hope is a burning buddha candle.
set aflame with his ornate head slowly melting.
we sat in silence and blew the candle out before his waxen ears met his shoulders, but you would’ve liked to have seen him exist in a puddle.
you sit quietly that morning and wonder what it would be like to exist in a puddle.
you decide that you would have liked it.

hope clings itself to the fabric of the floral sundress you bought two weeks before the leaves turned shades of burgundy and ochre.
when asked why you bought it, you shrugged it off.
you wore it, baring shoulders and all, alone in your room with the blinds open.
the september sun glanced at you and you at it.
you were never a dress person, but the blue and pink flowers seemed at home on your torso
and who were you to separate blooms from their home?

hope is your baby brother showing up at your door, sand blonde hair reminiscent of the beaches you were raised on.
he smelled like salt and violent adolescence.
in his hands, he clutched four large pieces of fruit that he stole from the hotel because he said that the fruit bowl from home missed you.
you saw novels in his seafoam grey eyes that read that he missed you, too.
you hugged him
too tight
too many times.
you didn’t cry when he got in the car, but you did when he called you later and said that he was counting down the days to christmas.
there were 114, now there are 109.

hope is st. elmo’s fire and holding your best friends hand as you explain to him that you always felt like ionized plasma.
that you’re like lightening, but not quite.
it is stopping the car on the side of the road to pick wildflower bouquets and press them between the empty pages of your new journal.
it is squash blossom pizza and $60 parking tickets because you were too lazy to catch the bus.

hope is writing a poem and, for once, it not sounding like a eulogy.
hope is writing a poem and not hearing your voice shake as you recite it.
hope is writing a poem and finally feeling like a poet.
hope is writing a poem and finally living like a poet.
hope is writing a poem.