I have never touched you.
I have wildly laughed, bent
at the waist, hair
hanging - shaking laughter.

You have seen my garden,
we have circled it. Bare patches of dirt held up by crooked wood planks, they were here when i moved in, i just put up the chicken wire.
I told you what I wanted to grow in my soil.
I told you about my truce with the weeds - creeping charlie that
grows beautiful tiny purple flowers and heals your stinging nettle if you yank up the small round leaves and rub them on your skin, turning it green, but
also choke out my radishes.

I have seen you sweat -
on a bicycle on a hot
day - you look at
me - exasperated.
   And joyous.
Under your helmet, beads
of moisture gently sliding down your hairline.
You are gorgeous. And you
may or may not know it-
But when you smile at me,
my heart smiles back.

You feel like forgiveness.
You feel like inner peace and hope.

Your gentle quiet vulnerability
   has me weeping

                relief
                 joy
                 grief for my past
                                     selves.
A deeper understanding of
myself and of love and connection.

A spiritual journey, - is all
life is.

The sun softly arrives on my skin.
A welcome visitor - I have
      learned gratitude.
I have learned gratitude for
                    you.

These fast months, since the
  fireworks in Manzanillo -

They rush with no hope
of slowing down.

Until the planet decided it
was time to change
our pace.
The time is now, as it
always is.
No choice but to be present,
because in a few days
it might be demons
                and flames.

The future wants you
       to worry and
have concern -

But only Mother Earth, the
Goddess of the Universe -
Only She has control.

Do you choose love, do
you choose fear?

Do you squash the bug
that flies and lands
on your knuckle?

Do you listen for sirens,
or do you listen for
                         hope?

Who do you pray to,
     and why?

Is there a difference between
feeling connected to others
         and feeling alive?

How long does the pain
of grief last?

Will you embrace what the
      Goddess has given you?

My hair and your hair
     in the sun
appearing to set the world ablaze
               like my heart feels now
like a sinking stone in a clear blue rushing cold river
like bruises on both my knees
like breathlessness, 150 feet suspended in the air
             lowered slowly by your gorgeous hands
breathless
like waking up tied around your hot skin
like hot tears in my morning coffee.

like writing poetry to send messages to you via universe vibes mail

How to tell you i miss you
how to express that my soul has melted
or disintegrated

As if Chernobyl occurred in Northeast Minneapolis

Killing us both -
I'm simply waiting. When
will the green luscious vines and plants, butterflies
and birds repopulate this barren space -

filled with the worst kind of poison

Not for another thousand years
Or at least
not until
Spring
Summer
Fall

My eyes remember you
   differently than my skin does

I can see you
getting into your little white car
and driving away

blurry

        you didn't look back


I can feel the warmth of your skin
   under thick blankets
your softness was delicious

I can see you sitting at my kitchen table
speaking to my mother, but peeking at me
over raspberry tea
           cheeks pink, watery eyes
    Getting ready to leave
you are always leaving.

I can feel the soft strands
of your hair, my fingers wrapped
       around the nape of your
       neck, smoothing it down,
pulling gently.

I can see you looking at me,
staring at me, exasperated,
frustrated. Your mouth says
I can't do this
but your eyes say
I can't leave you, either


       I can picture you
at your warm and loving home


surrounded by the family I
never quite fit into

I can see you
holding on to your beautiful mother
then,
driving around our town
to look at pretty lights
maybe with your brothers,
maybe with someone new


Months later,
a whole year later ( only one day later) (after a whole lifetime has passed)


when I allow myself to close my eyes for a moment

I can feel your body holding mine

my feet tucked underneath me
my face pressed against your chest,
heart beating against my eardrum
your chin resting on my head

       I can feel your love
       emanating - shining
into me


                                    on this day
                I am grateful to have
                ever touched you


    I am grateful that I
            ever laid eyes on you.

