Maybe if I could find pills that give me the same effect  you do when you  say “baby” I’d be okay.

you got your college acceptance letter today and I’m so proud, but the minute you sent me that photo my chest collapsed.

I just want you to be happy even though most of me knows you’d be happier else where, I grasp all the time I can get with you like it’s special tokens that will give me life.

I told your mother I loved you and she smiled, she told me she thought i was a good person and that I would be fine in the world; I think she knows you’re going to leave me soon.

my skin crawls, my veins shake, and my stomach flips when I think of the inevitable dust storm that comes every year, hiding my happiness in a blanket of opaque grey, leaving me coughing in the bathroom trying to catch my breath as I mutter through my broken sobs “you’re okay”

but I won’t  be okay

because there isn’t anything like watching you live, getting a second older.

there isn’t anything like feeling you move your face from side to side so you can get deeper in my neck

there isn’t anything like touching your skin, or tasting your tongue, and I’m afraid I’ll never forget your name.