there are still poems of you
rotting softly in my drawers —
paper-boned heartaches
that smell of cigarette smoke
and petrichor and old perfume
that have all learned to outgrow
my cathedral memories of you.
darling, I wrote you into everything —
all feral. mundane. visceral;
into the spine of every lonely dusk,
into stray storms washing over our love,
into trembling midnights
I would spend thinking about you.
I wrote way too many poems about you.
after all, what is first love
if not a catastrophe
that leaves an aftermath for one to suffer?
so I’ve turned you into poetry, darling.
and every word sounds faintly
of your footfalls leaving,
of quivering breaths I couldn’t hold
when your ****** lips first touched mine
and staked their claim on my innocence.
I was so afraid —
thinking that the world would bruise me
and throw greek fires at my trembling feet
for kissing a boy at sixteen —
for laying my softness bare
and giving in to your papery arms.
the world’s anger had drowned me,
but I loved you still.
I loved you with all the stolen afternoons
and borrowed metaphors
we kept hidden in locker rooms
and midnight conversations.
I loved you like a hymn
tucked beneath two young lovers’ tongues.
like a prayer to abandoned gods.
the world gnawed at tenderness
with cruel and restless teeth,
but I loved you still, darling.
and still,
you left me.
and your absence, your farewell
once burned through my **** ribs.
I remember how the stars
hung outside my window
like an unwritten apology,
like words gathered at your clogged throat.
so I reached for a pen, instead,
and wrote the thousands of apologies
we failed to send each other.
I wrote way too many poems about you.
darling, tell me —
have you written one about me too?
after you, the nights just slipped away
like a montage of hushed clamors
and love poems in sheer disarray.
but every love poem felt like an elegy
before I could even start writing.
every sheet had yellowed on the edges
and grieved longer
than the storms I’ve weathered
in the wake of your departure.
all this in vain pursuit of forgetting you.
all this just to quiet the echo of you.
and truth be told —
I’ve loved a handful of men after you,
learned to weather
each season of heartaches —
but this harrowing storm of grief
that takes its shape out of you
is a patient river.
it always circles back.
as bruises return beneath each paper cut.
as poems return to the wound
that first taught their language.
darling, even the wreckage
has learned to speak your name.
I’ve loved a handful of men after you,
truly, deeply, in the ways I could.
yet every season steeped in sorrow —
every quiet undoing,
every solitary dusk,
every trembling midnight —
always leads back to you.
I wrote way too many poems about you.
all rotting softly in my drawers.
darling, I hope someday,
your hands will find them,
and your eyes will finally linger
on every dusty word.
May 25
May 25, 2026 at 7:48 AM UTC
there are still poems of you
rotting softly in my drawers —
paper-boned heartaches
that smell of cigarette smoke
and petrichor and old perfume
that have all learned to outgrow
my cathedral memories of you.
darling, I wrote you into everything —
all feral. mundane. visceral;
into the spine of every lonely dusk,
into stray storms washing over our love,
into trembling midnights
I would spend thinking about you.
I wrote way too many poems about you.
after all, what is first love
if not a catastrophe
that leaves an aftermath for one to suffer?
so I’ve turned you into poetry, darling.
and every word sounds faintly
of your footfalls leaving,
of quivering breaths I couldn’t hold
when your ****** lips first touched mine
and staked their claim on my innocence.
I was so afraid —
thinking that the world would bruise me
and throw greek fires at my trembling feet
for kissing a boy at sixteen —
for laying my softness bare
and giving in to your papery arms.
the world’s anger had drowned me,
but I loved you still.
I loved you with all the stolen afternoons
and borrowed metaphors
we kept hidden in locker rooms
and midnight conversations.
I loved you like a hymn
tucked beneath two young lovers’ tongues.
like a prayer to abandoned gods.
the world gnawed at tenderness
with cruel and restless teeth,
but I loved you still, darling.
and still,
you left me.
and your absence, your farewell
once burned through my **** ribs.
I remember how the stars
hung outside my window
like an unwritten apology,
like words gathered at your clogged throat.
so I reached for a pen, instead,
and wrote the thousands of apologies
we failed to send each other.
I wrote way too many poems about you.
darling, tell me —
have you written one about me too?
after you, the nights just slipped away
like a montage of hushed clamors
and love poems in sheer disarray.
but every love poem felt like an elegy
before I could even start writing.
every sheet had yellowed on the edges
and grieved longer
than the storms I’ve weathered
in the wake of your departure.
all this in vain pursuit of forgetting you.
all this just to quiet the echo of you.
and truth be told —
I’ve loved a handful of men after you,
learned to weather
each season of heartaches —
but this harrowing storm of grief
that takes its shape out of you
is a patient river.
it always circles back.
as bruises return beneath each paper cut.
as poems return to the wound
that first taught their language.
darling, even the wreckage
has learned to speak your name.
I’ve loved a handful of men after you,
truly, deeply, in the ways I could.
yet every season steeped in sorrow —
every quiet undoing,
every solitary dusk,
every trembling midnight —
always leads back to you.
I wrote way too many poems about you.
all rotting softly in my drawers.
darling, I hope someday,
your hands will find them,
and your eyes will finally linger
on every dusty word.
