I've been drinking
melancholy
and chasing it down
with disappointment.

Last night we climbed onto your roof
to watch the stars
but mainly to tell secrets where
they'd be wrapped in the mask of night.
I told you I was afraid of abandoned buildings
and collapsed walls
because I thought I might become one.
You told me you thought I was beautiful,
but then you always did love sad things.
My blood jumped when your fingers
traced my pulse points and
I cried when I thought I would laugh.
You kissed me anyway.
Life seemed too far away to be real
and that's the way I prefer it.

I've been thinking a lot lately about death
and how I used to think it was lonely
but maybe it's more of a returning
than a leaving
and immortality would be the loneliest of all.
I've been thinking a lot lately about life
and how things aren't really supposed to turn out right
but we let hope get the better of us anyway.
I've been thinking a lot lately about you
and that look you gave me last November
when you told me this crumbling world
still had a promise of light
(and that's all I really needed to hear)
how you contain so much life
and I want to hold on to that a little while longer.

Strangers huddle together in the station,
caught at a common place for assorted purposes;
dozens of faces looking worn and tired,
souls being tied into knots, or
coming undone.
Some with hope still alive in their dreams,
some returning home after theirs has
dulled, or broken.
A woman traces the ring around her finger, smiling
while the man across the aisle just lost his wife,
(as he's reminded with every breath)
but maybe that's just how the world works.
And the twenty-something who hasn't forgiven herself,
what she did for a love that never gave her
anything in return.
Guilt peeks out of her pockets
waiting to be released by the man in the next chair over,
if he asks about it.
He knows how much easier it is to
expose your exponential faults to strangers,
to make yourself the martyr, if only to
ease your own mind.
But he doesn't ask and she carries her burdens
on her back, slowly splitting her spine.

My fingers shake as I grip my coffee mug
and your face comes to mind-
yesterday you told me you loved me
but I couldn't say anything.
My heart beat too fast and
words caught in my throat and
all I knew was that I had to get out of there.
I didn't used to have these sky high walls
around my heart,
but maybe that's why I do now.
And I'm sorry that I strive to keep myself
so closed-off,
that my veins show more color than my words.
I know you're infinitely frustrated with
how fiercely my eyes guard the secrets of my mind
because I'm frustrated too with
how afraid I am to put my mending heart
in someone else's hands.
You don't deserve to love a girl
whose stomach turns at the
thought of something permanent.
But I promise I'm trying
I'm trying
I'm trying
to say I love y-

She's a natural disaster and a work of art.
Rain rushes in and out of her mind
while wind gusts through her heart.
Drifting from a tsunami to an
earthquake and everything in between-
on a good day the sun shines through her veins
as she walks on flower petals and
free spirits
but on a bad day her footsteps sound like thunder
and her words throw flames until her
misfortunate surroundings are reduced to ash.
Some days clouds pass over her eyes
and birds go still
and she doesn't say anything at all...
But stars always populate her thoughts
even on the darkest of nights
and the rings of Saturn are often mistaken
for the hypnotizing gold rings around
her irises.
She's as lovely as the first green day
of spring
but as lonely as the last red day
of autumn
and she has never once noticed
that while she was wishing on shooting stars,
everyone else had been wishing
on her.