I want you to stop talking about beautiful people like you are not one of them. I want you to look at yourself and smile and think about the ocean, how I loved you more than I loved myself. After this, there will be no more echoes. After this, there will be no more staying. I don't think I will continue to try an write you down in poems. I don't think I will wait up for you when I reach the border. You're a ******* tidal wave. A gunshot straight to the core and I hold my breath but fall apart anyway. You claw your way out of my ribcage like I am temporary, like you haven't kissed truths and secrets into the pale of my wrists. You were never that fond of my fire, but even when you realised all I've ever been is ice cold your hands still trembled when you'd come too close. And everything without you is quiet like the h in honest and the sounds you didn't make when you left. I love you. I thought the bruises you left on my hipbones implied you felt the same, but I'm not sure anymore. I am no longer myself. I handed you a knife so you could cut me open and into pieces, rearrange me any way you'd prefer but all you did was take it and stare at your hands like they weren't yours. Hit me with a closed fist and let me pretend it's your heartbeat. Tear me open until I'm nothing but truths, until I'm nothing but fire, until I'm nothing. Remember those nights when we'd stare at a clouded sky and you'd pretend to point out the stars? I'm different now. My bones don't break as easily as they did back then. You see, I still carry around the double edged knife in my left pocket, I still act like you were here once, I still act like I used to be good enough.