the first time her lips met mine
was like a war ending,
like the moment the bomb hits
and the smoke curls up,
and for one second,
the world forgets its weight.

it wasn’t soft.
it wasn’t polite.
it was heat,
and teeth,
and a hunger I didn’t know
I’d been starving for.
her hand brushed my waist
like a secret,
fingers tracing the curve of my body
like she was trying to memorize
the taste of me.

we fell into it—
the kiss,
the touch,
the way our bodies came together
like they’d always known
where they belonged.
I wanted to hold it,
wrap it around me like a blanket,
press my face to her neck
and never let go.
her breath was warm against my skin,
her heart beating louder than mine,
and in that moment,
nothing else mattered.

but then—
the door slammed open,
the world barged in,
with its judgment and its fists.
the voices rose,
too loud,
too angry,
too full of things we never asked for.

“what the hell is this?!”
they screamed.
and I looked at her,
hoping she’d hold me,
hoping she’d fight for us.
but she pulled away,
eyes wide like I was a stranger,
like I was the one who’d made her
forget her place.

“no, no, no,”
she screamed,
shaking her head,
her voice cracking like glass.
“it wasn’t me—
she made me do it!
I didn’t want this.
I didn’t want her.”

and every word she said
ripped me open,
every syllable was a knife
twisting into the space
we’d just built between us.
I stood there,
frozen,
feeling the weight of her denial
crush everything I’d felt.

her eyes,
her beautiful eyes,
didn’t look at me anymore.
they looked at the floor,
at the people who’d come to take me from her.
and in that moment,
I realized how small I was—
how easy it was for her to forget
the taste of me,
the heat of me,
how easily she could sell us out
for the sake of safety.

I didn’t fight.
I didn’t scream.
I just turned,
and walked away,
my lips still burning from her kiss,
but knowing it was already dead.

There’s streets, streets, streets, streets,
Endless streets ahead of me,
Black tar bleeding into cracks,
Stretching farther than eyes can see.
They go on without mercy,
without a name, without end,
Just more streets, streets, streets, streets,
No turning, no bend.

I walk ’til my soles are thin
like paper peeled from stone.
Feet dragging through the dirt,
‘cause no one walks alone.
There’s bottles smashed in gutters,
and faces in the rain,
All strangers to each other,
tied together by the same **** pain.

Keep walking, man. Just walk.
Don’t stop for the moon.
It’s a liar like the rest.
And dawn? It’s coming too soon.
A cigarette burns like hope,
and ashes fall like dreams,
On these streets, streets, streets, streets—
nothing’s ever what it seems.

There’s streets ahead and streets behind,
and neither way feels right.
But still you march, just march along,
in the dead and sleepless night.
Through alleys of the hopeless,
and avenues of pride,
It’s streets, streets, streets, streets,
and nowhere left to hide.

So walk, man, just keep walking.
That’s all that you can do.
Because streets don’t end,
they only stretch—
And somehow,
so do you.

he said:
“there’s a point where you stop
believing in miracles.”
he sat down,
pulled a flask from his jacket,
and took a long drink.

“but the funny thing is,” he said,
“you keep waiting for one anyway.
like some part of you
didn’t get the memo.”

i watched him stand up,
sway a little,
then walk out the door.
he left the flask behind.
it was empty.

the world hums like a bad refrigerator,
louder when you’re trying to sleep.
I sit in this rotting chair,
watching the ash from my cigarette
grow longer, thinner—
a ******* metaphor
I won’t write down
because metaphors are for fools
with something to prove.

the landlord’s upstairs
stomping out his bad marriage,
and the cat’s staring at me
like I’m supposed to fix it.
like I ever fixed a **** thing.
the whiskey’s out,
the bread’s moldy,
and there’s no mail
but bills that
have already lost their patience.

I knew a woman once,
beautiful in the way
that broken glass can be beautiful
when the light hits it just right.
we didn’t talk about love,
but the bed remembered us,
the walls learned our names.
she left
the same way the good ones always do—
quietly,
like the sound of a train
you only notice
after it’s gone.

the ash falls,
finally,
into the grave of the tray.
and I think,
hope is like a stray dog—
it keeps following you
no matter how many times
you kick it away.

they don’t wait for the grave.
they start digging
the moment you clock in.
a little deeper every day—
beneath the fluorescent lights,
beneath the bills piling up,
beneath the weight of everything
you were supposed to be
but never got around to.

they bury you early.
in offices,
in traffic jams,
in cheap apartments with walls
thin enough to hear your neighbors fighting.
in the same bar every Friday night,
where the jukebox keeps playing the same sad songs
and the bartender pours another round of regret.

they say,
“this is just life.”
and maybe they’re right—
maybe you’re supposed to carry
that invisible coffin on your back,
marching forward
like you don’t feel it getting heavier.

I knew a woman once.
she refused the shovel.
quit her job, sold her car,
got on a bus going anywhere.
people called her crazy.
but she sent me a postcard
from some small town by the ocean.
she said the air tasted like salt,
and she’d never felt more alive.

they bury you early.
unless you fight.
unless you throw the dirt back in their faces
and run like hell toward something,
anything,
that doesn’t feel like dying.

his hands are cigarettes,
burning slow across the keys.
he plays like he’s trying
to empty something out of himself,
something heavy,
something he doesn’t trust
to speak aloud.

the crowd doesn’t notice.
they drink their whiskey,
laugh at their own jokes,
and hum along like they
understand the chords.

but I watch him,
the way his fingers tremble
like they’re afraid
of what comes next.
he’s in love with the piano,
or maybe he’s just stuck with it,
like a bad marriage
that refuses to end.

the music is sharp
and it hurts in all the right places,
like stepping on broken glass
but still feeling alive.
I want to tell him:
you don’t have to play for them,
they’re not listening.
play for yourself.
play to make the ghosts shut up.

but I don’t say anything.
I just watch him finish his set,
pack up his misery,
and leave the room
quieter than he found it.

I caught myself in the mirror -
not really me,
just someone wearing my face.
they moved like a bad actor,
lines all wrong,
hands heavy,
feet borrowed.

I lit a cigarette,
watched the smoke curl
into the kind of shapes
I wish I could slip into.