You were the ocean
infinite in some ways
mysterious and dark, impossible to reach the bottom

Powerful, pushing me and shifting my weight from standing to floating

You were the ocean
large, expansive
But so soft, a carrying presence
I knew you would never set me down

That fateful day
I was standing on the shore, picking tiny shells out of the sand to give to you, lifting my skirt so as not to get it wet

I saw the wave growing in the distance, but I didn’t think to move
As it grew closer, I did not panic.
10 feet, 20 feet, 30 feet tall. A wall
and when your freezing cold wave crashed over me
I still didn’t think to move

You could never hurt me.

Under your abyss, I could see my red hair turn to kelp
Thirty feet long, rooted in the ground

I begged you to release me, swallowing salty seawater
But you held fast

You were so beautiful
you could never do a thing like this

I always thought you would be the ocean under my boat
The wind in my sails
The love in my heart


But I drowned that day


I am still trying to determine
If I will ever grow gills

The pain of not knowing
this gnawing feeling
cramps in my sides
squeezing my blood dry
this bed is always too hot
or too cold
wake up freezing or sweating,
always thinking of you

spirals downward
into the hopelessness district
where souls crawl, missing
their other half
leaves fall, trees naked and bare
crawling to the sky like vericose veins
         and I
                       won't
                                      call


because knowing would be worse
knowing that you are gone

and never
             ever
                    coming back to me

Rainy day phone call
      from my fogged up car
I can hear your smile
                                    it lights up my eyes

                                    I can feel my skin glowing

                                              underneath your fingertips

and tears forming
                                      underneath my eyelashes

I feel in my skin
in my hair
in the backs
       of my eyelids,
that if there was one
house in minnesota that felt like New York - -
this would be it. Quiet dead of winter, the street filthy out the window,
people wandering the cold dark streets in the night sky
me, cozied up on your paisley couch with a cat warming my feet with its soft purr,
drinking a glass of sweet red.
you, typing emails for your union organizing, and playing your favorite jazz record for me. Me,
                                            in love with you

                  You, loving me,
                                    as silly as it seems to me.

working here,
  i get the sense that everyone
is a little ****** up
   Either insecure or vain and
full of themselves
         too quiet or too loud
  too trusting
      or they're constantly getting  
    ****** over

Am i the girl that will
    break you or make you?
will I build you up
or tear you down

I want this to be a mutual decision

I'm an easily startled creature

move slowly,
        
             but always move in
                  my direction



     When you hunt me down,
                           make it painless

strike through the heart

       I will collapse

             blood seeping into
                      the soil
             drag my body through
                               the forest

to a safer place

We're the most ****** up poetic pieces of **** 

We grew up thinking the world hated us, regarding it as a hostile environment 
But never paying it too much attention
Never giving it a second or third thought 


And when you met me you thought i was beautiful

And when i met you i thought you were smart


And when we started falling into this ******* pit of dispair
I started to regard you as beautiful


And now your eyelashes brush against my skin as you tell me that I'm intelligent 
And interesting 



Interesting enough?
Is it a grey area?
How long can i keep this up?
How long until you figure me out


How long until you see me for what i am, who i used to be?

How long until we start hating each other


Just tell me how much time i have
So i can appreciate you

In this moment

Well we woke up in this relationship
And now i find that I'm talking ****
About myself and the things i feel
Because i don't know what's right or what's real
I only run sprints, not marathons
And you keep saying, "girl, what are you ON"
Because i never get tired of hanging with you
But I'm always so scared that you'll see that I'm too
Too crazy too weird too much to handle
One bad day and I'm off the handle
But hey i dont care if you believe me or not
Cuz I think you're cute and i like you a lot.

