being swallowed and you are taking flight
Tell me how the weather is, I hope it is wonderful
And I hope that you, in search of someone better, will find them
And that you will fall so far in love you wonder if the surface is now only a conspiracy theory
You are so deep in romance that mediocrity is unspeakable
I hope she loved you better than I did
Because, though it is hard for me to say this out loud, I didn't give you my best when I had the chance
So maybe she is smarter than me, maybe she will give you what you've deserved this whole time

He walks backwards into a room, takes of his jacket and sits down
The bartenders slides him money and a receipt
He slips the money back into his wallet and the bartender fetches the receipt from under his shot glass
His makes a bitter face as the alcohol creeps back up his throat
He picks it up and sips it back into the glass from his mouth
Things in rewind seem much easier
Like ants running back into their hole
Raindrops flying into the sky
Your skin will soften, teeth will sink back into your gums
Your shoes will get bigger, feet smaller
You will remember less memories
Remember less of the pain
You will forget about all the nights you lay in awe of how much you miss him, you will think of him getting drunk
Wishing he would spit it back into the bottle
Wishing he would unhang up the phone
Wishing you hadn't walked out
You imagine unpacking your bags as salt water tears that dissolved into your shirt slid back up into your eyes
In the distance you can hear the music playing backwards as you rock back in forth, unkissing his neck
You want life to be recorded on a VCR, little green and red buttons putting your mind at ease
But then again, you haven't owned a VCR in years

I like the sound his love makes
The way he calls me baby like he's singing a song
The kind my mother would listen to when I was younger
Something sweet that makes your heart smile
The way he kisses me, the way he breathes me in
And when he laughs I think maybe I have witnessed my first miracle
I know in my life I have seen very beautiful things
This world provides the most captivating scenery
Mountains, valleys, beaches, rain forests but I have never seen such green eyes
I wonder how two people can be so much in love
Sunrise to sunset I love him
We love like we invented loving, we love and we never stop
Because why would we want to when being in love just sounds so good

On their knees they beg for security, comfort, lust
Takes over their body, aching for affection without authentic feeling
One night stand painted golden, framed for friends to dazzle at the stories
Where the girl was just drunk enough to go home with you
She lost her keys, slipped into your pocket, under your arm slurring confused directions
Taxi cab drivers lost business when men discovered payment other than money
Standing at the front door smiling, lingering in hopes to be invited inside
Oh darling you look just beautiful enough to undress
Songs from the garden blossoming under his reign
She is dancing in the unknown foreshadowing of a casualty
Because waking up alone often hurts more than the hangover
The bed remains cold and *****, littered with earthquake memories
She does not remember taking off her clothes
She does not remember because she did not do it herself
This disease in minds of girls that they are only worth as much as their body can supply
Spreading like an epidemic often caught by sitting on any barstool, passenger seat, dance floor
Bedroom with pretty strangers who cannot withstand a night away from home
Bleeding out the crippled reasons as to why he left before morning
Searching for a phone number, business card, letter
And sometimes the easiest thing to find is reality

It's been a while since I've had this much not to say
I feel all of my words that once flowed through me with ease are clogged up and locked inside
They have become ashes, my creativity is slowly depleting
You make me feel like I have something worth saying again
I'm not quite sure what it is yet but it is something big and it is something beautiful

I want a bookshelf
And an intimately lit living room
And as my husband and I clean the kitchen after all of those who have gathered to share fellowship have left, as we are cleaning the mess
He will stop me and we will dance in the light coming in from the room next to us
We will sway back and forth and listen to the music that isn't playing
Because we never needed an audible reason for us to be this close
As we finish off the kitchen, we will move to the living room
Folding blankets, turning off the tv, and grabbing a book
We will sit down and read
Enter our own little word's of literature while still holding hands
Pulling them all together into one fantasy
One of us will look at the clock and realize how late it is
We will mark our page and you will tell me I am beautiful
As we walk to our bedroom and turn off the hallway light
I will look up and smile at you
Because there is no greater feeling than sharing love with another person
We will crawl into bed and you will whisper into my ear that you love me
and I will say it back
and I will mean it
Because I do love you
I may not know you yet, but until we meet
I will be collecting books to place on our bookshelf
I hope you are doing the same

Anyone who has ever been in love has gotten a taste of what it feels like to be completely mad
The things you will do, how far you will travel has no limits
Love does not care about your boundaries
It will push them until you begin to doubt why they were ever there in the first place
The hurricane that they put in you will get so bad
Blowing away any inch of sanity you once thought you had
Love never played a fair game
Cupid does not feel bad for the unrequited lovers
He is the menace that puts them there
Loving you is like breathing with broken ribs and punctured lungs but enduring because it is the only way you will make it out alive
I know that this will eventually **** me
But I wouldn't mind dying with your hands around my neck
Because at least I will leave the world looking at the one I love
Even if they do not love me

