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255 · Jan 2019
hopes & mistakes
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
we hope and we dream,
not for reality,
but for moments and scenes
that are not what they seem
shimmering behind sheens,
sparkling on silver screens
we do not see the deep
cuts, the endless lost sleep
promises they won't keep;
no, we thought love was cheap
so what now of our dream?
still, who are we to deem
that it can't be redeemed
and to now call unclean
these faults that we have seen?
is it beyond our reach
to both learn and to teach
our tongues new ways of speech
to taste something so sweet
we may forgive that heat
and venture to entreat
that we somehow may meet
in the vastness between
our mistakes and our dreams?
250 · Nov 2019
a letter
Tiger Striped Nov 2019
i want to tell you that you smell like sandalwood soap. and that i can't keep my eyes off your hands. and i want to ask you what was the last thing that made you cry? and then i'd think about what tears would look like in your beautiful eyes, and then i might cry myself. and i want to tell you that you look like heaven on earth, and you wouldn't believe me so i'd tell you again. and again. i want to look at you like you're the last thing i'll ever see and memorize everything about you. i want to give you all of my favorite things and take you to all of my favorite places and then find out what yours are. i want to know what you're thinking about and why. i want to read your words and tattoo them on my tongue. i want to touch you for longer than a second. i want to show you what it feels like to be wanted. i want to show you everything i see in you, if you'd let me.
249 · Apr 2021
angel
Tiger Striped Apr 2021
Come down from the heavens, honey;
Earth feels like hell when you're not here.
240 · Jan 2019
poetry
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
like me, you are
made of words
so will you
embrace
your roots?
237 · Jan 2019
advice for her, ii
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
be careful
near the fire
for i can see your heart
on your sleeve
and neither fire
nor gravity
nor time
will stop
to save you
and it is far too easy
to lose your balance
so if you are not convinced
by my words
then please believe
these burns
on my heart
236 · Jan 2019
seeing you up close
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i asked him
how he stood on the shore
of the ocean
and let the waves crash around him
(i was afraid i would be pulled under)

i asked him
why he always wore white
how those fabrics
seemed to shimmer with every color
and none at all
(i was afraid to stain my clothes)

i asked him
if those trailing tears on his cheeks
ever stung as they fell
(i was afraid to let them see my own)

i asked him
how he got
his big beautiful wings
how he soared so smoothly in the skies
(i was afraid of those herculean heights)

he told me there were times
he had inhaled the salty water
blood had stained his clothes
his tears had left scars in their wake
and he had flown too close to the sun

and when he spoke
every word fell on my skin
like a star from the heavens

and when he stood in front of me
i was no longer afraid
to touch
an angel
235 · Feb 2021
Falling in the Well
Tiger Striped Feb 2021
I prayed wordlessly
with glue on my lips,
a prayer that cracked the roof of my
mouth:
not that I would find love, just
that I could have you.
235 · Jan 2019
you are my dream
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
before you
my mouth and pen were dry
now poetry
rushes through my veins
pours out of my fingertips
flows from my mouth
you keep my head spinning
with words
and i need more and more and more and more of you
234 · Jan 2019
still miss you
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i should have known
the day you drove the wrong way
on the interstate
to steer clear of your path
we did not have to be in love
for you to leave a hole in my heart
229 · Dec 2019
River
Tiger Striped Dec 2019
i sent my dreams
downRiver, into your open
mouth. and i stood there,
shell-shocked by the sight of
you,
wondering what it was like to really know
you.
i watched your eyes close,
as the sunset silhoutted your sweet curls.
i exhaled a silent prayer, and hoped
the wind would carry it into your lungs.
my heart pumped blood into
the River
my body did not know
how to swim. so i stood and watched
you,
drinking in the world, without
any idea that it was my
blood that tinged the water.
i wanted to tell you everything
i wanted to scream
i wanted to touch you
but you looked so peaceful,
floating like you were
born to defy gravity. i could not
disturb you and ever forgive myself.
so i knelt where i was,
letting the saltwater trickle from my
face to join the River,
as it took you far away from me.
220 · Jan 2019
you, them, us
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
you are not
the sun
you are not
the moon
you are most certainly not 
the earth
you must learn
as i did
(when you were once my whole world)
you are a star
yet
you are one 
of seven billion

