"cornering" poems
This city makes me miss you.
And I would pretend to be surprised,
but the ceilings in cities are always too high
and my thoughts tend to wander.
(For the record, I am less than impressed
that they found their way back to you.)
Last night, I swear you were waiting for me to fall asleep
to climb into the rafters, and sneak into my dreams.
I woke up feeling haunted and exhausted.
Now you've been following me all day,
and I'm tired of looking over my shoulder.
Kissing him makes me remember the taste of your bitter coffee breath.
His kind eyes contrast the complex hurt yours used to reflect.
His simple, level-headed ways make me recall all
of the circles our troubled words used to spin,
the endless loops we were always trapped within.
My ears keep echoing with the way
you used to chatter nervously in your sleep.
And I can almost still smell your apartment
with the candles struggling to mask damp laundry,
unwashed dishes, the smell of sweat and stale ****
The heaviness collecting inside of my chest resembles
the weight of your body wrapped around my lap
the last time we spoke and the way my fingers
still found their way to your back.
I wonder if you understood the things my fingertips traced
while our words started cornering us into our familiar place.
We were circling the drain anyway,
I was just another silly girl who thought she could save someone.
I'm really sorry
You should be
I miss you
Good.
**You always saw through my ********
it scared the hell out of me.**
*I would have loved you exactly the way you are-unconditionally
You were always enough.*
I love being miserable.
Well, you should probably get used to it.
We were circling the drain anyway...
Our conversations are the world's worst song on repeat
but I felt such smug closure after that night
things finally felt finished or at least mostly complete.
So why now did you feel the need to start the haunting again?
Call off your ******* ghost, B.
I am tired. Its over this time.
This needs to finally end.
Jul 13, 2013
Jul 13, 2013 at 3:17 PM UTC
I miss my mother most
when I'm in her frenetic company.
Such an angry fragile woman
in the shadow of the mum
she used to be.
Lost and alone, wanting a way home,
one woman against the world
with no old friends
only fresh new foes.
She can identify every shifting lie
sitting scared with no escape
from a hundred shifty eyes.
Stalkers criticise every mistake
watching her practice looping moves
cornering her as if to prove
that we're all conspiring
each trying to rob her
when the screaming truth here
is that her fleeting thoughts
have already gone where
we can never walk
not even in our tears.
Mar 28, 2017
Mar 28, 2017 at 2:35 AM UTC
My lips hold back the lava in my chest.
The burning, consuming, encroaching destruction is hardening my resolve more than you could have guessed.
I feel so at home in the flames that water is so underwhelming.
It’s the coals I sleep on through everything.
To look so long at the light only to blind myself each time;
You’d think I’d learn my lesson after each rhyme.
I’ve never felt comfort for long enough to recall.
The videos of me laughing are something that now make me bawl.
I don’t know how that feels anymore.
I don’t remember what you sound like or the color of your front door.
Your voice no longer echoes in my head.
Your face no longer plagues me in bed.
I don’t know you outside of memories;
Moments of my time that bite like fleas.
You make me itch still,
A symptom that which the spot can never refill.
I’ve been battling between anger and grief for so long now.
It’s a why; it’s a how.
It’s a feeling I can’t live without.
No matter how hard I try to erase the pressure or smother the intensity, the kindling always relights in this drought.
With a deep breath in, releasing all the smoke back out.
It’s my meditation now.
It’s my medication now.
To smell it on someone else and be engrossed in the poison that this can allow;
My dear, that’s intoxicating for me lately.
A mass we are swallowing with the passing moment cornering us innately.
I don’t partake with my own vessel but I will consume a host so absorbed.
They don’t see me molding my character every time I get bored.
One day I will have the entire puzzle lined up together.
Each piece fitted so perfectly, completely combined in a tether.
They will compose a tale so broken and numb.
That’s the feeling that fills my ****** drum.
Every tear is a bad dream.
Every eyelash is a wish for this story to have a different theme.
