he realized that this empty house was not a home but a labrynth of rooms, where memories hung like grease stains on peeling walls.
there was a time when he had convinced himself that he had been robbed but as he brought his fingers to touch the tables that were now collecting dust, he saw that he had been a fool, for he hadn't  any possessions to begin with.
he was weak to his impulsivity and he found himself laying face down on faded sheets that reeked of
whiskey tainted distress and careless words that he tried to swallow but inevitably slipped and fell off his swollen lips.
the same sheets she tangled herself in as she looked at him dazed with ****** eyes that had abandoned church doors.
the same eyes that he often woke up to and caught staring into the darkness trying to make shadows of the black nothingness
or staring out the uncurtained window, transfixed on vacant roads
the same road that he had scooped her body from, thinking that it would stop her rapid shivers failing to see that it was not the road that was so frigid, it was her heart.
so with bruised knuckles and salted cheeks
he walked away from an empty house
and walked along the vacant roads
with hands that were full of nothing whole.
-m.a.e