Sitting in a board room with these people licensed to teach
Talking about education gap like it's some sort of disease
Like it's only the white kid that knows how to read
And only white teachers know how to lead
But i think that some people just forgot
That like america, the classroom is a melting ***
But for years and years it's been boiling too hot
And all the white kids are floating up to the top
While everybody else gets burned
Burned by the system
That just wants them in prison
With petty drug charges
And a better ear to LISTEN
Listen to the cops and the teachers and store clerks
Listen to the president and the creeps that urge him
To cut all the funding for public education

Let's just send em' to prison
That'll teach em'

like that dream you have when you're falling
and you wake up with a jolt
                and heart is bump bumping
    loving you is exciting

like when you're eating a meal cooked by your mom
and you just can't believe how good it tastes
warm and full of comfort
loving you is home

like when your sister is in the hospital
and you can't stop wondering if she's going to be okay
loving you is devastating

like when you hear that song that brings you right back to high school
heart swells with good memories
       loving you is nostalgic

like when you spend all your money on a new camera you've been saving up for
and you're just so excited to make new moments beautiful

loving you is brand new

policing my body with your jealousy

controlling the love I share
the number of friends I could have

Always judgmental, Always hiding from me

Your **** insecurities
      brought us down

and when I fell
you chained me to the
        floor


foot on my neck

         -    -    -   -   -
     DON'T
                         MOVE



*or I'll leave you

you brought me right
   back to high school

staying up late
                smoking ***
making love until
                    we just can’t
                                   anymore
you broke down all of my walls
               you peeled my shell
               off of my skin,

leaving me flushed and pink

    You brought me right back
            to child-like wonder
  and joy

laughing so hard we roll on
                      the floor
running and screaming
               then you lift
                          me up
                way into the air

the child in me

        is the happiest


I’ve ever been
--------

        When we finally

have to wake up and be
                     adults--

When that morning comes

                             I’ll cry like a baby

I don’t even miss you

what were you but a person,
any person

to watch tv with, to look at, to sleep next to

just a warm body



that filled the space, with empty words


and in the end, the space was left empty. room was made, but never filled

never to capacity

my heart was forever giving, and never full


and now that you have left,
I don’t miss you



I feel like I should thank you
for allowing my heart to become accustomed
to empty space,

empty

life

am I numb?

am I shoving these feelings down in order to survive?

if I was truly feeling them, could I go to work, or go to school?


could I laugh and have fun with my friends?
could I think about kissing other people?



am I numb?



or maybe I’ve just been over you since the last time we saw each other

two months ago
when we wore promises like chapstick



and I wore your hands like a shirt

I have wiped the slate clean
with the sleeve of my shirt

where my heart once found its home


this morning
sobbed over the frying pan

stupidly thinking
about how I used to make you breakfast




but it was being appreciated that I truly miss
and I’m not sure if that’s what it really was
if you truly appreciated me


or if you just liked the idea of having someone make you breakfast.


regardless
I miss you saying thank you

the last time we saw each other
I was a mess

and you never got to see the person I was after that


you just gave up
that I was a cocoon and that the butterfly had perished inside
and might never come out.


but those wings are bright orange and purple

and I don’t really miss you at all.

remember when we first met

how I was so ****** up
and the ways I chose to deal with things

like a child, angry and out of control
rash decisions
drinking
***
cutting

and over these past three years

you turned me inside out
my skin is on the inside
and my heart is on my sleeve

I said I couldn’t imagine my life without you

and now you have forced me to do the unimaginable

it’s bleak, dark, lonely
full of fake smiles and 2 am binges
stomach aches and head aches and back aches, nausea
this weird urge to chop off all my hair and send it to you in a box
along with all your ******* letters with that little three word lie printed on every page
in your small beautiful handwriting

no sleep,
and when sleep happens
I wake up with a tiny speck of disgusting hope that this was all a dream
and it fades back into reality like a dark shadow over my bed

like my makeup smearing into my skin

dying my cheeks black


you’re gone

and you’re never coming back



if my empty chest was a house
I’d burn you to the ground

when I think about even the simplest things

like placing my palm on your warm cheek
or running my fingers through your soft hair