Jul 7, 2022
Jul 7, 2022 at 2:02 AM UTC
She watches me
as I illuminate her
head on the pillow,
still cornering the daylight
into the rear window.
She lays, outstretched,
filling the back seat of the car
with unwrapped thoughts,
too deep;
my rays can only reach so far.
Her sleepy eyelids blink
at me in question.
A suggestion?
I hide my face behind a cloud.
"'till soon," I whisper.
I'm only just a surface moon.
Sep 28, 2021
Sep 28, 2021 at 12:32 PM UTC
Whisper, whisper but I can still hear you.
Your eyes tell it all.
You don't even know me and you don't even care. It's people like you who ****** onto me a two ton weight that kept me from walking tall all these years.
It's people like you that ignited a feeling of torment for the unrelenting realization that I will never escape people’s stares.
Days like these I wonder why, friends aren't friends and everything seems like a lie.
“I never asked to exist”, (words that echo through my head every time someone falls from exceptional to unbearable) .
You don't have the courtesy to talk behind my back, instead you boldly break me with your tacks; tacking your words onto my skin, until my pride and self-worth wears thin.
That’s why on weekends I would sometimes cage myself in my room because though I was not free, I was at least free from your gazes, and though I was not living, at least I was alive.
I stayed inside because outside there were wolves and I refused to be a meal. I've seen what they do to their prey, cornering, growling in order to strike fear, battling with their eyes, and then they consume them until all that is left, are bones.
This is what they do,
and many of us can attest to their brutality.
May 28, 2014
May 28, 2014 at 5:12 AM UTC
I know.
I know it feels like your body is disintegrating,
How it aches in places you didn't even know existed;
That you want nothing more than to rid yourself of this skin that burns with loss in every fragile movement.
Your heart and mind are betraying you.
Bones incapable of carrying around this
Palpable heartbreak.
The infrastructure
Of everything you had carefully built
Shattered beneath your feet.
I know it seems like the walls are closing in,
Cornering you,
Suffocating every airway
Until you cannot see tomorrow through the darkness.
Darling
Be patient,
I promise you'll find seeds of recovery amongst the rubble -
Your stems of self worth were never rooted
in anyone's actions but your own,
Your flowers never fed by anything but love for yourself.
Your crushed spirit will break through
These confines of hopelessness
To blossom, once more.
Nurture your growth
And protect it like a diamond;
Cover it in gold.
For you will never own anything more precious than this existence.
You have all the minerals you have ever needed
right there inside of you,
Blood flowing like lava,
Fire burning through your veins since the day that you were born,
Strength emanating from your core.
I know.
I know you're struggling to find the light
But in this darkness you begin your healing.
Remember all that you are
And all that you have been through.
You are loved in ways you can't even imagine
And will grow to love, once more.
Darling
Be patient,
For you are as tenacious as the sun,
And every sun will rise again.
Mar 11, 2017
Mar 11, 2017 at 1:07 PM UTC
He was five or six when he first challenged her
To play a game of checkers.
Fresh-faced and eager from battles with friends,
Young master of jumping and double-jumping,
Connoisseur of cornering and kinging.
Ready to wreak havoc on his grandmother,
A simple farm wife, unskilled in the battle of the board.
He didn't contemplate that the checker set
In the old farm house was hers....
Their battles raged,
Sometimes every day,
With, "Want to play again?"
His constant question.
I would watch her lose,
Seeing what my little boy,
The often conqueror,
Could not see in victorious glee.
Twenty-five years later,
We sit again at the old farm table,
And the two are pitted in their checkers game;
The same, but wearied box waiting
While the battle rages on the old scarred board.
Her hand, uncertain, moves the pieces slowly
As though she is off somewhere thinking,
And he, now patient, waits in a treasured time,
For her to contemplate and make her moves.
He is twenty-nine, and she is eighty-nine,
And though the opportunities rise,
Through my misty eyes,
I see my son, pulling punches.
