I believe that I can change you, or revive
what marrow was carved from my bones
the night that train swept you away. It will grow
like plaque on teeth,
widen my hips so I look more or less how I
did the first time - our first.
In my year of oceans and sunburns and purging,
polygraphs were not yet invented and
bodies still responded
only to those who kept eye contact during ***.
You curl my hair with your fingers
but I say you cannot break my heart again. I have
written enough letters to power
an airport, you have killed enough cells for
us to have made a child - only lonely
because none of this can be
said aloud. If your hands secreted invisible ink,
you'd just quietly piece me back together
without realizing
it could help us feel better. If
mistakes were like sunburns, I hope you'd hand
me aloe vera and make the wounds go numb.
Listen, I have seen you love
more than I have heard your ghost haunt my bedroom:
whispering that lie, the one that got away.