I feel like I’m dying

I feel like I have cancer, it’s infecting my heart and rapidly multiplying

and like a person who knows that they’re dying

all I can do is watch tv

and stare at my phone

and cry in the ******* shower
and cry in the bathroom at work
and cry on the sofa at 1 in the morning

but I can’t eat
and I can’t sleep


because you made those things so much more than simple human needs
you took these mundane every day activities like shoveling food into our mouths

and you made them into these magical moments

where I was truly, and completely

content

I stopped eating
you would tell me to do so
but we’re not talking anymore
and food tastes like ****

sweetness lingers too long on my tongue and turns bitter
textures feel odd, make me gag


so i’ve been eating soup
which I hate
but you love


which is ironic
because I love you the way you love soup
or the way you love snow

or the way you used to love me, and don’t anymore.

It is such an enormous privilege
to have access to fresh, wholesome, healthy food
at my fingertips,
the garden I built at full bloom in
my backyard

fresh spinach basil kale lettuce onions

much like your love is on the tip of my tongue

to eat and drink in the presence of You
is to experience pure pleasure -
                                           pure joy

a bowl of fresh strawberries
         a warm omelette bursting with sweet and spicy aroma

they tell me I should open a restaurant
        they tell me that my cooking is like a meal dipped in gold

but the food never tastes as good
      without you smiling at me

without you holding me in a soft sway
                to the music
                                           in our mouths

     without you
                                     life is bland

when will these cops learn
that their hard work means nothing
when the curtain falls upon Baltimore
and the frightening dark sky washes upon us

when will these people learn that they are powerless
that the system isn't broke,
that we're the ones that are broke.
and that means the system is working

when will these people learn
that black means criminal
and white means

God
When will these people learn that

wait, they can't learn
because the schools have been shut down
but that's okay
'cause the new light rail train was built and
it runs from north minneapolis to the prison

when will they learn that
Freddie Gray is Ferguson
and Mike Brown is Baltimore
and our sons are alive, but they're not living

when will we learn that diversity means nothing
if there is not first liberation
when voices are silenced,
they lose more than their right to speak

when will they realize that
riots
are
justified

my man has a sweet, soft nature
elegant and warm
he is a sea ~
often calm, but the storm is a beautiful and frightful place to be

my man has delicate fingers
they find pleasure inbetween the strands of my hair
against my thighs
behind my neck
underneath my shirt



my man is like the father i never had
stern with me
proud of me
invested in me


my man is my favorite person
when he sleeps he is perfect
when he speaks he is thoughtful
when he gives he is gorgeous
when he is frustrated with me i crumble


my man is devastating
devouring
deeply in love
divergent

my man is righteous
radical
real
ravishing



my man is no one's man
my man is his own love and his own sustenance
he asks me of so little and he gives so much

my man is a contradiction of too good to be true and standing right in front of me

when you held me last
there was a grey tension

the two of us, held in suspension
the air thick with questions

a grey tension, a fog placing the slightest pressure on my lungs
wondering when the air will clear

wondering if you will be here
when you are gone


those questions- small bricks
my clothes catch on them, they come out of nowhere
seemingly to fall from the buildings we have constructed together

a brick falls here
and there

empty spaces next to the window
missing


they have fallen on me,
luckily missing my head


these questions
were a grey fog
keeping my lungs from their full potential

these questions
were heavy bricks from our house
falling on top of me


and today
i could breathe
when i remembered that the fog is temporary

my bruises disappeared
when i remembered
that our house can always be repaired


so if you will take my hand

let's move to the lands where the air is crisp and clean
and rebuild our house
together

Remember how you used to
                  watch me?

your blue eyes,
                 staring at me while I
   was onstage
playing a song, reading a poem,
         performing a monologue

even when I wasn't onstage
    when we were alone
                in my room
and I would sing  for you
          then kiss your forehead
     and stroke your ears.

Even in class, when I would speak
      my mind
I always knew you were listening
                          intently

sometimes, from across the room,

    you would watch me
            dance.

