a new therapist,
can you pinpoint when you started to feel like this?
a party four years ago with a boy with sun-bleached hair and blue eyes
got pinned on a couch and, sure, kissed him with tongue but wasn't drunk enough to
fool herself into sleeping with him, into regretting him, so she walked away
with a mouthful of his curses.
his, i made you what you are. his, you broke your promise.
the sky is always falling for her because the sun beat heavy on her neck.
you should get that mole checked, cassandra said, instead.

she takes the day off and thinks
drinks eight glasses of water and eats a full meal
deals with her frizzed hair and aching head
dreads seeing the sun rise the next morning
but still wakes early to see it anyways.

greece burns and she watches
it isn't the first time and it won't be the last time
her sister helen calls her on the phone
drones on and on about a new boy
and she asks her, she begs her, do you not remember troy?

her therapist says, we can't fix the problem if you don't talk.
but she does and she does and she wonders when she doesn't
she tells her the sun is falling out of the sky, greece is burning in bright lights,
how do you deal with a trauma reborn like a slice of something
taken from her parents, a splice of hatred from a lover scorned?
cassandra finds it hard to find a part of her that hasn't been left burned
her words like a cyclical epitaph.

she turns on the news and watches the sky fall again.