I glanced at an old polaroid of us,
it belonged on the corner
of my writing desk
months ago

I don’t know how fond memories
are becoming so distant,
how the colors are fading
from warm to dull

like I won’t remember
anything, soon

even red lipstick
leaves a mark on your skin
when you try to wipe it off
and you’re left with
a cherry stain

is it still called
a broken heart
if you have
glue to fix it
yourself

not heartbroken-

just learning to love
on my own

he fell in love with me
on the same night I wore
a summer dress in the fall
and talked about how much I hated the wind

we spoke to each other in vivid colors
when we were so used to
only hearing black and white

imagine finding something so meaningful
almost upon accident
when you have been searching for it
your entire life

and like the freckles on my ankles
connecting as skin stars,
I want to spend the season
with him on my side

I told you my love
was good and borrowed,
endless seas to drown
every sorrow,
I told you holding my hands
were so far from sin,
they’d have your skin peeling
though pale and grim,
I told you my needs
were different from yours,
I throw back the starfish
even if washed up on shore,

I told you I’d be here
as long as you stayed,
but you had already left
as the sky above me grayed.

your heart is far too cold
for you to love her
but her body is too warm
for you to say goodbye

I could never mind
being fire and ice with you
as long as we kept our distance -

but you touched me
and now I am a puddle of water
instead of something solid
that could make it through the night

summer came
and I was falling

he promised to be spring
but his heart felt like winter

so please tell me why his love
goes away like this wind
carrying the leaves

I think I’m going to see you
everywhere that I go,

because my brain is already
picturing your hands
on the window shop mannequins
I’m passing by on this city street

and I begin to wonder if they are a perfectly delicate match to mine
when held up in comparison

so you placed your right thumb
on top of my left
and we found two similar beauty marks
mirroring with each other

maybe it shows the pinpoint
of where we met in another life

it was all about you at one point,
I believe that’s how I got lost

you never noticed my love

until you watched it
walk out the door

and fall into the arms
of a person that makes life seem fifty-fifty,

equal shades of black and white

the moon with some stars

milk and cookies

as that is how love
should be

I think you’ll find a piece of me
in the bouquet of roses
held by your left hand
at her front door

soon the petals picked for her
will freshly turn
and fade away

similar to how you loved me at one day
and disappeared
at one night

and red is my favorite color,
after all

I leaned my head against the other pillow
and my bedsheets were still caressed
with the outline of your silhouette
and I couldn’t stop thinking how
you didn’t say a word to me,
no matter how hard you tried

I don’t like fighting until the sun’s up
there’s always beauty in between the rise
but we seem to miss it every chance
as our tired eyes shut
and my thoughts begin to race
about how much "I love you
I can’t let you go
I need you to stay"

I was dreaming about you again,
wasn’t I

they say hearts see ten times past vision
I’ve always felt sheltered by my glasses
troubled at letting go of things in front of me
managing to carry boulders when I weigh feathers

longing for the answer of not breaking at the stem
pleading to split down the middle
always dealt the smaller end

I will forever be a third of myself
if I count every step I took backwards

cars passing by as lines of light
and I know my direction is north
the hands around my waist
seem to spin me around clockwise
life having its middles
and I am reminded of my favorite novel’s end

I walked towards him like a withered rose
how am I looking in the mirror and blooming