Thank you for appreciating
        the art and
           those moments I
wanted to share with you.

      I hope you cherish
                   them

as much as I do

I fell apart
   I fell hard to the ground
Felt myself shatter into
some large pieces
and some small ones.
too small to pick up again.
                              ****** fingers-
                                            shards of glass.
Nothing could be done.

I fell apart
               identity split between
thousands    -       millions of
things that make me up.
split between
                         daughter/feminist
                     partner/student
                       privilege/marginalization

split between
                         "it was bad for me
                       worse for you"

how does this erase

                  how much light does this
             give?
                             How much love is
                shared and exchanged

    when we fall apart

                             by choice

when love is black
and our fingers are intertwined

i look outside and see the white snow
and tremble with anger

but i hold my sustenance dear

when the walls have been broken down
and there is confusion in our voices

i look to the blood red sky and pray
pray, yes, I pray
that i will see it blue again
in  this lifetime

My mind is flowing
                       with questions
and no answers
                              I don't want to
                           be trapped in this

I want to lie in the grass in a
                field,    
                              absorbing the sunlight
      and listening to my breath

                    in.      out.
                                       in.       out.



and it seems funny
        
         that some people do.

             some people are lying in
                       warm grass

or maybe on black pavement -  hot from
                 sunlight
                                     August in Missouri
                    
  sounds nice right now

Does it have to get worse before
              it gets better?
                            are we going to
                            drown
   before we grow gills?

             or can we depend on each
                other to lift us out
                    of the deepest ocean
                         we've ever swam in

Who is benefitting?
                                     Who is angry?
Who is Dying?
                                Who is surviving?
Who is scared?
                               Who is speaking?
Why
           are
                  there disparities?      S   P        A    C    E   S

                                               between the
                   lives we want to live
                                           and
                                                       the ways we are
                                                                              shot in the
                                                                                         street

what can be done
         we live in a black box
with no airholes
                         trapped
                        suffocating
                        scared.
who's going to protect us?
who am I going to protect?

                      who  .             .               .               .          .     ?

I have one sister
                one partner
                          one best friend
                                     two parents

and a hell of a lot of pain.

      who will take this on their
        shoulders with me?

                                  and who will
shoot holes
      into this dark box?

burnt mouth taste
aching chest
legs tights and cramped

heavy head, not to be held up any longer
by the strings I have cut throughout my day

i want to be free from them
I want to hold myself up


but i always wait
wait for your strings
to be tied around my wrists

please tie my soul to my body

I fear it will fall away
and I will lose myself in the sadness I felt before I met you

and I will go back to being the sad person i was

you remember.
I used to write those sad poems

now my poems are only sad when you feel far away

when I get the opportunity
   I dig you out of the ground
like gold
      I dig my fingers into
your crevices, spreading your
   skin across my palms

I once told you that you are like ice cream.
I want you to know that you're not just ice cream.
You are like sunshine, or air.
You are like cilantro, or laughter.
You are the water I want to dip my toes into,
a crisp clear lake


in which I see my reflection

If more people lived life, modeled after you
If more people lived freely
If more people expressed themselves
Without fear
   Without that crushing concept of conformity
   This world would be a better place
        A place I could be proud to be a part of
If more people took the time to open their eyes
        And break apart those hoary curtains
Of societal expectations
That smother us in their weight
And choke us in their clouds of accumulated dust
This world would be a better place
You bring so much to this world
Each
                                            moment
     you share
     with us

I want to be a place
   a safe haven
                    for you

a place
                 where you are warm

       I want to be a home,
          consistent
                               sturdy
                                              dependable
I want to be your bed


         you can come here

   strip off the clothes of the day

            sleep
                  as peaceful as
           a sunset lake

                   in me.

he can't build you the world
                       no purpose
                                    or magic mirror
                    show me the truth
                                       !
                              a feeling
                           a bigger boat?
                                go ahead
here's looking at you
                    and me
                          together

You stand up there
with the most gorgeous curly black hair
you look out into the darkness,
the light shining on you
                                  and out of you.

