sometimes I wish I could read your thoughts,
but maybe that would be worse. because if I could reach into
your mind, I'd only search for the things I want to hear and end
up more hurt at what I didn't find.

it's been too many long months and longer nights and I
am tired of writing about you while making love to bottles
trying to forget the taste of your tears
the last time we kissed.

but I wouldn't dare compare your salt-stained cheeks to an
ocean because you are worth so much more
than overused metaphors.

I am tired, of trying to find rhymes to replace the words
you left in my mind.

and apparently writer's block only takes its breaks
while I've locked myself in the shower
because while these words finally come spilling from my brain
I am trying to scrub off what parts of you remain.

but. do I even want to? because every single time I see your smile
I am reminded that we lived, at least
for a while.

I am not sad anymore (maybe some nights I am)
maybe I'm okay with this, okay with having pieces of you
burned into my skin
because even though the fire we shared died,
the one you lit inside of me never did.

i remember once something like two years ago we were barely more than friendly acquaintances and i was a different person and you were just starting to become one

and i remember it was summer and everything should have been okay but i was ditching school having decided to be nothing that day

and i remember you asked how i was and in a moment of weakness or maybe strength i told you the truth that all i needed was physical comfort and a cigarette and i was tired of being alone, but i kept that last part to myself

and i remember you showed up not even an hour later with exactly what i needed despite never having asked that of you and we sat beside each other and though it was quiet i finally felt like something again and you smoked out my window for the first time and i took a picture of you without you knowing for the first time

i remember realizing i didn’t need to be alone

there’s not enough hours in the days,
in the weeks, in the months
and years

to properly explain how much love I have
for this **** **** world I’ve been dropped in

and through the seemingly endless cloud cover I have found
the shortest sliver of sunlight
to nurture in my cracked chest

I am warm

January 17, 2016
10:28 AM

Sometimes it feels like I'm ready to say goodbye to you. Sometimes I feel strong and steady and my backbone is rigid and my eyes finally stay dry. But then I'll see your face again or feel your lips against my forehead and I'm reminded of all the things I shared with you, how much of me rested with you. I'll find myself replaying old memories of us sharing cigarette smoke and how you laughed and I'll feel my knees buckle. I told myself from the get go that this was not permanent, and I believed I was okay with that. I never once thought we would be eternal but I wont lie and say that the thought of a life without you in it doesn't make me tremble. These next few weeks, hardly even months, will feel like nothing but a time bomb ticking away the few moments I have left with you. I can feel my chest constricting with every numbered breath and I wonder how you feel. I wonder if this will hurt you at all. A part of me hopes you will be perfectly fine and that you never felt that strongly for me to begin with, a part of me that wants you to be happy and satisfied and would never want to see you hurt. But another piece of me wants you to feel enough of what I feel so that you will not so easily forget me. I want to have meant something to you. There must have been something in the two years of companionship that touched somewhere in you. I don't want to be a face without a name, I want to be the whisper you hear in your dreams. I don't want you to think about me months and months from now and feel bitterness, I just want you to remember me. Because god, I will remember you. You found some tenderness inside me that I didn't know existed. You helped me become. And I think I've realized that no matter how this ends, I will miss you, and I will always be grateful for you. Love is a silly, stupid thing, but I'm happy to have shared some small piece of it with you.

he was summer fire and hot flashes
and wondering wondering wondering
he was hesitation and ego inflation and
playing with matches

she is oxycontin and sleeping till three
a side thought lodged in the frontal lobe
less than real, more than a dream
she is just half of a need

he was internalized self-hatred
that was realized too late
he was affectation and frustration and
too much dead weight

she is not enough time
not close enough to feel yet
close enough to touch
she is some, but not quite enough