it is hard to love someone
while you're grieving
the loss of the person they used to be.

my brother hasn't spoken in weeks.
a headstone reads,
here lies the brother you once had,
and the flowers I placed there are barely living.
I've spent all of my time digging him out of one grave,
only to discover there's an entire cemetery left to unbury.

my mother hasn't smiled in days,
and exhaustion has become
the guest that has overstayed its welcome.
misery usually loves company,
but I am anxious for it leave.

I am homesick for a house
that I once lived in.
I am homesick for a place
where only love grows
from this family tree.

you had made this bed too quickly,
not realizing the sheets weren't fitted
and the blankets were tangled around our limbs.
you were so used to lying in it,
you didn't know how to be honest.

don't reach for me with hands
stained from the ink you used to rewrite your stories.
don't speak to me with words
that should have rotted out your teeth.
don't look at me with eyes
that I once saw my happiness in.

I will not play nice.
I will not worship
the storm that destroyed my home.

in the future,
my life will be so full of love,
you won't be able to look beyond it.
I hope it leaves you blind,
so you will never see the person I'll become
without you.

in one universe,
I wake up as a child,
sunlight pouring through the heavy curtains
and embracing me in warmth.
my mother knocks softly on the door,
and tells me good morning.

in another,
I am driving down a highway
in the middle of the night,
holding the hand of contentment
as we let the radio drown out the silence.
I pay no attention to the exit signs
because I know I am already home.

but today,
I woke up in shambles.
I tried to rebuild myself from the ruins,
but I can only seem to create a hollow outline
from the pieces I have.
like a child's toy,
happiness must have been sold separately.

today,
the exit signs seemed to glow,
advertising familiar names, but foreign places
―destinations I've never reached,
but always seem to be approaching.

they tell us darkness is just the absence of light,
but they never say when the light comes back.

in some universe,
I am rewinding my happiest moments
and experiencing them for the first time again.

but today,
I killed what I wanted to be
and buried her beside what I almost was.

I seem to only measure time
in units of when I last saw you.

black holes only devour what you feed them,
but I still try to fill this cavity in my chest
with your words,
with your love,
with your presence.
sometimes feeling whole is only
the homonym taking its place.

I gave up the sunlight
to lay in this grave.
I turned my back on life
to continue courting my demise.

but now,
I give up my grave
to bask in your warmth.
I give you the words of love
I used to save for death’s ears.

I give up parts of myself to fill in your blanks,
and though so much of me is missing,
I am better when you are whole.

the person you are
and the person you want to become
bear the same roots.
you are already her,
you just haven't learned how to be.
putting yourself back together is treacherous,
but you don't have to do it alone.

your very existence is rooted in worth:
the 12 percent of carbon in your body
is the same carbon that creates diamonds under pressure.
the .2 milligrams of gold in your blood
is the same gold people spend a lifetime trying to earn,
and having you in my life makes me richer
than I'd ever be with money.

broken is not synonymous with useless.
no matter how many pieces
make up a mosaic,
it will still reflect light.

secrets don't make friends,
but they do make war.
a battle between my pacifist mind
and the pieces missing from it,
from all of the words I have yet to speak.
I try to keep the peace,
but I only know how to give it away.

what do you do
when you've become the skeleton
in your closet:
the one that will still be in tact
when tranquility crumbles;
the bones of a sinner found in the ruins
of a home that tried to be pure.

what do you do
when you've become the monster
your father searched for in your childhood:
the one he tried to scare away
with a bible verse and a visit to the confessional.

what do you do
when honesty is lodged in your throat,
but you rearrange the sentences
to fit the script you've been handed?

when the bible verses stop working,
when what you've built is merely rubble at your feet,
when the ink on the script begins to run,
you are left with destruction,
but you are left with the truth.

they say that every 27 days,
the human skin replenishes itself.
how nice it is to think, every 27 days,
I have another chance.

this is not the end.

this is the beginning of the next few weeks
where my skin will turn
bruises into flesh,
scabs into scars,
hurt into healing.

where my words will change
apologies into appreciation,
anger into tolerance,
hurt into healing.

where my mind will change
imbalance into equilibrium,
and bury the person I am now
underneath the person I will become.

I just have to be here to see it.
I just have to keep waking up
one more day.