dear
1957,
*******
and take him with you.

Some nights,
we found ourselves huddled together
in the dark
with the sheets sticking to our
glistening
hot
skin
knowing that someday
one of us would have to live
without the other.

Some nights,
we fell asleep
with our fingers intertwined,
our heartbeats synced,
content at the thought
that we'll probably die in our sleep
with the other
restful
unaware
beside us.

Balance is what keeps madness on the porch.

Your name means
The name of God,
A cry in the night
Screamed out into the
dark,
Drunken
street
By the girl who's name means
Peace
But who feels only the clawing
Numb
Familiar feeling,
Knowing,
That the name of God will soon turn to ash in her mouth
And that she cannot keep him
For very much longer
At all.

If I had known
That I would only learn
to love my name
When you graced it with your lips
I would never have told her
"I love you".

On the night you left,
the northern lights outside my window
illuminated the floor of my bedroom with soft red
and green light.
And I pictured you
My love
Driving
Sailing away
And the aurora
Guiding you like a lighthouse
Westward
Through the calm spring air.
I close the curtains
And take a deep breath.

For You, My Fantasy of Reckless Abandon and Whiskey Mistakes

I sit here as the thought of you,
whispering slurred speech between my legs in soft red light,
bleeds the youth from my veins,
Pulls me under,
like hooks in my tender, pale skin,
Cinematic,
Glamorous,
Gilded,
Burning.

The ****** sits on the curb,
Her hands knotted together, white
at the knuckles and
Red on the light palms,
Blue of veins and purple under
A bruised fingernail,
Slammed in a car door a week before.
The heels of her shoes are caked in Earth,
Heavy,
But she feels light,
For her hair smells of cigarette smoke
And her breath of whiskey and songs
And she knows she can’t go home like this,
So she listens in the still, thin air for
The sound of a train whistle,
Something to take her away,
Something that won’t let her look back.

Today I am weighted down,
Weights of lead, of life,
Not tied to my tired shoes,
But in my hands,
And I do not how to put them down.
My palms, blistered blissfully
With marks from lovers and liars alike.
I want so badly to love my lips,
My hands,
My heart,
But they've done such damage,
Conquered with such
fiery,
clumsy
force
That even their owner must admit their faults.
I want to do better,
So much better,
But sometimes, sometimes,
I feel it is too late, to far into the winter,
I've died young,
Burned out before I even learned to fly.

To whomever can hear me on the other side of things:
What does it feel like to believe what you're told?
Does it feel like everything, or like nothing,
Is your world full, or is it stark?
Does your mind look like I think it might look,
Like static behind your eyes when you close them,
And you answer with “I'm thinking, I'm thinking.”

****, son, it's late, it's too late.
But he sends her up for him anyways, first over the phone, then up the elevator, then down the hallway
And he welcomes her inside with the smell of hotel sheets.
Sorry for the draft, and he stuffs a towel into the crack below
the door.
She's like a duchess on a throne which is his bed,
and he sits across from her and puts the coffee on to drip as she undoes herself
jewels
dress
hair
which tumbles down her back and it wants to go further but she stops it
He pours them each a cup, it smells of vanilla and faraway places
And he wonders if shes ever been to any of them,
the faraway places,
But only for a short moment does he wonder this,
as she is here to make love to him,
and he scrubs the veneer from his face and
Lets her look at him
for a little while
Before he beckons her into him
And he whispers his secrets in her ear
as she Rocks Back and Forth
in his lap
like a cat or a merry-go-round,
And she makes him feel like a man in love,
Maybe even a married man,
A man with a deep, mad, certain love
that won't keep him awake at night.

Goodnight, sweet little *******.
Your innocence is going, and you'll hate the world the instant you wake up,
And you'll scream and want ***** so you can throw it all up to feel the burn in your nose
and in your throat
and in your mind,
and you'll wake with a new grater light to shine through your ***** windows, you'll buy yourself a
nice
new
car
with a
nice
new
woman,
you'll ride down Main Street, making loud noises and cursing
at men in suits
and women with babies
and children that they drag along behind them,
and you'll treat yourself like a god and eat what you want
and **** who you want
and no one will be able to touch you
ever
again.