I'm good.

I’m in a good place.
Friends the next room over,
a few streets down.
Living a life with
those I love all around.

Listening to their grace,
imagining you in this space.
I could almost burn.

I know you didn’t choose your face,
though it makes this a difficult race.
Your kisses I can’t unlearn.

Bring the flood.
The hours, days, months, years,
the unquantifiable tears.
Squeezing in self-discourse when I can,
logic and hope crammed between fears.

Another dud.
A grand plan disguised
as a firecracker, prized,
one promising an explosion,
lightning bolts etched on the sides.

Though there was never a detonation.
You cut the fuse short
or maybe I never lit it.
Maybe I’m like Rogue,
absorbed that firework’s nature
and can’t quit it

My veins are gunpowder.
My heart the wick.
Thoughts of you the flame
and I’m praying they don’t stick.

My mind is racing with water
in an old fashioned wood bucket,
assembly line style carrying reason.
Though my worst fears I can hardly stomach.

I’m working my synapses as fast as they’ll churn,
but like every western movie ever filmed

the water gets here too late.

I stand watching myself burn.