I know you have known heartache
Had coffee with your pain, sat down with your loneliness
You are not a stranger to darkness
Your mind wanders under this umbrella
Shielded away from love
And you feel so much
Your body tenses at the mention of her name
Your heartbeat quickens, palms sweat, knees twitch
It is as if you have a disease
Love sick, as they call it
She is the only one you can talk with about the shade of a cloud
Or the dreams you had last night
But you don’t tell her that she was in them
For fear it would scare her
You are careful with what you say
Because it is easy to come on too strong
Because you have never known weakness in love
You let her hear your music and she sings for you
But never to you
You imagine kissing her
It is patient and impossibly slow
Your ecstasy is her lips, she is the drug you can't stop craving
You have considered rehab
Finding someone else
Venturing into the unknown oblivion, falling on your face
You are not nervous around other people
So you must not be over it yet
You must not be ready to let go
You do not feel anything unless you are with her
You are confused on how to love her this way
How to maneuver around being her friend
You wonder if the feelings will ever be returned
If she will look at you like you do her
Like you are the moon and the stars
The sun, the solar system
The atmosphere holding all of the air she needs to breath
You wonder if she will miss you like you do her
Unsteady, walking around her room
You is not answering her phone
Worried if you are alright, if you are thinking of her
Panicked at the thought of you with someone else
If your hands have touched another warm body
If their body reminds you more of the summer than she does
You wonder if you will ever be able to walk away
If you will one day come to the realization that you are wasting your time and that she will never love you like that
But more often than not, you wonder if she will

You can hear it in the silence, you can feel it on the way home, you can see it with the lights out
Your mind wanders into oblivion and you wonder if his hands still feel your warmth when it gets cold out
If the folds between your bed sheets feels the same as a bonfire he now sits around with someone else
The sound of her inhale and exhale is his new song
I do not mind that he is happy though I wish I were still a part of it, some days it does not matter but on most it does
Trying to avoid feelings that are unavoidable
Is like believing you can live forever
Fooled myself into thinking he was my fountain of youth
But I have found myself drowning in a flood that provided no warning signs, no television broadcast
Water showings up without RSVP
I can hear your voice in the silence, feel your breath in the crevice of my neck on the way home
I can still see you, even with the lights out
I am afraid of what I will see when I turn them on

Daydreams have become common occurrences
I am sitting in the driver's seat of my car at a red light when suddenly
A vision of him sitting on his front steps, long legs stretched out and crossed casually at the ankles
Eyes bright and watchful, still piercing even from a distance
His smooth complexion, a reflection of his mother's
He smiled, gentle like a child, playful, toying with my mind like a cat with a ball
He was so beautiful and he didn’t even know it but I did
Snap out of it
I am lying in bed, sheets tucked at my sides, head resting on the edge of my pillow
I look to my left to see an vacant resting place and suddenly
A recurring thought of him there like he once was
Hands tucked just beneath his cheeks
Spread out, stretched wide like a trampoline
I could feel the warmth of his body radiating towards mine
Opening up, chest full while vibrations of giggling humming, rising to the ceiling like steam
The sound reverberated to my ears as if he really were here
Close, next to me curled up like it used to be
Snap out of it
I am in a coffee shot, fumbling through sheets of paper
Scribbling words I won't remember, finished up work I should have done hours ago
I glance up at the empty chair across from me
Suddenly he is there
Laptop open, hiding the writing on his shirt
I could see his collarbones peeking through
He would sigh and look down, grinning
My feet propped under the table onto his thigh
He told me I was distracting him, trying to be quiet about it
Whispering loudly, stop it while laughing through his teeth
Snap out of it
I can't snap out of it
I can't stop the recurring thoughts of you
I had taken you everywhere I love to go and it is hard to find new places in such a small city
I have had to find new music, listen to the scraps of songs I loved years ago before I had known you
Still the lyrics somehow bring me back to you
I can never escape, I am locked in a holding cell and I fear this will be a life sentence
I will tell my children about the boy who convinced me life was all about loving
And then who later made me feel so absent of air
I swallowed the guilt and it weighed down my stomach like a rock
I questioned if I'd tried hard enough
If I had done a little bit more, pushed the boundaries, exposed myself
Stripped down of righteous cause and let you see
I was so in love with you
I still am
Daydreams have become common occurrences
Each one, a little worse than before