i am still thinking about how i live by a cemetery without a fence
and a sign advertising cremation
you said you’re not sure what to think of that
but this is how you know me,
this is how i let myself be known
starved and dying and silhouetted
against something i don’t own
like the sky or the trees or my gravestone

i think you should know that i love you, or used to love you, or will love you
i think you should know about the incisions
three over your heart and around it
like erosions of faith

i will fold into you, become a bullet
this is a way of being close to you
and i hate to admit i think i am hurting you
imagining your fingers curved over my collarbone like you’re afraid you’ll break me
because i know how that looks when i have a knife gripped in my hand

i am still thinking about the way our hands slotted together
like days of the week,
normalcy perspiring in the air behind us
because we were getting used to feeling somewhat alive
i am still thinking about the short hand of the clock
digging into my ribcage harder than your fingernails ever could
and i’m sorry
i swear i’m sorry
i am kicking and yelling and throwing sand in your eyes
despite the fact that i know you love me
and i am still thinking about the normal length of a pause
when you’re telling someone you love them, too

i think you should know that i love you, or used to love you, or will love you
[pause]
i love you too
[pause]

i hate to admit i think i am hurting you
i love you too
i hate to admit i think i am hurting you
i love you too
i love you too
i love you too
i love you too
i love you too

if i died, my left hand over my heart keeping the bandages in place
while i lost consciousness
if i died and you had my journals
i know you’d read them and
i would fold into you, become a bullet
a way of you being close to me

i am still thinking about how i live by a cemetery without a fence
our hands interlocked
how can we tell that we are outside the cemetery
if it has no fence?

days of the week degrading freely

i am hurting you, i hate to admit
i think i am hurting you

[pause]