I am the crushed cereal at the bottom of the box
Your last clean pair of underwear you only wear on laundry day
The popped balloon left in the balloon seller’s hand at
The end of the day when he goes back to his
One bedroom apartment and warms up soup in the microwave

I am the last thing you want to watch on TV
An infomercial or a re-run re-run of a show you don’t like
I am the bit of soda left in the can
That’s mixed with saliva and has no taste
And most times you don’t drink it, so
You just toss away the can with me still inside

I am the wallpaper in a dentist office
That no one buys except to paper dentist offices
I am the crumbs you sweep under the rug
I am that thing on craigslist that would be
Perfect except for that one little thing wrong

I am all those lonely things.

I want to return to being a child
And unlearn what I know of the world
And its pain and sadness

I want to go back to the time
Scraping my knee was the worst pain
For I know now it is far more painful
To scrape a heart

I want to see with those unbiased eyes
That do not understand yet understand all
For only a child can see without the judgement
That blinds us

I want to sleep peacefully once more
Protected by my own illusion of security
And wake each morning to the new world
I have not yet grown weary of

Life, love- why did you leave?
Where are you, darling, I cannot find you but
For your faint shadowed whispers

I mistook you for my beating heart
For dark-black nights sprinkled with
The lights of a night-time city

I mistook you for throbbing music
For flashing lights and crushing heat
And things passed in dark rooms

I mistook you for my reflection
For dark-black eyes that speak stories
And a stranger-face with no innocence

I mistook you for a false Life
For a liar, a thief, a betrayer, a tyrant
A false god to we who are Life-lost flock

Like tender birds in dark-black night we
Fly to places where your traces linger
To only find faint shadowed whispers

Hold me in your tongue
Stroke me inside of your skin
Kiss me on your eyes
Braid me into your hair
Your eyelashes
Catch me in your creases
Pinch me closer to you

In that hot house heart
Is the red red life I would paint myself with
To let you dry on me like glue
I'll catch your smell in a jar
Trap your gaze in my chest
Where my frenzied lungs try to inhale you

Become insane, for me
Frantic, thumping, gasping
Become mute but for my name
Become lost but for my touch

And when you leave
Rip me from this world
And let me sleep inside you forever