here's to long silences followed by awkward conversation,
vague civility and hookah smoke,
wasted afternoons and drunken nights

here's to the dragging feet of 8 AM classes
here's to sunny afternoons and snowy evenings

the belltower marks time,
cutting through the haze of drunken nights

here's to the quiet murmur of a somber crowd
here's to candles commemorating lives lost

here's to generations of footsteps gracing the bricks of the Oval
here's to many more

four of hearts and he whispers
"the best is yet to come"
Well, snap out of it.
think of sunshiney days on the Oval,
think of nights spent in your bed
think of blue skies
and smoke by the bridge

kissing on the couch,
heartbreak and PBR

I spent the afternoon in the breezeway
watching the clouds tease the mountaintops
and here you come
wide-eyed, eager, kind
embodiment of youth.
you tell me stories of men in uniform
and what lies behind that shining facade
of smiling military men, all in a row.

He was tall, you say, all-american--and strong.
when he took her to bed, it was the day after
her husband was lost to fire and shrapnel.

Paratroopers, you say, are told one thing.
'Don't speak to civilians.'

You left me feeling queasy,
watching and wondering with suspicion
the blue and peace of the sky.

the bleak reality of life
is giving spark to a dream
and one day waking up
inside a coffeeshop
in the city you love
but have begun to question

(once the doubt sets in, it aches small and grows and grows)

the magical backdrop,
the music and hipsters,
bikelanes and teetering mountaintops

you can barely grasp the
feeling you once knew so well

breathless expectancy
towering opportunity
a fire in your chest

what was safe was safe in the
unknown and the opportunity

two pennies and a peach soda
coffeeshop dreams and tattoo guns
brokenhearted like a nagging hangnail

the best feeling in the world is
being recognized in a crowd and
pulled into familiar arms

and drunken monologues,
nihilism and Nietzsche

fridge beer - it's in the fridge
***** looks from passerby
purple sunglasses and
a sleeve of mountaintops

mid-afternoon rush and strange men
wearing sports shoes
empty words and another good
day

there's never enough time to write as life is happening

these are just words and words,
for writing's sake
he told me to write about it
but maybe I can't.
I tried to jump past it -
the messy dreams and the
stark emotion each morning

(I hate waking up to my emotions, spending most of the morning putting them back where they belong...)

twitter poems and hookah smoke,
long days and longer nights

all the boys suddenly see me
i am awake and in their minds
maybe in their hearts

i waited so long for this and now that it’s here
I can feel myself falling away

are you reaching? i search in your voice, your eyes,

the way you leaned toward me last night after your cigarette,
and the way i walked away

the feeling i get when you light up my phone
destroys me in the worst way

I want the reaching. I want to be kissing your shoulder, always.
I want to wake up to you every morning.

I remember the night on the bridge, you were gone,
he was with me, his arm around me,
the river was alive
and jumping with the lights of the city.

everything was so bright, so shiny,
when the ******* finally hit me
i felt everything

I reached for you and you were nowhere to be found
and he mistook me, pulled me tighter, and I looked up at him and saw my whole future there, on the bridge, without you, on the bridge

and later, you appeared. you were there and i was drunk and then we were drunk together. i left with you, and i know he watched us leave

later, again, in my room, we slept.