Nov 7, 2016
Nov 7, 2016 at 1:46 PM UTC
I once wished
that we first met as friends, rather than
lovers,
that I knew your tongue
rolling against your teeth to
speak something honest before I felt it curling
around my skin.
Ever since,
I have tried to stay separate – I wanted
to paint portraits of the
earth, of luminaries and geodes,
but every picture looks like my body after ***
with you,
little crystals of you
cornering the emptiest parts of me.
I part as a flower blooms,
two years
and I realize I must believe in falling stars
now.
Apr 5, 2014
Apr 5, 2014 at 5:36 PM UTC
become immovable,
a wall of unimaginable strength
too tall to see over and
too wide to walk around.
become undeniable;
do not mewl,
howl.
become so vast you cannot be looked past, shoulders so broad you cannot be held with one arm.
do not drown yourself in the tide of a man who would not **** on you if you were burning.
cultivate a culture of talking back. cornering. countering.
refusing and defying.
become unwavering.
become brave.
become angry.
become loud.
not because you are bitter but because you deserve the things you've been denied.
become immovable.
Oct 5, 2019
Oct 5, 2019 at 1:00 PM UTC
Awakened and running from the tomb,
I held what was dear, intellect and groom,
The grooming of intelligence and common sense,
At one point I thought there was no difference,
How could all of humanity be this insane?
I try to help, I’m no hero, in vain.
-
Running wild, I found the path
The winds and turns, cornering so fast,
I got lost within its woods,
Until I stopped, lost, and stood
Aside a trunk so broken and old,
I caught my breathe before a cold,
The breeze picked up and kissed my cheek,
I pulled my collar and felt so meek,
At some point, I started to endure
The path again, walking once more,
I thought of everything today had brought,
The lesson, the woman, the thoughts they wrought,
I thought of old times and hating things then,
Not knowing in time I’d hate like a man,
Pre-determined, with knowledge and ability,
To make the judgment with further virality,
In contempt I held all that I’d known,
A willing sacrifice upon a stone,
I walked with venom until it struck,
A visage so wrathful, it had me stuck.
-
Speechless, I paused and looked,
I stood there agape and almost mistook,
It for a leviathan, it was that grand,
A massive tree that surely there stands,
It must have been a thousand years old,
Seeing true tales of stories unfold,
Its grandeur surpassed all before
I’d seen or heard of in stories of yore,
Its beauty was a roaring wave,
Its white, dead bark and leafless branches depraved.
-
The dead, white Sycamore stared at me,
A bench underneath it beckoning,
When I sat, I knew nothing but dark tranquility,
I felt my blessed suffering,
I’d only ever known what agony,
Had life ever had in store for me,
But sitting under this guardian,
I could have slept soundly and quite solemn,
The chill in its bark warmed me inside,
I shared something with something in mind,
Its arms lingered over me and forewarned all out,
That I was not to be touched throughout,
My journey here, or ever again
Would the dead infest in me herein.
Apr 23, 2013
Apr 23, 2013 at 7:11 PM UTC
Another day has passed by
The moon illuminates up high
Shining through the window's blinds
The cold wind begun to crawl behind
The crickets I hear made me unknot
Such a stressful day for a youth
A day of harrassment became so blunt
A part of me was lost like a missing tooth
I was intimidated by the fact
The truth that I was bullied by the society
Daggers of words are still intact
Cornering me in a room full of despondency
I let people disgust me
I let them misjudge my sincerity
I let the day becomes my misery
I let the day becomes the night of melancholy
Tick-tock-tick-tock
Here it comes, it's three o'clock
It's time for happiness until five
It's the moment of being alive
Finally, I have found peace
Where my heart is feeling glee
In a jocund room that I please
A room that has Him and me
It was then three o'clock;
where my soul peacefully lays
Wandering like a soft cloud
And the chirping of birds play
I thank God for being loved.
Aug 9, 2018
Aug 9, 2018 at 9:18 AM UTC
My cat is alarming the daylight every single rotten day.
