don't carve their name in trunks,
with your father's father's father's blade
don't scrawl across your papers
initials and immortal dates
don't buy a pet together,
don't let them into your bed.
nothing is permanent,
not even the ticking time bomb
dangling high above,
don't let them be everything,
don't attach them to your soul,
until there's nothing that's quite yours,
until you're one being, fused and whole
don't let them touch your heart,
or say that you are their's.
with every utterance of "mine",
a piece of your being dies, right there.
you can't get back the words
you strung across their lips, for
nothing can return
when it's touched new skin.