It's such a cold feeling
Turning around to show you something
Excited to make you smile, to share with you
Only to remember, embarrassingly so
That I still have that bad habit
Of turning towards someone who isn't there anymore

All of my demons stayed quiet
Because we all loved listening to you

Fingers trace the pages, hearts untold,  
Aching where the fiction burns her skin.  
Touches linger longer than they should,  
A spark too fierce to quiet deep within.  
Lust is not a whisper—it’s a scream.  

Yearning swells in every glance, unchecked,  
Every fleeting brush ignites the flame,  
And still, she drowns in all that she expects,  
Ravaged by a hunger with no name.  
Never his, yet bound by his embrace,  
In his arms, she burns and lets him take,  
Nothing quenches longing’s cruel embrace,  
Giving in to what she’ll never break.

your absence, like a wound, will rot and fester until the skin around it is raw and hot
but the love i still have puts a bandaid on, and insists it’s just a scratch
the love i still have, like a doctor, gives me a shot while making sure i look away so I don’t see the needle entering my skin
the love i still have, like a shot, runs through my veins, making sure not an inch of me stays painful
the love i still have, like a vein, is in every part of me, carrying the blood to my heart and my brain
the love i still have, like my blood, keeps my body and mind alive, making sure i can love, hate, laugh, and cry
the love I still have, like my body, carries me to everywhere i go
the love I still have nurses my wound until it only festers when it is stabbed by an absent memory, and will nurse it all over again

it's hard for me to let you go,
you look like an angel
--a deviant against God,
beautiful and forbidden
--against impermanence

ever-lasting;
a taste of ambrosia
a touch of Midas; gold
--yet rarer than the birds
that seem to circle around
--your crown;
not of thorns,
but early morning dew

and the fruits you bear;
not of love,
but grief
--and indelible prints
pressed on your skin...

you make my heart beat,
for once it never moved,
until my shadow was seen.
it's hard for me to let you go.

What if I waited?
What if I didn’t drag it for so long?
Or was it our destiny
To touch the sky and
Fall back to Earth, split apart?
Caged somewhere
Forced to love and be abandoned,
Did they lead me to Ogygia?
Is this my destiny?
To be stuck in this
Land of nothing,
Trying desperately to
Make someone love me
The same way I love them.
I’ve been tangled
In this cruel life of sorrows,
And intrigues I didn’t ask for,
And anger I can’t contain.
I can’t get out, help me.
Did I give you enough time?
Can I go back home
And make the same mistake
Once more?
I am willing to burn my skin,
The wounds have healed,
The scars are still visible
But they don’t hurt anymore.
I want you to remind me
Why did I suffer so much
And I lost myself to love you.
Put me through Hell once again
Make me agonizing,
My ***** trembling
By the fatigue of not kissing your lips.
Let me touch your flame
And the hole you left in me
Will be filled.
If honesty didn’t work out
I’ll try with patience,
But please don’t slip from
My grip again, I might die.
You condemned me
To live an empty life
Longing for your embrace,
Why did you choose me to
Torment, of all people?

I love you more than anything.
Now,
           I’m breaking apart to the
                                                        ground.

I’m wasting my minutes
                                            And hours,
                                                                  And days
                                                                                      And weeks
                                     Andmonthsandyearsand—

I love you more than anything.
How,
          could you be so
                                        everything,
                                                              anything.
How
          could you love
                                      someone,
                                                        something
                                                                            like me?

I feel at home at Taco Bell, as the cuisine
echoes the worst of my mom’s cooking:
cheese that tastes like beans,
beans that taste like rice,  
rice that tastes like flour.

It’s where I go when I am missing someone,
usually near their Jesus’ hour, between
the last sip of a lunch hour Pepsi
and the first after school Cinnabon
Delights clutched and munched
in little fingers.

I'll lean in whenever a raven haired Circe
at a corner table, resembling Sabrena—
that witch who first broke my heart—
casts a disdainful glance my way.

They’ll tug at the corners of their
bad girl leather jacket, gather
their familiar charms, and
shoot me a bird as
they vanish in
the smoke of
memory.

And then, on some evenings, customers
with my mother’s laugh will walk in
and then out, their arms cradling
grease-slicked terracotta bags,
sacred relics in the
fluorescence.

The smell of cheap tacos in brittle shells
filled with Hamburger Helper,
gummy cheese, old lettuce,
canned diced tomatoes-
that heavenly mess
masquerading as
a meal would
pull me back  
to her
cocina.    

In the haze of the Taco Bell fryers, the grease
sings of her failures and resilience.  Like her,
I would smile through it all—always
apologizing yet always trying—
in the end,  scraping meat
off chipped plates

remembering my mother’s taco shells and
refusing to wipe away the grease,
letting it linger an echo of
loves imperfect folds.

What greater pain is there than to yearn for the arms that never held you?
To long for the touch of hands which never held mine.
Uncertain voices over faulty lines speak words never so true.
Promises of "us", and "our" in the dead of night.

Words were all we had, yet there came a day when words were no longer enough.
When words began to hurt,
Slicing deeper than sharpest blade.
"Us", and "Our" bitterly turn to
"Me", "You", no and. No us.

Now promises echo in the stars,
Taunting me,
Like a bright sun in a bleak winter.
Words fade and crackle away,
Teaching a lesson that will never stick.
After all, it is better to yearn than to learn that love isn't meant for those who need it, but for those who want it.