I put my faith in pinky promises
and astrology apps.
It isn’t our mistakes that first come to mind
when I think of us,
Though they certainly do.
Instead, I remember the French cafe
From where I can no longer bring myself
to buy hot chocolate.
Instead, I remember curling up in a plastic chair,
feeding two quarters to a payphone
dropped them more than once
in my excitement for ten minutes of your time.
From Winter Beach Weddings to
Three months of “missing my calls”
I’m not quite sure how we got here.
High school rock music shook my skull.
I thought my kneecaps would pop off
and leave me sprawled on the auditorium floor.
Her angelic voice made my ears bleed.
A colossal, though unintentional, “*******”.
First heartbreaks are like golden retriever puppies:
They contain infinite stores of energy that somehow manage
to refill themselves after only a few hours’ rest.
Their blonde hair is everywhere.
You are everywhere.
We were like George and Lennie:
“clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation”.
It was never going to end well.
And I could write (have written)
so many bitter, hurt, apologetic heartbreak poems
a million stanzas that are essentially
paraphrased Waterparks lyrics.
But none of this will change the fact
that I likely won’t receive an Orange-Crush soda
on Valentine’s Day.