even if we could reach the stars, everyone knows that they burn your fingertips
by @darkblue
they tell her to let her imagination fly
but they don't know how much her hands shake
when she thinks of his smile.
the sun always sets
but the sound of his laughter
ringing inside her mind won't.
she wants to make a home in the stars
that twinkle in the galaxy of his irises,
but she knows better than to find comfort
in someone else's body,
especially a body that she has never
had the chance to hold.
they tell her to let her imagination fly
so she keeps thinking that she will someday
make a bed inside his collarbones
and that she will spend her mornings
watching him trace the outlines of her hips
with his fingertips like she used to do
with the strings of the violin
she used to play as a child,
but no one ever told her
that you can't make homes out of human beings.
she tries to imagine a world
where the distance between them is shortened,
where she doesn't have to look at the moon
and pretend that he is looking at the same one
even though he's probably asleep
and dreaming about someone else's eyes.
they tell her to let her imagination fly
and she wants to let it skyrocket
past the ozone and land next to where he is,
on the other side of the solar system.
they tell her to let her imagination fly
and she does, but not because she wants to.
she has to make up all the words herself,
the way he smells and the way he tastes
and the way he sounds in the air.
she knows that everyone needs a place
and that it shouldn't be inside of someone else,
but imagining a world with him
is better than imagining a world where there is no love
and where everything goes wrong.
which is to say, imagining a world with him
is better than imagining a world without him.