I can hear your heart pounding from across the stage.

the world stops.
I stop.

           I can’t breathe.
I feel like I’m in a dream.
I look at you, you gorgeous thing.
                              and I feel you.
and I’m not used to feeling things.

And then,
               and then,
                               you open your mouth
                                                    to speak

you speak.
You speak with eloquence
you speak with passion.
you speak with a voice like velvet.

you speak
and the words chosen,
so carefully put together,
wrap around my throat

choke me

Slavery.
****.
******.
Prison.
*******.

All with a forked tongue.

Without thinking
I sink in my chair.

It will not be until later, when I am riding home in my car,
listening to the radio with the windows down,

that I realize
I am ashamed to be white.

I hate it.
I hate it that you woke up one morning angry
at people like me.

White, symbolically representing innocence
but you know **** well that we are ******* guilty
of everything.

White, symbolically representing purity
but our past is as ***** as the floor underneath the rug,
where we have swept all of our genocide and pain.

I hate it.
I hate them.

I can’t seem to understand how,
with this privilege that I was given at birth,
that I am more likely to be America’s standard of “successful”
although you are obviously more talented.

I can’t seem to understand how
White Middle Class
is better than
black gorgeous badass.

It’s ******* criminal.
I want to tear my hair out.
I want to **** the men
that have hurt you and your family.
I want to cry.

but instead,
(weak as I am)

I sit in my seat,
listening to your voice.
It causes me to shake.

I hate it.

The words etched into your black skin
Mean so much more to me
because they were cut and burned into you
with White words
White knives
White cigarettes
White privilege.

Like mine.

I hate it.

But, I have no way to escape it

Like you are unable to escape the pain
the pain that people like me
people with skin like mine
have inflicted upon you.

So, I sit there
like a naughty child

and I think about what I have done

the water is dark. we've been in this boat for a long time.
we're holding each other, shivering.

the water is dark. Black
we lie in the bottom of the boat, trying to stay warm

holes, tiny holes.
breaking through our little boat.

stand up.
water covers our toes, turn yours blue.

the boat rocks.
you are losing your balance.

the boat rocks.
you grasp at me, at the edges of our boat.

I reach for you, taking your hand.
that was close, my love.

something in the water.
the sky is dark; no stars nor moon.

"what is that?"
I don't know, love.

scared, all of a sudden.
tears, as cold as the water.

will we make it?
I don't know.

Wind blows suddenly
a wave crashes

what is happening?
I don't know.

You go.
You had to leave.

I couldn't hold on to your hand
fingers frozen

I'm sorry.
I don't know.

I tried,
I tried.

I wanted to help you.
We were in this boat together

and all of a sudden,
I had to save you

I don't know how.
I don't know.

You are sinking.
Sinking.

The boat is sinking.
Sinking.

You are gone.
Do I jump in after you?

Do I hope that you will make it?
Can I help you?

Is it too late?
I don't know.

I don't know.

I reach
            My arms are not long enough
my heart feels like a lake of clear
                                water, bursting through a dam


I explode with desire
                                  to hear your voice

to understand everything about you

               My feet are rooted to the ground
                        and yours have blisters from running

I do not understand
                           I wish to understand

to know how and when your heart beats
                when and why you feel pain

                         where you are
      
                                    where are you?


How can I get to the place to where you
                                            are going?

Listening to you breathe, your head tilted back
The pillow a blueish tint in the light from the window
It is unclear if the light comes from the moon or from some street light
But it does not matter
The light is blue
And it shines onto the skin of your face, with little stubbles on your chin and the space on your cheeks near your ears

You on your back, my hand draped over your chest
You shift to face me, you slide your leg over mine, and our toes search for empty spaces in the other, then lock into the gap. I lock myself to you.

