with a smile,
a wink,
the rapt attention
I bestow,
I give love to strangers
people who don't ever catch my name, who dont stop long enough to
I give love to fantasy people cardboard cutouts who my be real in front of me but have no knowledge,
of my war,
the inner struggles  that cause ravage in my soul
ridden cage,
I give love to strangers people that wont remember,
that wont recall
the stretch of my smile or the thickness of my thighs
I give love to the mail man,
push it out over my hands, to blow kisses into his face
it wraps around his chin and climbs up the gap and sits on his cheeks,
rosy and stained,
I give love to the children being yelled at two cars behind me in the drive thru line,
I love you, I don't know why she's acting like this but boys one day youll know she loved you,
but she was broken and tired with excuses
I give love to the man who sits by me, rattling the table so badly with his shakes,
and the ever scent rolling off his clothes,
that smell like broken promises leading up to his broken home,
I love you,
I give love to the strangers rich or poor broken scattered collected gathered,
I give love to faceless people, the ones who fight overseas,
never knowing me,
I give love to strangers,
because I cant seem to use it on me.

because when I turn it to me,
the light burns the whispers screams,
the love too tight,
hugs too close,
kisses too intense,
love too much,
oil over water and blood,
lotion over bones,
its too hot for the cold

"i dont love you
                                                                                but i always will'

i scratch at bruises,
i press my flesh and
im still bleeding bruises
of blue and black and purple
and have come to find comfort and sorrows song
                            " I dont love you , I always will"

You were the words I couldn't say.
the words i still can't seem to manage,
and you knew them,
you could whisper them to me like pillow talk secrets,
pressed together tight between sighing information
but you are only one part of me,
the right atrium when what I really needed was the left.
you get me but your not what I need.

and i begin to resent that the notion,
that you'd say you were my best,
but your not,
you won't be,
you aren't.
Its not even vanity if I were to say that,
soberly,
The best of you is me.
time would tell you what others do not,
intentionality would broadcast the truth in the lies,
I don't expect roses,
in scripted jewelry,

just for you to think and intentionally remember me.
an aorta to your heart,
an elixir to allow you to breathe,
remember me.
when you reach for the next long legged cigarette,
with the the tattooed sleeve wrapped round his neck,

Remember me.
Because I do not forget you.

and we lay pressed together,
he tries to teach me the dialect
of butterfly kisses,
and being so close,
we are no longer a landscape of two mountains and valleys moving,
but we are one,
and its so warm and comforting to feel his weight as he weighs on me,
and he still needs to be closer,
wrapping compact muscles,
around my stumps for legs,
and he is sticky fingers, that bestow solemn pinky promises,
half attempted secret whispers yelled across the room,

he is a sweet sunrise,
when all you have ever known is the blistering loneliness of night.
He is not afraid to talk and to share his thoughts,
and there are moments, snapshots of my failing infrastructure,
that lashes out at his incessant nature, me willing him to stop.

He discusses my beauty with strangers and mid thought tells me that I am so very beautiful,
and when he says it I believe it.

he falls asleep like one who is proud to tell anyone listening he is 3 and a half he had to add.

i wish he were mine,
mine to keep,
mine to trully love,
but I'm just make believing playing wifey to families,
with no need,

but right now its just
you and me
and the me I am with you,
and in this moment i hold your small 3 year old hands in my hand,
and its enough to be.

I am hungry i think as i lock eyes with you
i tap my feet hoping your questions will be enough to spring forth the rhythm of a vibrant relationship
ask me how
care about the whys

and you do care for me
protectively

but i am struggling stubbornly with wanting to tell you how to love me
and the stubborn belief that i shouldnt have to tell you how

and this is the new chapter called the firsts
and i want you to be curious bout me
and jealous when you know
i want to tell you
but dont you see
youve got to be the one to ask me.

I want to bring it up
can we talk about it, like really,
till im ready to bring it all out,
I worry over the inconsistancies of my speech.

will I always be this broken?
will I always crave your touch late at night or early morning?
i watch the time crawl ,
and all i want to do is  crawl  back to you.

and im tired of waiting,
waiting for you to catch up
or get the hell out but your withdrawl could be the death of me
i wonder if this is me dying
me bruised and forever bleeding
here again im left blinded stumbling and crying.

i want to stop,
i dont know if i can,
take these hands that fetter me,
remove the chains around this neck,
unlock my lips,
you can be creative,
figure out the steps,

make war on my senses,
id rather leave (her)e senseless,
capture this,
moment,
stolen,
and bought,
this organic prepackaged heart,
pressed and used to be pressed and you used again.
but its different for you,
ive made it for you unshackle the weary,
bones help me shake them down,
lets dance over supposition of our innocence now,
innocence used as a guise to cover and uncover who we really are,
well... the we ... we are together,
chop it up spit it all out give them something to shout about,
i will the secrets you keep hold to hope
will make a promise,
never to consider the rope
of injustice,
a picket fence and 2.5 kids
make the promise for living