the day you realize
that humans
are so carefully crafted
so delicately designed
so infinitely intricate
will be the day 
you start to treat them
the right way
219 · Nov 2020
Ode to Annabelle
Tiger Striped Nov 2020
Brilliant Annie,
with dried watercolor on her left thumb, and
charcoal smudge just below her elbow
who are you painting now?
Heart-shaped lips and
round, rose cheeks -
I've almost forgotten the sound of your voice -
what do you whisper in your sleep?
I remember your shadow perfectly, Annie,
I spent years frozen there,
I know its curves and the way
it moves when you laugh.
I'll admit I hated it there,
but I could never quite keep away from you.
Lovely Annie,
with guitar-calloused fingers
and songs tucked beneath your tongue,
who do you write about now?
Maybe you write about me,
like I do you,
maybe I appear in your dreams
and touch your hand,
like you do in mine.
Sweet Annie,
do you still put your index finger to your nose
and smile when you're listening?
Do you still go to concerts of bands
you barely know?
Do you still push your glasses up the bridge of your nose
and tuck your hair behind your ear
when you're thinking too hard?
Of course I shouldn't be thinking of you,
Annie,
after all these years
I'm hundreds of miles away
and you're probably smoking in a parking lot
thousands of years from thinking of me.
Beautiful Annie,
you probably don't even remember me
but I could never forget you.
218 · Jun 2020
i dream
Tiger Striped Jun 2020
i dreamed of you last night
you were someone else
who loved me
i awoke a ship at sea
drifting aimlessly,
far from the shore
ignorant of the time or date
so long has it been since i gave notice to
the sunrise
or clouds
or stars.
i long for the shore,
yet here i am
in the middle of the ocean
i know not where you are
i sail because i have no other choice
i dream because i must
218 · Jan 2019
big little world
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
How indignantly
human hearts have hammered
pounding our fists
in the air
against the wall
across the years
raising our voices
until we rasp,
struggling valiantly,
to carry out our each and every end.
Alas, we shift a balance
that will never weigh entirely in our favor.
We castigate the society
that we comprise:
waiting, demanding, crying
for our fellow citizens
to liberate themselves from their terrible ignorance.
How dare they look on with such apathy!
Yet latent affections lie dormant
under our doormats
where we sweep them
to be trampled underfoot, day after day.
For we have found that choice issues
are better handled by the foot
than by the mouth.
Still our mouths continue to shout
over the protests of their counterparts
their fuel, our hasty hearts.
We exist in a state of hypocrisy, as it is
none of us above the other –
we ride our flighty opinions
into clouds of superiority, perhaps some of us
above reason.
Here we cannot be touched
by opposition or criticism
and from our lofty elevation
we aim to shape the earth.
202 · May 2021
In the Aquarium
Tiger Striped May 2021
I.
Pink light
cascades in ribbons from the tank
to land surreptitiously
across our faces. Its glow
hides the creeping blush
rising in my cheeks
as I notice, in the glass,
your rippling reflection
staring at me.
So I try not to smile,
holding our gazes clandestine for
a minute longer, just to let
the jellyfish think that
we’re admiring them.

II.
From one eye,
a turtle studies the warm-blooded couple,
a girl, fingers cold
and a boy, palms sweating.
Their image bends and
warps; their muffled laughter
joins the glugging rhythm
of the pseudo-ocean.
Holding its breath, it settles into
a front-row seat
for its favorite exhibit.

III.
You point out a pair
of angelfish gliding blithely,
two lovers floating freely.
We were fish once,
you tell me.
Yet here we stand,
I reply,
with our feet stuck to the ground,
only able to dream of
breathing underwater -
what kind of progress is that?
And you just smile,
silently tuck your arm
around my waist,
pull me closer
and wordlessly answer all of my
questions.
201 · Jan 2019
spacing out
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
The Moon crept into the sky
softly shone on the streets at night
peering over the horizon
waiting on the Sun.
She soaked in his light
felt his warmth from thousands of miles; 
reverently she reflected his rays.

Her glow was gentle
she waited at dawn and dusk
as he rose on the horizon
she ducked away.

There were other stars in the galaxy
but gravity kept her in orbit
her light was a whisper
his was a crowd cheering
she dared not inch closer
she knew she would burst into flame.

