you are still where i see
myself in thirty years -
your clouds and long
arms - but, god, i am at
least trying to find
something in someone
else until your joints
start speaking my name
with your steps again.

i have tried to build a home inside myself,
one of iron and molten lava and red hot
brick,  but you have snuck your way
through my sealant and made
yourself a space in the very
center of my being.

i like your nicotine
breath, a black lung
frenzy drawn in
and out at the base
of my throat

god, all this air is
so thick. i've been
dormant for too long
i fear. i have not hit you,
hated you, told you how
badly you ****** me up
to your face yet but lord
you did. you turned me
into somekindof outline
with blurred edges and
creases that just won't
flatten. i wanted to be
yellow andgreen and
red comingoutofmy
seams but you took
that all away from
me, you disgusting
excuse for a human.

you built a house across the
street from my apartment
on the roof of the parking
garage where we shared
part of your last hours in
this town. i asked you if i
could make your space our
space but you shook your
head, did that squinty eye
thing i have come to love,
said "no, gorgeous, not yet"

If I could
go back I
would
fall for you
instead of
wasting my
time on
another.
You once
told me I
made you
feel safe
and I'm
so sorry
I left you
alone like
that. I
forgot the
sound of your
heartbeat for
just a second
and heard
someone
else's at the
wrong time.
I'm
sorry, I'm
sorry.

I spread out everything I had inside
of me on your living room
floor
in small, neat stacks.
I said
fix me
fix me
fix me
please
but you didn't know
how.

when i was little i wanted to grow up
to be a tree, did i ever tell you that?
there was an oak tree next to my house
and i loved her like she had given me
my skin, used to plant tulips at her feet
and sing to her on the coldest days
of winter so she would know i hadn't
forgotten about her as soon as the first
day got shorter. i thought if i breathed
with her long enough i would learn to
be tall, learn to be sturdy, learn that wind
is nothing but a momentary nuisance.
i would stand at her base and let the sun
that rippled through her leaves paint
freckles on my nose while i reached my
arms up toward the clouds like vines,
thought i could bend and stretch and make
a home for the birds and the butterflies.

my dad always told me there is no such
thing as something that is too far away.
there are always cars, always boats and
trains and ladders. if you want something
bad enough, he would say, distance
doesn't exist. but an ocean. but an ocean.

sometimes i think i could feel you in my
fingertips before i knew you. like when
i was stretching up to the endless sky,
you were pulling from somewhere else. i
wonder if the me who wanted to be a home
for the earth knew she'd grow up to want
to be a home for you.

hush now
how can
you stand
the noise
you've put in
our ears please
just come
home

i'm hope someday that
i will turn into a willow
but tell me how does one
grow up to be a tree?

t h e      s u n       i s
about    to       come    up
where  you are   and i miss the
morning  grouchiness  that  comes
before your first cigarette of the day,
the   smell  of  my  shampoo   in  your
hair,  your  sleepy  face  buried  into
every warm crevi­ce of   m y   body

the other night
you said you
claim
me- and vise
versa- but tell
me how you
can call
someone your
own but also
not want them?

You tended to the forest in my
chest and now you're gone and
the roots are overgrown, and the
leaves are making their way up to
my mouth and I can taste them when
I breathe your name late at night. It
hurts. Now come back and finish
what you've done to my insides.

I have a list
of people I
cannot go to
when my heart
is collapsing
and I hate that
you've put
yourself on it.

I am not allowed
to have your
mouth (a fact which
I am more than
well aware of) but
today I did in the
basement of an
antique mall and
I wish it hadn't
been so fleeting,
been so rushed.
But after all this
time it was still
enough
it was still enough
you are still enough.

I want to do something


B                            I                            G


with my life but I'm
finding it so much
easier to be content
with living small.

It will always remind me of the
fabric on the seats of your
beat up Taurus (god I was so
scared of that car, of you), a
profession of love for Whole
Foods and the best rootbeer
I'll ever taste (you sat yours
in the cup holder between
us to grab my face and say,
"Hey, look at me. You're so
beautiful" before reigniting
everything with your mouth on
my mouth), a book of pictures
of New York City (the one you
said you wanted to buy for me
and snuck off the shelf and to
the counter when I wasn't looking)
that I can't seem to throw out
no matter how hard I try, and
you telling me "it's happening"
when I apologized for my lack
of meat-eating that was
keeping you from falling in
love with me. Tell me how
I'm supposed to move on,
please, because I'm having
trouble forgetting your details.

o  w
l             l
s                    y
I am realizing
that I am my
only home.

(I)
god i don't know if we'll ever
match up quite like we did then
when you were just skin and a
pair of boxers under my hands
and you smelled like cold
chicago air

(II)
i packaged up
my heart after
the last time, after
him, and i was trying to
mail it to myself but i think
some part of it got mixed up
with the cd i sent you so did it
end up at your doorstep did
you put it in your pocket
did you slip it in an
envelope marked
"RETURN TO SENDER"
because if you do not
want it i would like
it back

i am in love with the
messesstickysweetgum
glued to my windpipe
please destroy me with
promises and feed me
forever's straight from
the palm of your hand
because i will store them
when you have given
up already and moved
on i swear i will still
hear them rumbling
from under my bed after
you are long gone

there is a hurricane
flooding into all of
my empty rooms.
the problem is that
i would rather be
quartered than live
with these weeds
growing up my
esophagus and this
tunnel in my stomach.
i thought it would
hurt less by now.

strained vocal chords
are merely the very
beginning of attempts
of telling myself
that i am worth more
than this. i am messy
and jumbled and i
will never do my
dishes within two
days of using them
or wash something
other than my socks
and underwear at
the end of every
week or speak in
sentences that make
sense outside of
the corners of my
brain,
but that's okay.

I
don't
know
what else
to say except
that I am here,
Ryan. I am always
here.

where you are a soft hum
in my chest he was a riptide,
a cheese grater swallowed
whole, the fifth sunburn
of the summer. you are
the breeze on a rainy
morning but i can't
love your hands the way
i did his why can't i love
your hands the way i did his

i think my soul
knew you before
my mind did. as
if all the **** i went
through was just
paving stones and
concrete, just
making sure i had
the right foundation
for you.
how many
coincidences are
too many coincidences?
i really couldn’t tell you.
but there is a softness i
feel in my rib cage that
i’ve never felt before,
like all those weeds i
thought i’d been growing
in there were actually
just a prairie for the
yarrow and the anise
you’ve wound around my heart.

I have become
a secondary
whisper at the back
of your
mind. You,
however, I've been
unable to peel from
my frontal lobe since
some time at the end
of June.