12:05 am, drunk text, honest words
fingers brush the send button
message sent reads the screen,
sweaty palms, backtracking
hit delete, no use

eyes close, deep breath
message received


1:00 am, sober thoughts
angry groan, swear words
escape your lips,
waiting, hoping, praying
hit open, no use
eyes close, deep sigh
no reply

3:16 am**, point of no return
parallel realities flash by
one good, one bad
one yes, one no
call him? no use
eyes close, almost asleep
one new text

if you can hold her hand
without feeling torn at the idea that
one day, you may never feel its warmth again,
then you are not in love with her

do not keep muttering worn-out
i-love-you's
under your breath
just to fill the empty spaces in the air
even if they no longer beat with passion,
do not try to explain the thousands of reasons
why you love her
if you don't

because if you can live with the thought
of her name being engraved in
someone else's mind,
her fingers running through someone else's hair,
the thought of those beautiful words
whispered into lips that don't belong to you
then you have never loved her, even for a second

and the bitter fragments
of the love she gave away
were never worthy to
belong to you

If you get sick at the thought of someone else touching me
**why are you touching someone else

You can't talk about long distance relationships until
the only way you can hear his voice, is through the voice mail he made
6 months ago

You can't talk about long distance relationships until
you can no longer feel his arms around you

You can't talk about long distance relationships until
you forget the colour of his eyes
and the shape of his jaw

You can't talk about long distance relationships until
the faded memory of his laugh breaks your heart
because you can no longer hear it

You can't talk about long distance relationships until
you say I love you to him
and his grave says nothing back

You can't talk about long distance relationships until
you're in love with a boy
*six feet under

My naivety died with my father
at the bottom of Lake Shelbyville
when I was seven years old
and still losing little teeth.
-
I turn twenty-four next week;
January the fifteenth.
I can still sense the difference between you and I
by the long pauses in between weather talks.
-
I find solace in solitude
and that will never change.
Too many years of misunderstandings,
dope addled family, and conflict avoidance.
-
My mother has an addictive personality
which she tries to superimpose onto me
as a way to keep me away from the ****.
She wants me to be her negative film; her opposite.
-
I wish my grandma had leveled with her
instead of surrounding drugs with the mystique
and the danger of a loaded weapon
in a teenager's back pocket; denim daredevil.
-
Grandma.
Now that is a name I miss saying.
She was the stern force that matured me
and my protector in time of matriarchal absence.
-
Her mind started to die years before her body did
and I had to sit and watch it happen, helpless,
with my mother; her daughter.
Alzheimer's, falls, strokes, and in a flash she wasn't there.
-
I don't find myself rooting for the cause these days.
I just want to escape where I came from;
who I am, but the path is circular.
I'm accepting the fate, bathing in lust, and waiting for summer.

Whatever it is
that gets you
out of your bed;
do that all day-
do that all day.

Whatever it is
that keeps you
out of your bed;
you'll find a way-
gotta find that way.

If it is
something you love
it is a part of you,
just as you, now,
are a part of it, too.

"How can it be
that some things are all wrong
and some things are all right?"

"It is what it is.
Deal with it or be dealt with."