We’ve been living in the right lane of the highway
Going way too fast way too carefully
I think we missed our exit but I know that we missed everything in between
But honestly,
I think the whole world is right here, in the cab of your beat up pickup truck

If this is love, then I think writers got a little confused
This is confined, and nuanced, and breakable
There is no indestructible rope tying us together
Our love is trapped inside a glass prism
All you have ever needed to do was knock it off the shelf
But that doesn’t mean it was any less beautiful in one piece

You need to learn a lesson
Girls in short skirts and tall heels will not dance with you
They will fix their lipstick and take pictures for the internet
But they will not move any further into the party
The dance floor is lava and you are children
Your love is an ocean and she is a hot air balloon
You will never reach her
And she will never fall into that

But it got your imagination going
Some rusty old gears that you thought had fallen apart
And that makes it worthwhile, right?
Or maybe it doesn’t
Maybe it rots your insides until your soul melts out your eyeballs and you fall apart for real this time
Maybe it makes a pin ***** scar that you’ll have to explain to somebody someday

But honestly, if we left hand prints on beaches or carvings in trees,
I think we’d be wasting our lives
I have never regretted taking out my camera
Because nothing is permanent, but you can last for as long as I carefully back-up my memory card

I had my first dream last night that you weren't in.
not even a minor character,
your ****** name wasn't even in the credits,
let alone plastered across the sky in flashing lights
like you want it to be.
my first reality that you didn't belong in,
and it was the most blissful peace that I can remember since we bathed in pools of cloud.

I heard the first song that didn't make me think of you yesterday.
the lyrics, for once, were just lyrics,
not an embodiment of you and the things you do.
guess what?
it was coldplay.
you always hated coldplay.

this morning, I basked in the sun and didn't picture you coated in gold light beside me.
I didn't look at the leaves adorning the trees and picture your face laughing beneath it.

I didn't trace the plate lines of my palm and imagine the earthquake we used to create when yours collided with mine.

I didn't eat new food that I wanted you to try and I didn't want to share the smallest details of my day with you.

you may have won this poem, loverboy,
but don't be too triumphant.
your victory won't last long.
it's the era of my new beginnings without you and I'm going to be just fine.

"But what if we're wrong?"
It was silent
But her thoughts echoed around in my head as we laid on top of her pickup truck
I swatted at the eighteenth mosquito chewing on my leg
I don't want this to be love

We were tangled up in the acoustic music they play on the radio on Sunday mornings
She was trying to dream up something clever to write about
And I was pretending I could learn to play guitar through osmosis,
As if blending myself in with the harmonies, finding her in every lyric, and sheer willpower would give me wings or at least magic guitar hands

She set the alarm, checked it over and over
She was not going to be late for her first day
I told her I'd be asleep when she got home, she told me she knew
I told her to wake me up

I wasn't looking for perfect
Perfect really only applies in first year physics courses
After that, we learn to fall in love with "rough around the edges" or "unique" or "unfinished"
As if their life is a puzzle that we need to complete
Just so you know, it isn't

She bought me breakfast and dropped me off
She used to tell me she loved me, but I know she didn't
She does now, so she doesn't have to say it anymore
When I said, "love," before, I didn't really mean it
Not like I mean loving the garden on the balcony of her apartment or thunderstorms in May
Even if I was a puzzle that she completed (and I'm not saying that I am), we didn't need any glue to fit perfectly