I'd love to love you
and hold
your hand.
We could
pick sunflowers and
I'd put them
in your hair
while you made faces
at the sun.
We'd crunch
through orange leaves
and rub red
noses together
to keep
warm.
I'd make you
hot chocolate
and wrap you up
in my heaviest
quilt under the stars,
and in the
morning
we'd find ourselves
wound up
tightly
and so very content.
But only if you'd
let me love you.

I don't stay
up
until 5 a.m.
anymore
because my brain
worked
way too much
on so little
sleep.
Because
the only words
I heard were
"you, you, you"
and I didn't
like it.
Because I woke up
with pen marks
all over my hands
and smears
on my face.
I don't stay
up
until 5 a.m.
anymore
because it started
to know
all of my secrets.

Thank you
for loving me
despite
the fact that I crack
my knuckles
and talk too much.
Three years
have passed
and I still haven't forgotten
how you taught me
the right way to breathe.
And we may be
separated
by miles of soil,
but you're the only place
my heart has
found permanent rest.

You are fireworks
in my chest and
things I can't hold on to
are slipping between my toes as I walk
across them. You don't care
that you showed up and stamped
a small portion of my stomach
with your butterfly-shaped coil.
I want it off
gone
out
done
but I know you'll come back
and I want you to feel the outline of it.
That way you'll know I never stopped trying
never stopped caring.
I need you to care, too.

I don't remember
a time
when I was ready for change.
I always seem to take it
right in my lungs
and let it out so slowly
that people get annoyed.
No, yeah, I wasn't prepared.
Sorry.
Here, teach me how
to be like you
and pretend this was my idea.
I told you
you'd be happier
with someone else.
Duh.