In the cold, dark
        of January,
         I remembered
              you
        the most.
  As the chill
      snapped bones
              like branches,
     as the afternoons
   bathed themselves
in gray,
     as the birds
and the backs
      shook,
so did my lips
   around your name.
I'm so happy
     January is almost
over now.

when there are shouting matches in my chest
your deafening whispers of i love you
are the only thing to drown out the doubts

i want you so far
i want you so much closer

these ghosts are still present in light—
i'm tired of the same old fears;
i fear that you will fear me—
they will haunt us past the night

i want to push you away
i want to pull you nearer

the voices in my head
they may tell me i'm not enough
but yours sounds so much sweeter

as i lay beneath the midnight stars
for each speck of light i discern
i conjure another reason why i love you so
until the tiny lights fade
and the sun greets my weary eyes.
this practice i repeat night by night
til i may turn and awake
one morning and each morning forevermore
to the sight of you
to rejuvenate these tired eyes.

knees faltering and feet failing
my steps betray me
strides carry me no further away
stationary, subjugated, gasp for air
keep running to nowhere

To love myself
I wish I knew
To hate myself
I can't do too

I'll simply live
Without a clue
How to feel anything
If not for you

Today is blue.

The air wet,
My eyes are too,
Today is blue,
Where are you?

you took my words.
well, borrowed and never returned.
well, i gave them and never asked for them back.
well, i gave them and don't want them back.
well, they were never mine.
well, they were your words all along.

i would never have wrote them
if not for you
but this isn't anger or bitterness --
it is trying to disprove this nagging thought
that you were the only reason i could write;
that i can no longer write if not about you
and this is failing
at
proving
me
wrong.

The day is drawing near
and every year it comes around
every year
the flashbacks saturate every
dark corner of my mind
I've written
and written
and written
about that night so many times
that I can't stand to anymore
you know what happened in that room
and so do I
but now there's someone new
someone who looks at me
and doesn't see your hand prints
on my skin
who doesn't know
that years later
I still carry the weight of that night
on my chest
it sits there while I sleep
counting my breaths
permeating my dreams
enveloping every empty thought
with an unwelcomed thought
of you
I've got so many skeletons
and I would love to say
that they're all buried beneath the dirt
of time
but they aren't
sometimes
they slip out from the closet
and sit right beside me
sometimes
they hold my hand
and sometimes
like today
they crawl inside my skin
and make themselves
at home