i saw it in the warmth of your hand when you played with the soft cold of my fingers. i smelled it in the short distance you kept between us every time we talked; in the way i forced myself not to smile because my mouth, so close to yours, didn't want to show that it wanted you. i touched it when my loud, black-out drunk cries were calmed by your quiet presence while sitting in the bathroom floor. i heard it sing when you called my name from down my window or when you showed me your favorite song. i heard it mourn when you told me that you liked her. i tasted it in your burgundy voice when it whispered that you were sorry and never meant to hurt me. i knew it was love when i forced myself to smile because my watering eyes didn't want to show that they wanted you.
i knew it was love because every time you kissed her i couldn't help but stare and wish i was blind.
i knew it was love because i wrote thousands of poems about you hoping one day you would jump out of the page and be here with me, until i realized your name didn't even jump out on my phone anymore.
i knew it was love because when my mind wandered around you it felt like a perfectly stacked box of cigarettes filled with every moment we shared and all i wanted to do was smoke it all until each cigarette burned out and faded with the thought of you.

however i knew it wasn't love
because the way you glanced at me from across the room can't compare to the way you contemplate her so religiously.

i knew it wasn't love because i wanted to be loved so badly that i accepted the smallest crumb and called myself full.

i'm glad it wasn't love because my name was a wooden ship that would simply break if i forced it into your bottle glass heart.