you sit in a daze filtered with street lights
At eyes length and ears depth
You wonder how you got to be
The ******* the second floor balcony
Chainsmoking as if you heart would flatline,
Your blood stop flowing
Through your veins that
The tiniest bit of alcohol was seeping through
To the skin that only sometimes felt comfortable
If you stopped

Only comfortable
When someone else was admiring it
And the shadows that dance behind you
Are the shadows that you wished you were
In your eyes, when anyone says I love you
Clinging to it
Believing that at the end of the day
That they won't stay
Whirring sounds of cars pass by
Thoughts become softer, the world becomes louder
You're not quite sure what you adore more
The silencing of your being
Or the loudness of your heart
As every chore you do is reciprocated
In ways you prefer to love
And be loved.

And be loved.
To be loved, to be loved.
What a sight I imagine as my children grow
To see the life I sought
With homemade cookies
And scrambled eggs for dinner
With snapdragons and lillies blooming
As rain water collects by the play set
Outside in the plethora of greatness

To sit on a second floor balcony and consider
The life that brought you here
With too many cigarettes
And enough bad decisions to
Create the life you always dreamed
Wouldn't be your own
Stuck between what could be
And what is