Darling
I cannot close this book
I’ve been learning how to lucid dream
So that somehow I might fly, bird-like,
Over London
And roost in your apartment.
When I awake, tears arrive in a great migration
South
I’ve been living in a quaint town called denial
From which you departed months ago.
Our crops are failing, and this current rain-dance will be as fruitless as the last.
I’m riding this sinking vessel straight through the iceberg, and all twelve winter months.
An Italian Riviera awaits me with wide, apathetic arms.
I hope I die making the wrong decision, because I can’t live with the consequences anyway.
If I’ve conned my way into heaven, it only makes sense to do penance until I reach hell.
Plummeting from the pedestal I placed you on.
I hope my safety nets tear wide open. And that the king's horses trample me. And that the king's men trample me. And that
Putting myself back together again is a labor worse than the trampling itself.
But I don’t know if I believe in all that anyway
It’s like some kind of nursery rhyme.
Or prayer.
Or mantra.
And as I go to write it down, I can’t find the bottom of the page.
Are we both forgetting to forget? Or is it just me?
If you were here, I’d ask you how your day was, until my skin wrinkled and my jaw locked.
I’d smother that banality with a hug that was too tight.
Let’s both hold our breath and see who passes out first, just promise you’ll wake me if I win this stupid contest I invented.
I’m still writing this just to lengthen the time you’ll allow me to stay in your thoughts.
I think if I stopped I’d cease to exist.
But why dwell
It’s impossible to keep my head down and my chin up at the same time.
Grinning like a great-white politician, selling myself the lie. Swimming out to sea.
Or at least to other lands
Where the grass is greener but the sky is greyer
When will this end?
How long is a piece of string?
I just ******* miss you, there’s no way to be poetic about it.
I might as well be an oracle to clichés
This might as well be braille,
Morse code,
Thieves can't,
A romantic language that I’ve been practicing since the 17th, century…
Darling
I cannot close this book
I’ve been learning the dark arts
That I might conjure a memory in corporeal form. That she may cradle my head in her lap.
And let me wipe my tears on her thighs.
I feel like an infant being rocked nauseous. I just want to sleep, 12 months minimum.
Tell me our love's not comatose, but if it is, cut the cord before I come too;
If I’m a ghost to you, let me pass on. If not, say the incantation anyway.
Echo those three words into the void,
Make up for lost time when we bit our tongues.
Make me into a mantra
Or a prayer
Or a nursery rhyme
Any myth that helps you believe
Because I promise I’m true.
And the ocean is just a big lake
And the time between us is only a dream
That I will forget about
In the mourning
Whatever that morning may bring
Feb 8
Feb 8, 2026 at 4:14 PM UTC
Darling
I cannot close this book
I’ve been learning how to lucid dream
So that somehow I might fly, bird-like,
Over London
And roost in your apartment.
When I awake, tears arrive in a great migration
South
I’ve been living in a quaint town called denial
From which you departed months ago.
Our crops are failing, and this current rain-dance will be as fruitless as the last.
I’m riding this sinking vessel straight through the iceberg, and all twelve winter months.
An Italian Riviera awaits me with wide, apathetic arms.
I hope I die making the wrong decision, because I can’t live with the consequences anyway.
If I’ve conned my way into heaven, it only makes sense to do penance until I reach hell.
Plummeting from the pedestal I placed you on.
I hope my safety nets tear wide open. And that the king's horses trample me. And that the king's men trample me. And that
Putting myself back together again is a labor worse than the trampling itself.
But I don’t know if I believe in all that anyway
It’s like some kind of nursery rhyme.
Or prayer.
Or mantra.
And as I go to write it down, I can’t find the bottom of the page.
Are we both forgetting to forget? Or is it just me?
If you were here, I’d ask you how your day was, until my skin wrinkled and my jaw locked.
I’d smother that banality with a hug that was too tight.
Let’s both hold our breath and see who passes out first, just promise you’ll wake me if I win this stupid contest I invented.
I’m still writing this just to lengthen the time you’ll allow me to stay in your thoughts.
I think if I stopped I’d cease to exist.
But why dwell
It’s impossible to keep my head down and my chin up at the same time.
Grinning like a great-white politician, selling myself the lie. Swimming out to sea.
Or at least to other lands
Where the grass is greener but the sky is greyer
When will this end?
How long is a piece of string?
I just ******* miss you, there’s no way to be poetic about it.
I might as well be an oracle to clichés
This might as well be braille,
Morse code,
Thieves can't,
A romantic language that I’ve been practicing since the 17th, century…
Darling
I cannot close this book
I’ve been learning the dark arts
That I might conjure a memory in corporeal form. That she may cradle my head in her lap.
And let me wipe my tears on her thighs.
I feel like an infant being rocked nauseous. I just want to sleep, 12 months minimum.
Tell me our love's not comatose, but if it is, cut the cord before I come too;
If I’m a ghost to you, let me pass on. If not, say the incantation anyway.
Echo those three words into the void,
Make up for lost time when we bit our tongues.
Make me into a mantra
Or a prayer
Or a nursery rhyme
Any myth that helps you believe
Because I promise I’m true.
And the ocean is just a big lake
And the time between us is only a dream
That I will forget about
In the mourning
Whatever that morning may bring
Request permission to use this poem