Each day they watched the same earth
she danced around it, hoping to catch his gaze
he kept his distance
as well he should.

Sometimes she watched shooting stars
and wished that she might join them
but falling is dangerous
and there was nowhere for her to land.
200 · Jan 2019
dream in the dark
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
We dream in the dark
too close to our hearts
to be hidden from view
to be scattered askew
like the raindrops that fall
through windows, down walls
aside bleak shooting stars
that land somewhere too far
away from our hearts,
as we dream in the dark.

We dream in the dark,
finding it hard to see
what's in front of ourselves
equally cluelessly.
It's funny how different
we see things in this light -
I'm dreaming at midday,
you're dreaming at night.
I stood next to you
as we walked down the street
you watched people pass by
and I watched our feet.
I thought you might hear
the thoughts my mind screamed
I forgot you weren't listening
I forgot that we dreamed.
I forgot, since the start
we have dreamed in the dark.

We dream in the dark,
we dream and we paint
now in this state of mind
I might lose track of fate
I don't see the sun rising
for the colors and strokes
I don't hear the clock ticking
for the words that you spoke.
But still, time will exist
as well as will fate
regardless of us
and our ignorant state.
I can sleep days away
I can close my mind's eye
and it won't change a thing
it won't buy any time.
So I hide the same thoughts
in the back of my mind
for a stormier day
for a much colder night
hide the dangerous art
that I dream in the dark.
191 · Jan 2019
wasted words
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i fell in love
with words
long before
i ever thought
i loved you
so maybe it should have been a sign
when you never
cared about my words
did you ever really care about me?
189 · Jan 2019
drowning in shallow water
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
I have scorned vulnerability
yet it was with heavy heart
and guilty conscience
that I learned
it is much easier
to laugh at tears
than to wipe them away
188 · Jun 2021
I’d be a fool
Tiger Striped Jun 2021
to think you were perfect, but
you’re as close as it gets.
188 · Apr 2023
the race
Tiger Striped Apr 2023
Memory is not acquainted with the beginning
nor imagination with the end
of the race.
I remember how it used to feel
sprinting, endorphins surging,
nerves singing, scorning pain,
the thrill of being ahead,
never mind the
unending stretch of runners in front of me,
never mind that
nobody knows where we finish
our guide is precedence
only.
Once I felt good,
thinking only of my pride,
how good it felt to be fast
how good it felt to be moving forward
and sometimes, when I pause for an instant,
and glance behind me I
see a face or two
far in the distance,
we were once running together -
but never mind. The more I
run, the better I'm getting
my feet are lightning, thumping
quicker than my heartbeat
outrunning my lungs
almost ripping me apart.
I remember how it used to feel,
when my mind, my heart, my body moved in sync
when it once listened to me,
and did what I said
but never mind. I will just do
what I've only ever done
because it's all I can do.
185 · Jan 2019
blinded by you
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i clawed out
my eyes
so i would cry
no more
so i could finally see
everything
you weren't
and i will never
be able to see
anything
the way i used to
184 · Jan 2019
killing the cat
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
the day we walked in the woods
curiosity was stronger
than i was
as i opened my mouth
thirsty for your spoonfuls
of poison
it dripped from your fingertips
each time you wiped away my tears

soon my vision
had bidden me farewell
how was i to resist
the only voice i could hear
anymore
when it belonged
to the last boy
i ever saw
175 · Feb 2019
abandon
Tiger Striped Feb 2019
you were the first brushstrokes
in the backdrop of my painting
the tangling colors,
colliding like comets
against an inky black sky
every day, with your knife you
peeled away the paint
leaving shadows
in the shape of you
i did not notice
until you were too far gone
the blackness
where your vividness had once been
i felt it
at the core of my being
you can pretend
you were never here
you can pretend
love and hate are miles apart
but i still hold the scraps of that painting
the canvas with
your footprints and
your tire marks and
the smears from your fingers
and i still feel you
at the tips of my fingers
175 · Nov 2019
I have a question:
Tiger Striped Nov 2019
Do you sleep on your back
with your heart to the
sky, and your face to the
sun?
Last night, I wondered
as the moon peeked through my window
and the night awoke,
I wondered with my heart to the
floor, and my
face pressed to the pillow.
When I was a baby,
my mother lied to the doctor:
"Yes, she's sleeping on her back,"
but I would only sleep on my stomach.
Still, I turned out fine,
right?
Sometimes I lay out on my back,
and I can see my heart beating
in my stomach,
through the fabric of my shirt,
but I can't sleep.
Is this what you feel like?
Can you watch your chest rise
and fall?
When you cry,
do your tears make two tracks
from your eyes to your ears?
Maybe you don't sleep on your back at all
maybe you turned out fine,
like me,
sleeping with your heart to the
floor, and your
face pressed to the pillow.
Maybe you don't watch your heart beating,
or your chest rise and fall,
maybe you don't cry —
but I'd like to think you do.
174 · Jan 2019
pyromania
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
fire danced
so elegantly
in your eyes

