Life goes by in a flash,
In an instant plans are memories,
Photographs the only residue
Of past normalities,
And then the realization
You’ve been going on along the whole time,
Without ever seeing it.

Sunlit dew is beautiful.
A blanket of stars across the night sky is beautiful.
Cold beers at the end of a long day are beautiful.
A new year is beautiful.
And even a broken heart is beautiful, when seen from the right angle.

The key is the point of view.

The only thing holding me back
From this new year

Is you.

Loving you broke my heart,

But I can't love any other way.

Do you remember the day we bought our beers, packed our bags and made our own party on the hill beside our building? It was just you and me and the sun. We were celebrating the first warm day of spring, but you still insisted on stouts, and they quickly lost their cool in the sunlight but I didn't mind. I brought my camera and photographed the wind curling through that blue and green sundress you loved, and you danced as if you were a leaf in autumn.

Until you spilled your beer, to which I reacted only with regrettable anger. You stopped dancing.

That lead us inside, away from the sunlight, to end the memory. You never wore that sundress again, and didn't enjoy those stouts the same way. We never celebrated another change of season, and I never again photographed you in the wind.

I had a heart once.
It looked something like a locket that broke in two;

She took half,
And never gave it back

So now I love things incomplete.

What makes you feel better
Than long walks at night,
A lung's breath of cold air,
Inklings of dreams and aspirations
With a halfhearted plan to get there.