i can’t sleep because you told me you hated me in my dream last night.
i don’t want to sleep anymore
if it means a constant reminder
of what i believe to be real
and what you tell me is not.
it felt real
when i was lying there
and the words bounced off your tongue.
“i hate you"

the trees settle their ghosts,
in the yellows of the sinking day
a strange wood
that waits for it to grow dark,
that sinks like a cloud
as falling leaves flood the sandy isles
with their sighs of fire,
as the trees ripple and flow
to a wind of immense breath,
rocking, floating down,
a sapphire ring left on a branch
by a girl who dreams of snow.

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I'm not going
to let anybody see
you.
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pur whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke
and the ****** and the bartenders
and the grocery clerks
never know that
he's
in there.

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say,
stay down, do you want to mess
me up?
you want to ***** up the
works?
you want to blow my book sales in
Europe?
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too clever, I only let him out
at night sometimes
when everybody's asleep.
I say, I know that you're there,
so don't be
sad.
then I put him back,
but he's singing a little
in there, I haven't quite let him
die
and we sleep together like
that
with our
secret pact
and it's nice enough to
make a man
weep, but I don't
weep, do
you?

...unless it's with me.

Dating you is anti-climatic
and I'd be ****** if I ever
succumb to a part of me
begging to be cut loose from you.

I don't want to be swallowed by
the euphoria derived from
vintage pictures and videos;
I know that the saccharine
comfort will be both
short-lived and lachrymose.

I don't want to have to
flip through your new pictures daily,
searching for remnants of the love we shared
through the new love you'd then be experiencing.

Usually,
I'd wish nothing but the best
but I want the worse for you.

My mental is too detrimental
to handle you and another.
I don't want to wake up
from constant nightmares
leaving my stomach tied in knots
you'd only see on TV.

I don't want to sit at family dinners alone
when you were suppose to be there with me.
I don't want to have to look at chocolate desserts
and remember how it's your favorite
so although I detest chocolate,
I eat it anyway to somehow
suppress the feeling of you not being there.

I don't want to watch you fall in love with another.
You carry a part of me
every time you're apart from me
and I'd rather you cheat
than to follow what seems like tradition
and leave.

I don't want to watch you fall in love with another.
I'm wearing my heart on my sleeve
and I'm down on both knees
pleading please,
oh please

I don't want to watch you fall in love
...unless it's with me.