One moment
I was in your life
- in every single
nook
and cranny,
trying to
smooth out
your broken edges
the same way
you smoothed out
mine.
But that was only
for a moment,
and the next
I was gone.

You cleared me out,
got a paint job and
fresh wallpaper,
stripping me of
mine
and leaving me
naked and
alone and
bare.

Don't you care?
Don't you care that
I had made a happy
home
in your heart
even though I'd
only just moved in
and the previous
resident had
left their mark?

I don't know what to
say other than
god ******,
I've got space for you,
the keys in the lock and
you don't even need to knock
because
I'll be waiting.

So please,
please make room for me
because I've never felt
so beautiful as when
you took the word and
translated it into
a hundred thousand
gestures and
expressions
and precious memories.

My wallpaper's
torn right through
but I can stick it back
together
if only you give me the
permission.

You don't have to
keep on living in
broken homes.

So just let me
try and fix the
one we made.

This will fade
like a stick and poke tattoo
but the heart is
a sensitive place
and right now,
it hurts.

tell me about the fact that you never sleep on your left side.
describe every turn, every toss, every other hour where you open your eyes again.
your hand reaches into the humid air, trying to remember the width of my throat.

and isn't that like you? to run your tongue along the taste of piled bones against a torn mattress.

not the heat, not the growls in between,
you are beautiful, i see how you burn for me.

but didn't your mother warn you not to play with fire?
kerosene is unforgiving, my fingers striking the evening in the shape of matches.

and so we scream, you slam your body into mine.
a breath into my neck, just like this, baby?

but don't forget the way my lips burned your skin.
you won't find destruction like this in any other life.

and that is the art of my absence.

so, tell me again how you don't sleep on your left side,
because that's where the fire started.

He holds the corners of my smile with his thumbs
like the way he balances his self-worth on top of how much I believe
he can hold on the surface of his heart without caving.
And I know that maybe the inside of his dreams
have been filled with wallpaper reminders of a dad gone missing
or fixing cars on Saturday’s, but his hands
are callused just enough to know they’re real, and they cover
me with their warmth at night as he loves on my body,
folding in my ribs until I’m weak.

Sometimes I watch him while he sleeps, tucking
my whispers behind his ear and taking off the blanket
from his legs cause I know he’s too hot, but he always
makes sure the goosebumps on my body come from his touch
and not the way the winter breathes.

I like to think we met let letters do,
in a 2 a.m. sentence or a delusional poem
that seeps from the cracks in worried souls and fingers.  
Our outlines, the ***** of his side and the bumps of my hips
fit together like cursive and I could write him for a lifetime.

We lay in my bed
Still wrapped in each others arms
Our clothes sprawled on the floor
We're still breathing heavily
This is normal
He'll come over every Wednesday
We'll do this every Wednesday
The same thing
And we're used to this
We like this
We'd only have a few minutes left
Before my dad came home
But we'll risk it and lay together
Just for one more minute
Then he'll put his clothes on
I'll straddle him one last time
He'll pick me up
Kiss me goodbye
And drive away

Your ever presence sends a wave of revulsion
through my mutilated body.
Your voice has become the infuriating car alarm
that seems to strategically go off
at 2am.
Your arrogance instigates the razors
hidden under my mattress.

But I love you.

You cannot fathom the amount that I love you.
Because you tolerate me,
and my ever-changing outlook.
You understand that pain allows me to express
the words I will never say.

But I hate you.
And I sit here,
involuntarily,
with a maddening blank stare,
itching to scream,
"Frankly, my dear, I don't give a ****."
And I'll run through the fog for the rest of my life,
if it means being rid of you.
I hate you.


Don't leave me.