I remember every metaphor I used for you.
It’s beautiful how quickly I ran out.
It was just so difficult to describe
a forest at the bottom of an ocean on fire.
You were soft,
I was quiet.
I remember every park bench,
every broken sidewalk,
every open sky.
It was so whole.
I remember breathing,
and the lovely amount of effort it required.
I hope you do too.
They say writers remember the important things;
I say they are liars.
I remember you wore a purple flannel
the first time I saw you,
even though it isn’t your favorite colour.
I remember that you take your coffee black,
and your tea with plenty of honey.
I remember the way your eyes changed colour
based on the weather,
and the way you looked at the sky,
like it was endless.
You were endless.
I remember everything you taught me.

They say writers remember the important things;
I remember you.

this is
your open field
this is
where you lie on your back
on a fluffy, plaid duvet
eating strawberries
forgetting the sound of honking cars
and car alarms
this is your studio
replace the clay with bars of soap
paintbrushes with shampoo bottles
write your thoughts on fogged glass
lists of run-on sentences, scribbled
without inhibition
this is where the water runs off
your shoulders
this is where you reflect
it is not poetic
it is quiet, it is ordinary
knots of hair from gushing wind
smoothed over with aloe conditioner
everything is spinning, but here it slows
this is where you pause
this is where you breathe
this is where you begin again

who would have thought i would become so obsessed with clean? not
my mother, who’d nag me to pick up all the clothes scattered across
my bedroom nearly every day of ninth grade. we rarely saw the floor.
i’d sleep beneath books and laundry on my half-made bed. now i
scrub dishes, scrub counters, scrub the floor at night because i can’t
stand the thought of a ***** kitchen—little cockroaches scurrying
in and out of pots and pans. my home smells of lavender oil, a soft
mist, air cleansed by a pink-glowing himalayan salt lamp and plants
in the living room. now i put things away in drawers, close doors of
rooms that are the slightest bit messy. now i straighten books on the
coffee table, set the remotes parallel to one another, everything must
be in place. now i floss, wash my face every night, stare in the mirror
and repeat i am clean, i am clean, i am clean. now i burn my skin in the
shower, inhale the steam until my breathing is slow and my sinuses
are clear. i am clean, i am clean, i am clean. now i fold the laundry, stack
our clothes into two piles, his and mine. i make our bed, i organize
our shoes by the door, i kiss the man i love goodnight. i am clean, i am
clean, i am clean. i know what my father must think, i know he loses
sleep, i know there are holes in his tongue where his teeth have made
a home. i am clean, i am clean, i am clean. i know he wishes i still went
to church, wishes my boyfriend believed in a god, wishes i was clean.
i am clean, i am clean.

i am envious
of what you have,
but not
of who you are

regardless,
it withers me

instead of watching
your garden grow, even if
i find it
utterly dull;

perhaps,
i should start digging up
the earth in my own,
neglected plot

and observe
what becomes

i do not feel compassion
for the man who made me
learn what it means to survive,
to come out the other side
with wounds that hide under
repressed skin, only to reveal themselves
as silence or black ice caught in
a flash of remembering;
i do not wonder what made him this way
think, did his mother hug him enough
when i hear his voice echoing
in nightmares where i cannot scream
and my legs feel like lead
burdened by the weight of all this baggage,
a torn up suitcase
filled with blood red bricks—
it does not meet the carry-on weight limit
and
i cannot unpack it.

i want you to know, the poem you wrote
it really touched my heart
did you have an idea when you wrote it
that it would be the spark
to lighten up the inner flame
that would brighten up my dark
a poem that touched my very soul
and left on it, it's mark

did you know the words you chose
brought me to my knees
and that those very words you chose
were at that moment what i needed
they caused the clouds to separate
and the sun to shine on me
the words you chose
swung wide open the closed
door in front of me

i just wanted you to know
about the poem you wrote