my heart bleeds more ink
than it ever did while loving you

those busy boy days
where we roamed hallways
dropped cash on comics we didn't need
stocked the shelves full of books and dvd's

it's easy to call those the good old days
when life grinds and halts and closes pathways
we sit in steam rooms of sentimentality
breathe nostalgia through our nostrils

there's beauty in the memories
but life's greatest gift is we never stop creating them

why is there pressure behind these eyes
the darkness wraps it's malevolent mitts around my throat
sanity lacking sentience
how do i control the chaos?

it's hard to breathe at the bottom of the ocean
cuticles cracking
torso thrashing
i'm sinking while swimming
screaming while grinning
dreaming of sinning or of new beginnings

nightly narcotic
forever aphotic

i'm melting for you
my heart drips
while your cream-colored candle rests under it

breath coated in bourbon
whisky fantasies
of you and me
i couldn't prepare for your hair
or your stare
or those bouts of two a.m. mayhem
i'm melting for you

i romanticize each time we cried
grip tightly onto the shouting matches
the steam in my heart
the dreams we couldn't start
relish every disagreement
burrow into bereavement

i punish the moments that weren't
the tides we almost rode
and the currents we never surfed

maybe tomorrow i can breathe

i can't quit this
nostalgic nicotine
yearn for laced fingers
face lingers
my eyes are appalled
              but
my mind is resolved
to absolve you

let the pages grow longer
love a little softer
unwind with intention
peel back dimensions
there i am