When I met you, I had no idea you'd teach me more than any classroom has
I didn't know that a year from then I'd be so deep in love I can't see the surface anymore
But instead of water in my lungs, it's butterflies.

I didn't know there was more to existing than hating my body
Didn't know that happiness doesn't have to be at the end of the road, but on the way
I thought that laughing into a mirror was saved for the movies

You taught me that a thousand miles means nothing
When the call quality increases and I can see every shade of blue in your eyes
And watch your cheeks crease as you laugh

A year ago I went through different self hate like phases of the moon
Wishing I could eclipse the mirror and take away this awful image
Too feminine, too masculine, too not-me and too outcast
Then you told me if I wanted to be your boyfriend all I had to do was ask

I don't think you know how much you've done for me
I never tell you because it's never the right time but
When you're reading this now I want you to know you're the reason my moon's always full
Your eyes are like a summer that only blooms for me and I want to bloom just for you too

You taught me how to try and understand things I have never felt
You taught me the bad things and I try to show you the good
You taught me that happiness can be as simple as someone else's smile

Sometimes I think that everything I do is secretly hurting you
That I mess up and drag you down but
Then you whisper I love you into the gap in a conversation and I remember
How it feels to be happy again

To the boy who taught me everything
I love you

Sometimes I wonder if I love you
I've come to doubt myself so much over the years
Sometimes I wish I could enter the body of a married man and feel what love feels like
So I know for sure
But then I see your glacier eyes
And realize I can't stop laughing before you do
Sometimes I realize there's no need to doubt
My love for you

Sometimes you can't say I love you back
That used to scare me
But you told me you always know you do
Sometimes I'm still scared
But I believe you

Sometimes you feel awful
And I know if I could swim the ocean
For just the chance to sit by your bed
I know that your hand in my hair would replace
The cold of the waves
And the pain in my heart

Sometimes I fall asleep before the tears dry on my pillow
Sometimes I'm awake long after
But no matter what I know I have you in the morning
Your glacier eyes and ringing laugh
Sometimes I doubt myself
And always you help me stop

In ancient Greece they would build alters to worship the gods
Lay down offerings of bled goats and burning wool
And hope their fortune runs true

And while this is no Greece
I'd build an alter for you
Worship like a dog at your shrine and hope you're listening

And if you leave I wait like Argos
No strength to move on but all the love in the world
Not moving until you return and my starving bones can waste away at last

He writes boy on his leg
Etching the letters the world won't understand
Wishing the felt tip pen could
Break the gravestones on his chest
And fill the valley between his legs

He writes boy on his leg
It's a word kept secret in fear
He's a mustang learning his legs
And the world is a pack of vicious wolves
They don't know what to call him
Only he does

He writes boy on his leg
Takes a picture and sends it to the one he knows understands
The flash against his pale skin stark and bright
Like sleepy eyes against fresh snow

He writes boy on his skin
Because he can't write it anywhere else

My thighs are bruised from your fingertips
Which have never actually touched my skin
But I grip my own cold body in the agony of your absence

And it's less of an absence and more of a never-presence
Like the school board that hasn't yet marked
The student who moved in late summer
So the teacher calls their name to an empty seat
Until they find out they were never coming in the first place

White moon screen
Guiding light to insomniac wolves
Struggling to close their eyes  
So when I howl at this full moon
Will you sing with me
And let your voice cry to the heavens
Spill out your tears into Ariel font
Lone wolves send bleeding messages
The most lost write the sweetest songs

I
When I look for inspiration
I dig through bedrock of heartbreak poems
So you but so not us

II
You are my inspiration
Not enough to put in words but too much to say
I fall asleep with poem scraps floating in my empty skull
As if all I could ever know was words for you

III
Sometimes my mouth gets tired of smiling
The things I don't tell you hang as deadweight on each of my ribs
Even your dove-wing voice can't pull me
From the black sea I lurk in
But you smile for me anyway

IV
Mid afternoon and I'm sleeping with the light on
You're a brewing thunderstorm that promises
Never to drought my dusty ribs

V
Late night and I'm not a poet
But you're the shallow river
Where I can sit naked and you won't hurt me
Your waters are warm and make me want to write
I'm not a poet but you're poetry