You told me again
In not so many words

This time I didn’t ask you
Why I was drowning in sand

Your hilarious moments
My part in your hands

You did not say why but
You did tell me when

And it was a month after I asked you
And you denied, denied my plans

But this time, you laid it out
Plainly and it really hurt

To see that you chose another when
I was still here in the world

So you will not be my lasting
My handsome prince

I did not choose to walk away
But you did, you did

I will chase you down
If you don’t love me
Fashion hairpins from
Fish ribs
Bring myself to anti-******
Thinking of your
Valleys and hills
Carry buckets of water
Over all the trails

I’ll teach you the value
Of holding my hand
And the separate pleasure
Meeting for moonlight sonata
In the middle of daybreak
And I will do it
Drag the entire world down
To fit in your palm
I will do it

I’d like to meet you in a daydream
On the foothills of the Appalachia
Spreading seeds and carrying
My harvest basket
I’d meet you for board game night
Across the table
And I’d meet you at a quarter past three
The dead silent night
Lift up my arms and bask in it
Surrounded by all of you

The stars were never this bright until tonight

I am standing on street corners
And huddled in the shelter
Every other
Fourth night
When the weather
Just, the frigid weather
Turns my bones to ice

He won’t drink with me like this
He can’t think beyond his brains, his fists

There was nothing behind it
The sainted windows
Where I sat and I waited
Peering beyond my own face

Ice cream cones and Captain America
No, I won't do it, I can't go it alone
Transparent through the glass
Nobody wonders if nobody knows

But you knew then
When the grins dashed behind our lips
The snowfall cushioning every footprint
You knew even when I didn't know

And all I have is the imprint
Your eyes
Because, you're just gone and you never said
Never told me
Never let me be alright

I've been big and small
Bent muscles and snapping sinew
Ate grief for breakfast
Pancake platters
Black coffee
And an endless summer where
I sat over the river on the
Train tracks
Looking up

No one sees me now
As they did not then
But now I have myself
An itch, memories
My only friend

I've sat up all night
Gazed out the window
To see lights
Blue
And white
If I'm not living
Well
I won't leave at all
It's my life

I could make you live again
Pealing laughter, movie reels
Scandals, scarlet, moving through time
I can make the sheets unwrap themselves
It's you and I, you and I, alive

The wildest fantasies
Your secreted-away dreams
Victim, poison
Feather-light fingertips
Again I have shown you what I fear
It's you and I, you and I, tonight

Everyone I touch
Leaves me
And I love them

There are no strangers
To have a coincidence
No one, not them

If I could be the starry skies
Or the freeway
Busy, all night

I could be the overpass
No one to listen to
Nothing to fight

I'd wrap myself in dandelion
Or whispers...
Endless pearls

I'd miss the morning
The next day, and ending
Of the world
__

Kiss me
Like morning light
The fabric of the sky

Like little diamonds
Precious pearls
I fashion from bone

What's here is no longer
I must have thought
I'd see the final blows
__

The world is rebelling against me
I must cradle myself
Hold me throughout the night
Red, lights, blue and white

I must wrap myself up
Place me in a glass bottle
Where none can touch
Just shining, shimmering, look-

My hair tangles and falls
Ditsy strands by the handful
In the same clothes as yesterday
And the days before that

I only exist to echo back out
I only drink if I intend to black out
I only wanted someone to notice
To find out ...

I no longer let my lips chap
Even when I want them to split and crack
I no longer curl my hair, or paint my skin
I don't starve my body
Or look everywhere for harm

I just imagine the steps to the overpass
I think of the glock, my guns
My childhood, on repeat, his arms

The last decade on the edge
When I could make no plans
Because today might be my last
In trash heaps, no friends
Wishing, wishing, wishing,
I could
The end