I'm sitting here thinking about all of the productive things I could be doing at this time of night, instead of sitting here watching Netflix and writing poetry that you won't ever read. But then I remember that there's nothing productive that I'd want to do without you here.

All I've Got is Maybe, if I Ain't Got You Babe Poem
9/16/2014

Maybe you spend your Sunday afternoons with a smile.
Maybe you take an extra hour to get out of bed in the morning.
Maybe you brush your teeth and put your toothbrush back down into that 4-slotted holder that just seems to look more full with a 2nd brush.
Maybe you go grocery shop once every few weeks to buy romantic things like checkered tablecloths, fresh flowers, and scented candles.
Maybe you run out of **** and condoms more frequently now that you're with him.

Maybe you've forgotten what my laugh sounds like.
Maybe you don't agonize over what outfit to wear out on a Friday night because I'm not around to care anymore.
Maybe you no longer get poems written about you, not that you ever knew.
Maybe now there aren't consequences for forgetting to text back within 2 days to messages like, "how are you, wanna grab a bite to eat?"
Maybe you don't miss swimming around the pool at 3am talking reminiscing about each other's past we didn't get to be a part of.

Maybe you could have spent a week this winter sick in bed and had me bring you soup after I finished studying.  
I'd tell you I bought it with a coupon and that the old-fashioned restaurant owner asked again if you were my brother or cousin because he didn't want to think you were my lover,
and of course you would laugh and laugh then cough and sneeze.

Maybe by now you would have formed a permanent imprint in the left side of my king-size mattress,
and picked out your favorite 5 pillows of the 15, rarely used - they look so dormant in that vacant lonely left side of my bed,
as if it had a wormhole that made it access:
a cold, limitless blackhole in outerspace.  

Maybe you wouldn't have kept using,
and felt like you needed to move to New York to escape.  
Instead you could have fled into my eyes,
that they say are the portal to the soul,
and let them gaze into yours as you'd make a steady embark to intertwine.

Maybe I wouldn't feel the need to immerse myself in academic studies and drinking at bars to keep as busy as possible,
because the one moment I allow myself to watch a romantic movie on Netflix,
I know I'll need to eat sodium-laden Chinese food to help me retain water so that I don't cry myself to sleep over you.

Maybe I wouldn't have had to bear my **** soul in front of an audience of about 35 people,
sharing the tragic afterthought of you in poetry form.

Maybe by now I would have figured out that...
Maybe you don't think about what maybe you could have had,
if maybe I could have had you babe.

Are humans inherently evil?
Does it go right to the core?
Do we always need to prove ourselves?
Do we need to settle the score?
I watched a documentary
With people doing experiments
On other people just like them
Callous with their detriments
The lower class
The prisoners
The foreigners
By practitioners
And now we have this information
Torture, surgery, chemical weaponry
Some classified, some out to view
Is it their duty of citizenry
To share that information with me?
To tell me how and when and why
To share results of tests gone by?
Do I even want to know?
Do not let them die in vain
Maybe I should share the pain
(maybe you should share it too)
To learn
To see
And  
NOT to do

I get home from work,
And settle down on the couch.
Food and Netflix time.

I spend another Friday night alone that's alright
I plan to make the best of it, I will curl up in my Lazy girl chair
I will not be  stare at the blank walls, no way
I have plans to take the boredom away
I plan to sit in my favorite chair with a snack and be transported to another time and place, It is a Netflix night!

I come home after a long day and pull my head off to put back onto the rack. It takes with it all the skin down my back, and I have to shake it out for lint. There it sits among friends and there I sit with mine, Netflix, my phone, and a bottle of wine.

I had hoped to find a sort of love this fall. One that might have kept me warm through the winter.
I had hoped to make treats and nice things for someone who liked me enough to kiss my face.
I had hoped to find someone who would waste Saturdays at home with me watching Netflix.
I had hoped to find someone to pour my heart into- even if only for a moment.
I had hoped to find someone I could write about- someone who would be good to me.
Hoped.