while my house was burning

and the match
was clenched between
your teeth
171 · Jan 2019
to look at you
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
One-sided glass keeps your eyes from mine
hides half-remembered words from another day.
every excuse I've made to cover myself
never feels like your touch should.
Selfish desires burn the ground beneath my feet
but your footsteps echo in another room
where the blood doesn't pound in your veins,
where the glass shows you yourself.
And maybe my fists could shatter that glass,
but I don't want to face
the look in your eyes
the red on my knuckles
my nerves screaming
my breath coming short
when you take up all the air in the room.
No, I'm staying over here
calling it biding my time,
watching sand rush through the hourglass,
trying to compensate for the days I spend
pretending that you can see me,
staring at the smudges my hands have left on the glass.
Yes, I'm staying over here
while they tell me I'm wasting my time
waiting for you to remember
those half-forgotten words from another day.
169 · Jan 2019
a broken heart
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
a broken heart
is the look on her face
as she showed him
her heart
and immediately
realized
he was looking at someone else

for so long
his rhythm
was all that her heart
listened to
and eventually
it forgot
how to beat on its own
a broken heart
168 · Jan 2019
last defense
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i pressed my lips
to your skin
and prayed
you would feel it in
your heart
Tiger Striped Jun 2021
Where do you go
when your gaze is fixed
on the junction of the crown molding
in the corner of your bedroom?
I watch your eyes, glazed with
labyrinthine pessimism
darting back and forth, navigating
a universe tucked away in a cupboard,
as you try to conquer the monsters in your
never-ending mental maze.
I used to think you were
admiring the stars,
but now I
turn to them
and beg them to let me follow you
and bring you safe back
home.
167 · Jan 2019
scattered hopes
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i searched for you
in the shiny hopes and dreams
i'd buried deep beneath the ground
with my bare hands, i
dug them up
with my eyes closed, i
shaped something
that might look like you
it kept me good company, anyway
it was all i wanted
but you were not.
you burned through
my illusory image
so furiously intense
that for a split second
i was convinced
you were all i needed
166 · Nov 2021
inch
Tiger Striped Nov 2021
There's an inch between
sunrise and sunset:
the sky's walls flatten
me, stretching my skin thin,
taffy turning interminably
over the earth.
Another inch between
this bated breath and the next
almost enough space for
a claustrophobic prayer -  
my occluded wheezing
heralds the marriage of
laughter and sobs.
When my cheeks wetten, I
watch them wrinkle
as the years drip down my chin
one inch lingers between
my face and the foggy mirror,
as I contemplate giving
an inch of love to the girl staring back.
163 · Mar 2021
signs
Tiger Striped Mar 2021
I like how you breathe in your sleep
it's different than when you're awake -
I know you won't notice if I open one eye
to watch your chest rising and falling
and admire the shadows the street lamps cast on your face.
163 · Jan 2019
living dream
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
if we dreamed together
would you see
what i see?
would your feet leave the ground?
would my words color the sky
the way yours always have?
would you feel time
as it slows smoothly to a stop?
would you see the electricity
between us?
i hope you would dream
what i have dreamed
for last time i slept
when i finally
opened my eyes
there stood my dream
162 · Jan 2019
watch me swim
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
i thought of you
as i sat on the floor of the ocean
i could hear you
"open your eyes"
oh, the serendipitous sights i would see!
if only i would listen to you
"just breathe in"
i had yet not dared
to inhale
my lungs had started to burn —
a breath would surely suffice.
i felt you in every inch
of my body
in places that i did not want you
that i had never invited you
the pressure was great
there, on the floor of the ocean
i console myself now:
perhaps
he never knew of what he spoke
perhaps
you still do not know
or worse
perhaps
you knew all along
162 · Jul 2023
circles
Tiger Striped Jul 2023
Something found its way
from your veins to mine,
too difficult to name
pulsing with serene desperation
that flows freely
in a perfect circle through
space and time, from
you to me to you to me to you to me to -
you get it. And the thing about perfect circles
is they have neither beginning
nor end,
and more importantly, they don’t exist.
Not in nature - well, maybe that’s not important at all. I’ve been thinking in circles
around you, how we don’t really
exist in nature anyway
unless there is some way to substantiate these thoughts pinging around in nonexistent shapes,
unless there’s a way to make them tactile, to touch them, change them in your hands -
but there isn’t. Therefore, I contend
we are supernatural, at least in some capacity,
like a heartbeat I can feel
miles away, yet still the same distance
as the arbitary space
we assign between seconds.
We do not simply exist in nature:
we think, we believe, we long, we love
on a different plane, one that supercedes nature,
one we don’t and could never
fully understand
but I like it better that way
and I belong here,
I think
so do you,
circling me circling you
perfectly, endlessly, impossibly.
159 · Jan 2019
reflected reality
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
Last night I dreamed
you were next to me
curiously close
I could hear you think:
how did you tell me things
that I never knew?
Are those really your feelings
or my concept of you?
There's a fragment of you
in the back of my mind
but I'm lost as to