You are gone.
In a place of nothing, darkness, and light
You do not understand what is happening as I kiss you awake
Your eyebrow my target, I feel the tiny hairs against my lip as your lids flutter open
Like wings on the back of a bird that never lands

You stare at me in awe
Love in your eyes

Outside the cars go by on the highway
Wasting gas
They should turn around, go home to the ones they love.
Loudly they vvvvmmmm past us,
While we,
Sweet and slow moving like molasses
Move our hands up each other from legs to hips to mouth

Then down, and feel for textures
You call me smooth, my skin like a cool stone in a river

You are like a grass covered hill,
Mossy and full of earth

We move together, the light blue from the window shifting from you to me,
And then back to you
The light on your shoulders to the light on my hips

Everything is blue
The love
Your shy smile
My flowing hair
everything is blue.

even
My hands
Moving across you

Like a little sailboat
In the middle of the ocean

They were scattered all over my house,
                                                      in a mess. An explosion of you, everywhere
I took the old plane tickets to Texas
                                 the movie stubs from a year ago
      these letters, in smudged envelopes

                          I found homes for them.
Tucked away safely in places I can find
                                                  them again.
I like to take them out
              hold them in my hands,
                                        feel memories wash over me

of warm sun on my red hair,
of tears salty on my lips
of your beautiful fingers around mine


I put my music in its case,
        my poems on the shelf,
              my love on the windowsill

Taking the parts of my past that I don't like
              giving it away;
                                        some goes in the trash.
                                                (but I know I won't miss
                                                                ­  any of it.)
I need to make room
     I need to make space
               for the letters, movie stubs, plane tickets
I need to make room for
                       new memories
                               with you.

A new future

                         with you.

in the air,    in the blue sky
      The same sky I often look up at
but I find myself looking down
   watching cars become specks then -

                                         disappear.
Endless horizon,
                         that blur of white and
          sea green, then
                            the clearest blue
                                   the perfect sky.

The earth is so much larger
                    than I can possibly
                         comprehend.


       Much like your love for me

in seven and a half days
you will pick me up (from the airport
and i will pick you up (from the slump you've been in
and we will hold each other there
in the air

in seven and a half days
my mind will finally be at rest
i no longer have to snap back into focus
after dozing into daydreams of
your sweet skin

in seven and a half days
my heart will burst from the feelings you elicit
inside of me, you keep me afloat
the world tries to pull me under
you save me

in seven and a half days
our worlds will collide
after remaining seemingly separate for months
I will know the people you know
we will share

in seven and a half days
i will not worry about grades
or missing the bus or getting fat or being alone
you will extract the ****
replace with beauty

in seven and a half days
your arms will become my safe haven
your body envelops mine, covers me
i have never felt so safe
in my life

in seven and a half days
our bodies will melt into each other
waking up next to you
kiss your forehead, toes intertwine
yours mine ours

in seven and a half days
I will love you
-in person.

If I wrote a poem for
      you
              every time you crossed
                 my mind
I would never be without a
           pen in my hand.

But as it stands
        my mind has stopped

   finding words to  put on
      paper

but my heart knows

how
       I feel

and how
                I think
about
     you

every time I
     take an order
             for a Left-hand
                     Milk-Stout
    at the restaurant
         where I now work

i step into the shower,
my hair flowing down my back

and i hear the bathroom door open and close
-click
           you enter

i ask if you're coming in,

           you pull back the curtain
and you stand there
like a mountain,
          absolutely majestic

your skin warm and inviting

i push my hair behind my ears

you step into the shower
                the stream hits your body

like a waterfall in Minneopa
in the middle of a hot summer day.

you lay three fingers against me,
like an electric current
screaming "I want" over and over.

You bend down to kiss my forehead,
the water spreads over your face

and rushes between my legs

             you kiss my lips

you place your remaining ******* on my waist

I snap back into place:
sitting in a hard plastic chair
listening to a short bearded man
go on forever
about some dead philosopher
who has never touched me.

and again, you are far away