I found my mom’s wedding dress
in the attic the other day.
It was carelessly sprawled across dusty boxes of junk,
hiding in the corner of the room
as if it didn’t want to be noticed.

I remember it used to be beautiful.
It was once dove white
with intricate beading lavishly sewn into the bodice.
It had a full, glossy train that flowed behind her with each step she took.
It was glamorous
and expensive.
I remember she looked like an angel that day.

But it is no longer beautiful.
It lies unprotected in my attic,
vulnerable to the dust and rodents
that keep it company.
It’s color has faded to a **** yellow.
The beading is mostly scattered on the floor.
The train is frayed and torn
and I counted a few holes where the moths must
have gotten to it.
The dress is no longer glamorous.
My mom is no angel.

I found my mom’s wedding dress
in the attic the other day.
It was abandoned.
Like the rest of us.

and here i am again
at the intersection
of pedestrian language
& old wives tales
swallowing gum
like 7 year memories
opening umbrellas inside
cause i can't seem get away
from all of this rain
i ******* with my left hand
cause i was told
back in highschool that
"it feels like someone else is doing it"
it gets me wondering
about the difference between
losing you and finding out
that some one else found you
or my sleep
or lack thereof
its starting to tear me apart
i keep having this dream
where you are in
an unfamiliar body of water
trying to wash my poetry
off of your hands
or the one where
something happens in my chest
every time you sit
on someone else's bed
i'm tired of feeling like something you've misplaced
but don't have the heart
to look for anymore
tired of you saying my name
like you're trying to bury it
i'm tired of wondering
if you can tell the difference
between the absence
of my voice & silence
the other day
i almost started sobbing
at work when a woman
asked me about
our equipment
i was explaining how
things come apart
and almost mentioned your name
it made me think
of how you used to say
things like "what would you do
if i showed up on your doorstep
one day?" now, i haunt
the windows in my house
i don't leave for weeks at a time
i sit on the porch like the dog
you didn't shoot behind the shed
the one that refuses to die
until you come home again
i told somebody once, that
you didn't even know
what my voicemail sounded like
i wonder if they thought
it was because you
are so important that i never
let it ring that many times
before picking up
or if you dont know
what it sounds like
because you've never called
you can't be the ****** weapon
and the search party
i'm tired of all the seats
to the ferris wheel in my chest
being empty
tired of your voice
being the one i look for
in abandoned places
that one sound i beg
to bounce back
down vacant hallways
i just seem to stand there
in all of that quiet
like someone looking for a mistake
on an eviction notice
so i guess the hardest part
isn't letting go
it's forgetting
you ever had a grip
in the first place
and since you've been gone
i wonder if when
you pushed yourself away from me
you used your left hand
so it felt like someone else did it

It starts in your fingers.
They grow numb and then your throat tightens
and it feels like your vocal chords will snap if you don't scream
and your airways clog and you can't breathe
and your chest starts to hurt but you can't massage it
since your fingers are so numb
and the pain becomes so overwhelming that your brain dulls
and you can't think, all you can do is feel
and feel and feel
until you can't feel anything at all
and that is how you drown without being in water.

The springs groan and the backboard sounds a sharp crack under my weight.
It’s been doing that ever since some friends and I used it
As a trampoline on my eleventh birthday.

I slouch in the middle of my safe haven and look at my life decorated on the red walls.
I marvel at all of the roses I’ve ever received hanging upside-down along my ceiling.
My favorite is the dyed-blue bouquet that my dad gave to me years ago “just cause”.
Sometimes their dried, cracked petals fall to my floor, but I save those, too.

I notice the posters that have tattooed my walls since I was a kid,
An old James Dean portrait, Abbey Road, and Kissing the War Goodbye.
There’s my record player sitting underneath Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors,
One of the many vinyls my grandpa had given to me growing up.
Over there is my massive bookcase, holding well over two hundred stories.
I scan their spines until my eyes spot my two favorite books,
In Memoriam by Tennyson and Stephen King’s novella, The Body.

This is where I go when I need time to think or when I just want to be alone, safe.

But then I look behind me at the black cityscape my uncle painted on my wall
Just a few months before he hung himself.
I remember the hole in the wall hidden behind my door
That I made with my fist the night I first told my mom I hated her.
Above my record player is the last picture of my sister and me before I lost her
And scattered across the floor are the many journals that hold my darkest thoughts.

This place is me.
It is my Heaven, my haven, and my Hell.