These moments move much too fast
For the shuttering of cameras to capture
Blurry stills are all we have,
The album seems to fill up faster
Before we're grown and taunt
Lessons burned and bridges taught
Sit still
And capture her beauty before it moves again

"Do you ever miss me?", she asked, right before taking her lipstick-stained cigarette to her rose embalmed lips.
     "Do you want the truth, or the answer I tell everyone else when they ask that question?"
     She followed me out onto that porch earlier, from that loud room, filled with loud music and loud smoke. Before this night I hadn't seen or heard from her in months, but I knew seeing her again was inevitable. Hell, we had the same friends, I lived with one of them for God's sake.
    Her eyes avoided mine, but I wouldn't look away until she answered. I hoped so badly she would want the lie, so I could tell her no and she could think I overcame what she did to me, that I overcame coming home to that empty room where she was supposed to be. I didn't want to have to tell her that I miss her more and more with every passing moment, that I can't get her out of my head no matter how many of my funny smelling cigarettes I smoke down to a nub and how many sleepless nights I have that I don't tell anyone about. I couldn't tell her that I still search at the bottom of every bottle for her,  only to find that it's dry and barren. Her eyes finally meet mine.
     She says, "I was never good with choices"
     "Well I was never good with a lot of things"
     I see the pain in her eyes, which dart down again because she knows exactly what I'm talking about. But I know I'd see even more pain, and water in those eyes if I told her everything I wanted to say. That after she left I couldn't help but stick my **** in anything that moved, that I was constantly in pursuit for the rush I always had with her, and it was always fleeting. That the pills she had help me save myself from were in my system right now, making the weight on my chest from her being there even heavier.
     "I don't miss you. I'm doing better."
     I tossed my half-smoked cigarette into the yard instead of the ashtray in plain sight. Some stones are better left unturned. You can awaken a snake hiding under it, and there's no point in fighting a snake who's venom you know you have no defense against. I couldn't tell her that I needed to lay my head against her stomach to feel normal. I didn't need to tell her that I was sorry for the scars I left her, on her soul. She didn't need to know that I often thought of putting a shotgun shell through the roof of my mouth, either so these thoughts could leave me be forever, or so the damage caused by several lead pieces of buckshot punching through my skull would cause me to not know who she was and what she had done to me.
     I turn and step inside, and pour myself another drink.

The hammock swallowed us that night in a cocoon of love, the crickets were as monotone as the symphonies of the love songs we've heard a thousand times before.
In my arms I held you, knowing that in a world of expressions all you wanted was acceptance, and after all the deceptions I just wanted to be the exception. You offered yourself to me in that space, a space where I didn't need to worry about being strong, in a world where strength mattered, all the weight of the world was lifted off my back at once. My head was clear, as clearly as you cried out, and the skies bathed our pale skin in its own mellow tint. You felt me for who I was, no preconception or misconception mattered in that moment, for you knew, as my lips passed messages for us, and only us, through yours, that no acid washed memories would catch up to us now.

It is odd for one to wish
to have skin made of crystals in order to captivate your interest,
an aroma that fills the air and lingers, so that an opened door tilts the head back,
a hazy effect on the mind and thought processes that leaves the thinker in awe of his own self,
to know one's worth, how much per gram of soul
and to appreciate their craving and need for you to be in the palm of their hand, or rolled up and inhaled euphorically.
It is odd for a flower to wish she were a ****, however, some gardens aren't meant to be watered, rather, they are destined to become forest fires.

A friend once said she wished she could get as inspired as I do sometimes,
And I certainly hope she finds her inspiration,
But never in the way I have.
I've found my inspiration in the gutters of people souls, myself included,
In witnessing the lashes someone can put in someone's spirit with their whips of words,
I've been the sufferer and the abuser
I found it in the anguish I came from, from finding a dying parent
Finding a quiet friend in a casket
From the brinks I brought myself too
It's tragic, I could never wish this on her
I wish her to find her inspiration humming from the strings of her guitar
From biting sips of wine
From a man who hopefully sees her as she is
And hopefully never from the abyss from which I take my chances
She should get hers from fast nights and slow dances,
From laying low in high places,
I think of you often,
By her I've surely been forgotten,
I wish the best,
But one thing I know is I'll keep the rest

You lost yourself somewhere along the way, somewhere as dreamy as the sounds you speak in,
We all do at some point, it happens,
Some call it growing up, I call it lying down,
I tried looking for what you lost in the wreckage of this town,
in smoldering piles of rubble and ash,
but nothing was to be found,
at least nothing that would last,
And now I see my Femme Fatale,
Lost in a mixture of sheets and other's ballads,
Come back to yourself
Not for me