clean sheets
straight-out-of-the-laundry clothes
a cool wind
sighing through the window
these are the quiet moments
of the world
that I yern to share
to gently
swirl my fingers through hair
feel bare back to my skin
trace veins in shoulders
but it always seems like
I tell myself
"When you're older Dan
when you're older..."

I'm not completely sane
but then neither are you.

cold
finally dark, damp
cold
eating at my bones
spearing my nerves
was I forged in
a forst draped with snow?
why does the frost
call me?
I long to be covered
suffocated with freezing hands
returned to
the hardened ground
a land covered
in ice

there's a slam of a front door
that sends a signal to my lungs
to tell them that they need nicotine
and another to the dry throat that
says it's time for a cup of coffee

i conduct a symphony of
slowly getting out of bed

taking the first sip of coffee
always reminds me of that
first kiss we shared on
new years at midnight,
i knew i would regret it

lately, the drinks i pour in
the evening feel worse than
a burnt tongue, because it
slides down my throat, into the
into the stomach, into the veins,
into the brain that usually tells me
do not think about this tonight but

i am drunk
i am obsessive
i am harmless

i have grown so exhausted of
always being the wrong kind of
brave