whether it's yours or mine.
Last night I dreamed
little things that you said
but in waking hours
it's all in my head.
Little things that you said
that I want to be real
buried somewhere beneath
things I try not to feel-
now I'm left to decipher
what fate has to say
for I found, while I dreamed,
that you lay awake.
159 · Feb 2019
for better or worse
Tiger Striped Feb 2019
i weave you into the words i write
in the hopes
that there,
you'll stay
out of mind
but there's no hope of getting you out of my heart
156 · Jan 2019
wasted wishes
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
at night i mourn
for the shooting stars
that we saw
all those wishes
wasted
wishing for each other
and i wonder
if i had never told you
all the things i wished for
would they have
just maybe
come true?
but i think the constellations
agreed, as they
watched us fall
we were always destined to crash and burn
156 · Jul 2022
in the museum
Tiger Striped Jul 2022
I want to fold at your feet like
paper
crumpling
under
water
dripping
sweetly
from your mouth.
You care
you know I’m thirsty and
you decorate me
you plate me; you’re precious metal
you encircle my neck, my wrists, my fingers
like jewelry.
You put air in my lungs, gently
and
you watch me breathe.
I could not
I cannot
tear myself away
from your doorstep:
you warm me
like nothing
and no one
I know.
You think it’s funny
when the blood runs from my fingers
you hold them, cold and white
and I can’t help but laugh
with you.
And I forget that I’m cold
I forget where I am
I forget that there was ever anything
before you.
154 · Jan 2020
simple words
Tiger Striped Jan 2020
i sink in the sound
of my thundering blood, rushing
in my ears, flushing
to my cheeks—why?
what simple words from your lips
were given power unparalleled
to command the blood in my veins?
they draw forth a cackle, unbidden
(a laugh?)
and i hardly have time to be mortified
amid a sea of elation.
my eyes and ears act with
wills of their own,
the former entranced by your lips,
the latter hanging on every word that floats
thence, to their patient wonderment.
i try on a knowledgeable smile,
not to betray my flustered state,
as if i am at all in control of myself around you.
i dare not attempt a sentence
(or mere coherence)—
for the present, i am content
to watch your lips and listen to their
simple words.
154 · Jan 2019
my journey to you
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
I walked for miles to get here
suffered blisters and beating sun
a torn piece of notebook paper crumpled in my hand
I waited at your doorstep
hesitation always by my side
reading the words on the paper over and over again.
I waited on you
was I a fool, blindly hoping?
Or were you cruel, crushing trust?
The truth is probably somewhere in between.
I didn't doubt your good intentions
until I pounded on your door
with shaking hands
waited
waited
no response.
It was later I learned
you'd moved across the city -
a more determined woman
would square her shoulders
pick up her paper
and walk the distance.
But I am not she
I am just a girl
my feet ache
the sun has burned my skin
and after all I have given you
I should not be chasing you.
154 · Sep 2022
too much is never enough
Tiger Striped Sep 2022
hold me again.
Your skin is humming
I’m sick in
cold sweats
ethereal healer,
I love you.
Say it again
you miss me
you could lie
but you won’t.
Let me trust you
not again,
it’s my first time:
pull pain from my
lungs until
I’m spluttering,
my faith splayed across your
perfect chest
my own
deflated like
old promises
forgotten by their giver,
remembered by me.
But you
exhale into my mouth,
carbon dioxide like
effortless anesthetic
I dissolve until all of
my atoms hit your floor
splattering ***** and crude
and somehow
you see each one,
you know them
and name them
and love them
and hold them
together
again.
153 · Mar 2022
fourth floor window
Tiger Striped Mar 2022
Floor to ceiling, glass
I stand on the sill
and lean forward
facing the ground
suspended over construction,
beautiful nostalgia
and a hundred people who don't
know they're being watched.
I belong up here, I think
always wondering if
it will crack beneath my forehead
and I'll go tumbling –
in slow motion, I hope –
towards the earth. But
I can't decide
if I'm meant to be down there
the watched, instead of
the watcher.
Who is happier?
The doer
or the observer? I
think the answer is buried beneath a little
self-awareness
and I don't have time
to search for it. I'm busy for
now
looking out the fourth floor window.
Tiger Striped Jun 2021
The trick is not
unconditional positivity, only
learning how to tell yourself the
truth.
151 · Jan 2021
footnote
Tiger Striped Jan 2021
Only if she isn't the moon,
roped down from heaven,
if she doesn't keep time
for your symphonies with her step
if she leaves you as you were,
instead of fever-stricken, breathless, burning
if you forget her when she's gone
and remember how to sleep without her
then you should let her go.
150 · Dec 2019
found & lost
Tiger Striped Dec 2019
I found you first
in meteors splattered against the
skin of the barren night sky.
I found you  
in the grains of sugar
liquefying joy on my tongue.
I found you next to me
my bleary eyes opened
I blinked
you vanished.
Now I search for you
ripping out every page of my favorite books
stripping away the keys of once-grand pianos.
Now I search for you
I pass the days lying in the street,
looking for a face like yours
through the windows of
cars that drone mindlessly by.
I don't sleep; someone must
scrutinize the sky
in case you make your fiery homecoming
but every second without you
steals you further from my memory
and sometimes, with my eyes closed, I wonder
if you were ever really here at all.
150 · Jan 2019
to us.
Tiger Striped Jan 2019
fear was all we knew
before we had the displeasure
of making ourselves known
to this perpetually unfamiliar world

