Dear mom,

I have never felt love like this before
Everything else has been dull and boring
So when I say that I love this man
I full heartily mean it

It feels like I’m in one of those high school rom coms
When the straight white girl meets the straight white guy
Her whole world is flipped upside down
And they grow up old

I didn’t think I would ever be able to experience this kind of love
And I don’t know if you ever have
Because if you have ever felt this passion and love
Then you wouldn’t want any minute anyway from it

My exes never really cared
When I say I loved them
It was completely true
But this one is life changing

The way I get butterflies in my stomach when I see the twinkle in his eye
And the way he looks my body up and down, feels my stomach and hips and then tells me
“You’re beautiful”
I never want to experience anything different

This man has become my body guard
When I feel his arms wrapped around me, I know that I am safe
I know that no other man should come my way or else my boyfriend will ******* up
And he genuinely cares

When I seem even the slightest bit off
He doesn’t just wait until I feel better to try and fix the already fixed problem
He drops everything he is doing to be with me
And that’s the kind of man I want

I want a man that would leave dinner
To meet me on a park bench while I’m crying
I want a man who will get me drunk
Then hold me in the bathroom while I cry and confess everything on my chest

The way we started wasn’t ideal
Cheating on our girlfriends just to taste each other’s lips
Wasn’t a good idea
But you can’t tell me all of your relationships were 100% perfect

He understand me when no one else does
When i say some weird metaphors to my therapist
(Which he frankly can barely understands)
My boyfriend will sit and listen until he figures out the riddle I told him

I speak in code
And he starting to crack it
Even though it scares the living hell out of me
He is trying to break down my walls

Mom, I have built millions on millions of bricks to keep this wall up
You have taught me throughout my whole life
To protect the ones around me and not myself
But with him, I feel okay to break down the walls

He is shedding it layer by layer
Brick by brick
And I am letting him
Because I want to let him in

I have never wanted anyone else inside of this dungeon
But I think he’s the one who can break me free
My dungeon of depression has been home for 17 years
And I am ready to show him my house

I have never been sure about anything in my life
I have always been so indecisive
But when it comes to him
I know that I want to be his

I want to be his one and only girl
I want to come home and see him everyday
I want to tell him about my secret
I want him

So mom, when I say I am in love with this boy
I mean it
And when I say he makes me happy
It’s because I have never felt safer

I love him

i have noticed
that the butterflies
follow me around
they flicker their wings
caress my cheeks

why are they so enchanted
by my old mess
my burnt skin
my scarred hands
my dried tears?

they kiss my eyes
shine on my feet
decorate my hair
every day there’s a new one

and i every day
i close my eyes
breath in deep
and feel them dance in my lungs
trapped by fabrics
of ill cut and sorrow
and just like that
i blow and blow
open wide my arms
let my mouth scream
they fly away
and into the world
into your eyes
and all around

All these years have passed and still nothing has changed,
So we have to march,
Against the abomination of colour segregation,
I'm just tired of all the lies I want to know what's real,
If I stand by your side will you show me the deal?
I’ve got the moon and the stars beneath my feet,
Will that be enough to free my speech?
Tried to climb peaks that were placed deliberately out of our reach,
They envy my life but I envy theirs,
Heaven looks great until you have to climb the stairs,
I capture my emotions in a liquor potion,
It's all good swimming with your tears in the ocean,
And if I can sleep tonight,
I'll let them know I wasn't afraid of the light,
Can you feel the fluttering inside?
Just come lay with me on my side,
And let's both watch the butterflies fly out of our eyes.

“I don’t know,” he said.
As I lay my head on his chest, I hold my breath to ever speak again.
And suddenly, I could feel the space between our atoms.

What should I eat?
A simple questions, but I only have one recipient in mind.
Only one person who knows me enough to know what I want when I don’t know it myself.
One person who knows what I ate yesterday, and the day before and narrows it down from there.
But, you don’t know what I ate yesterday.
Because I didn’t.
I ate my pillow and drank my tears.
The salt and cotton sat in my stomach like the butterflies used to.
But, those butterflied never died, they just got hurt.
Had their wings plucked off and bodies scorched with a magnifying glass.

I want you to like yourself as much as I do.
I want to like myself as much as I liked you.
I want to nurse you and those butterflies back to life one day.
Release them in the botanical garden and start a new holiday.

162 days until it’s all over and done with; real life starts then.
For now, I will play pretend.
Hide these feelings in the empty boxes I hoard under my bed.
Not to think about the empty spot in your heart and head,
where there was no room for me.

When I came home, everything was changed.
I found you to nurse and hold me, until love replaced the pain.
But with you, I was just hiding from it.
Like the boxes under my bed, I hide from their emptiness.
I hide from the raw meat body that used to take up half my spaces.

I have no foundation in this far too familiar nation.
Busy bodies twirling like ants from different colonies.
We will not go home to the same place tonight.

If I'm being honest,
I press my lips to the glass
To follow you down.
I am a message in an opened bottle
But I keep pace
With your sips
Hoping our loose lips
Might, together, launch ships.

If I'm being honest,
I sip the nectar of intoxication
To make excuses.
I am sure of my sober thoughts
But I know
Under night's tender spell
Is where we might tell
All truth before morning's knell.

If I'm being honest,
I'm already one ahead
To calm my racing heart.
I have rehearsed this conversation alone
Hoping to finally break
Past the short ending
Through the faltering and shaking
To say the things we are longing.

If we're being honest,
We're getting toasted
Just to loiter.
We keep turning the hourglass over
Buying more time
With water in bars,
Playlists in parked cars,
And chilly walks under the stars.

Every kiss brings butterflies,
Sends shivers down my spine,
Every kiss makes my world brighter,
Makes the sunlight shine.

Every kiss makes me weak,
My nerves tingle and jive,
Every kiss is magical,
They make me feel alive.

Every kiss is wonderful,
The only thing that is real,
Every kiss amazes me,
When our lips touch it's all I feel.

Sometimes when I think of you.
I think about your smile. The way you talk.
I am forever thinking about your laugh.
Sometimes I think about what you'd be like as a butterfly.
Fluttering about in your thoughts.
Nothing to hold you back from where you wonder next.
It's always at the strangest.
Most simplistic time that you appear and spread your joy.
As soon as your seen you disappear again.
Wandering about as free as you came.
Sometimes I wish I had your courage.
The strength to wander about as softly and freely as you do.
I admit, before I met you the thought of a butterfly laughing never crossed my mind.
The part of yourself that voluntarily gives without worry.
Bumping into the funniest of things.
Often times not knowing it's own perception of depth.
Sometimes I wonder where do you go when you miss someone so much.
If that reoccurring feeling ever leaves or does it continue to get stronger.
Finding a place to sit and wonder.
If you'll ever land on my shoulder once more