roll with the punches baby try not to shatter while you wait to
feel it
it might take a while for every synapse to come alive but
i promise you'll feel it in the end
light up like a christmas tree with every nerve impulse 100 watts your body
will light up the room.
you cast shadows on the moon and i wonder why
is it so cold?
(this wasn't what i wanted when i picked up a pen,
but it seems
like every poem becomes part of you
your blood runs in these pens and i can't help writing about you and your
talus -
that word means both
jagged rocks when you look down from a cliff and oh is this what you want
and the bone of your heel
that you grind into my chest and ****,
i think
that sums you up
pretty well.)
because your sparks were always the best thing about you,
when you short-circuit and sputter and all your lights flicker your synapses
have more life than they know what to do with
roll with the punches and cradle your cheek and be grateful that
at least you didn't crack
because electricity and water don't mix and you've killed enough sharks
in your lifetime.
you don't need another funeral on the mind
when you're still watching the procession
of your own -
(or maybe it's just a fantasy
which is
more likely than not,
you were never able to face that talus
at the bottom
or your christmas lights sputtering and
stopping) -
you watch your own funeral and breathe and i
pray
to god for a miracle
because your measured breaths are the saddest thing i've ever seen because i know
you're just breathing by eights

[eight protons eight neutrons eight seconds in and out
atomic number eight processes to stay alive]

the periodic table hung on your wall like a map of the world you
breathe by eights and i pray harder and breathe ragged you were always more measured than me like
you're morse code and i'm an earthquake
you're heart rate and i'm arrhythmia
you're chemistry and i'm alchemy and you disprove me with every breath
you the child of bright mathematics i crumble in your gaze
but still you short-circuit and i stroke your hair and breathe ragged while you sputter
your synapses can't hold all your life so i'll conduct the overflow
ground your talus in my chest and i will take all your flickers for my own.
it might take a while
but you'll feel it
i promise
because it's not so cold with your short-circuits in my chest and i bet it's not so numb
with my pens scratching your arms
you light up and i wonder how you can breathe so steady
with all this smoke
in the air
(i was breathing  ragged already but you said asthma suits me and
i guess you're right because
you were always the one with all the elements memorized while i
struggled to remember that air
could be something other than
painful)
you short-circuit and i stroke your hair and pray
for your numbers to add up
this time
and you sigh and disprove me
again
because i only live in your flickers and sputters and my
ragged breath
and i pray you will flare brighter light up stronger because
when you feel that punch
i can't conduct that impulse.
roll with the punches baby you'll feel it i promise it
just takes a while
breathe by eights keep that heart rate steady
you imagine your funeral procession and sputter
i breathe ragged baby i will take all your misfires
and write odes to your sparks
just be ready for that feeling when it hits.