(and it to us)
but here we are
always chasing satisfaction -

satisfaction
always two steps ahead of
fear,
satisfaction
teasing us with
greed

now fear is not
all we know
but we cannot say
that it is any less present
for fear is the unknown –
and each day we know more and more
that we know nothing at all
148 · Aug 2022
seamstress
Tiger Striped Aug 2022
Could I please
read you
before you write me?
I'm tired of being the first to care
and the last to know.
The world wraps
my heart around its fingers
like rings of red
and pushes its pain
in my mouth
and I'm coughing
and crying
and aching to
feel an ounce
of the love I've donated
to last causes and
apathetic souls.
Hear me, this time, please
look me in the eyes and
listen: see
how the thumbtacks tremble
trying to hold my skin
intact.
Please,
please, please
let me read you and find
you're a seamstress
you'll write me in cloth
and wrap me in words
take out each pin
and start again.
147 · Jan 2021
in another life
Tiger Striped Jan 2021
Everett, you're tired
of sleepless nights
aching lungs
girls who evaporate overnight.
You're tired of burnt Saturday evenings,
cars parked around dark corners,
staying out too late and
driving home on empty.
I would offer you a ride home,
but Everett, you make my mouth dry.
You smell like cigarettes and
look like all my mistakes.
I want to carry you, Everett,
and watch your scarred skin flush
at my touch, but I know
all too soon I’d be
carrying those same scars on my skin.
So I’ll cry with you
from the other side of the highway,
I’ll feel your albatross around my neck
and wish you the best,
but I won’t be there this time
when you decide to burn
everything that’s good to you.
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