I wake up chocking from the un flickering dream,
Numb and kinda nervous, still watching the leftovers
Of characters fighting the path, back into reality.
All my nights since my life began revolving around my addictions
I patronized them, I begged them, I bribed them, what I did or what I not...
Exclusively the ordinary: buying flowers, candies,
Slot machines, **** videos, riding on elephants,
Cornering the cliffs, eating spiders, smoking ***
And beaming at the stars while they were changing music covers
Aside me, in slippers, house dresses and chewing cockies outta space,
Between a tooth and the next one located at five minutes array.
So you cannot call in my nature as a bee. Or not to bee.
All the **** that you can do or not in dreams, I did.
Results presumptuous. As all dreams are.
Vague ends fishing the tale of monster Colombre.
He's old and he's lounging in Poseidon's trident,
Into the space between the waves of gravity
Along with the pearl promised to every human being ,
As long as they are clapping hands for fairies not dying
And children's bed time stories that never lasts enough,
At every gasp they take when something murderous
Is happening while mothers turning into stone are reading,
The horrors of daily news at9 clock whisky .
For a first, they enter into the deem reality
My imaginary ghostlike friends. I waved them farewell, at last.
I don't wanna spend more time buying crickets or entertaining Terpsichore.
Now I'm busy writing songs about them, eating space cookies with a little prince and feasting on crickets with Maruska.
How did we get this far apart, we used to be so close together
How did we get this far apart, I thought this love would last forever.
Aug 13, 2013
Aug 13, 2013 at 4:21 AM UTC
Stop thinking about the lost, forget the cost.
move on, don't even count the lost.
spoken like a Boss, from a Boss.
The power of will, and strength of the mind,
heals everything over time; don't exhaust?
All is, as it should be.
Perfection is only as a could be.
Four shadowing what it would be.
Calling big shoots,
cornering pockets,
until the ball drops.
blowing up spots,
like Small Pox.
Aug 22, 2014
Aug 22, 2014 at 10:21 PM UTC
heaven was
ink set in binded text
cotton veils on prayer mats
a never ending trial
guilty day by guilty night
higher presence
cornering me.
but when I was
in your arms, heaven was
so close I didn't even have to reach,
I could taste it,
sweet syurga;
your rose-dusted cheeks,
petal soft,
eyelashes,
the tips of butterfly feet, gentle
against my neck, your hair, framing your face so
angelically,
jet black waterfall slipping through my fingers gripping, gripping at
liquid so
impossibly,
God is dead.
God is dead.
God is dead.
heaven
is
out
of
reach
again.
Mar 15, 2018
Mar 15, 2018 at 9:53 AM UTC
*Walking the dawn in darkness
Passing the synthesis of stars
Who could you be looking for
On an hour shrouded in vice?
Do you seek the dame in bruises?
The dame who you shunned to do no harm?
The months may pass you by
But not your fears or your tears
This time
The cries are not your own
This time
You feel the need to compensate
For the distance that you made
To protect yourself from pain
Tonight
You have condolences to give
Tonight
You feel the need to chip at the ice
Before you turn and run
With no more ties to this crumbling estate
Your eyes were quivering so
Your lips were sealed by your own will
You dared not ***** your hands
Just glance and wear a smile or two
But now as the fool is raging
You fear that the dame may turn down life
As you considered once
When you sunk down all those years ago
This time
The cries are not your own
This time
You feel the need to compensate
For the distance that you made
To protect yourself from pain
Tonight
You have condolences to give
Tonight
You feel the need to chip at the ice
Before you turn and run
With no more ties to this crumbling estate
Do you wish to remain faithful
To your newfound passion for life?
Is that why you hope to reach out
Just this one time?
When you were a child
Your heart was shattered by violence
Cornering you into a hall of chains
Now you fear that there are other hearts out there
Running on the edge of despair
Could that be why
This time
The cries are not your own
This time
You feel the need to compensate
For the distance that you made
To protect yourself from pain
Tonight
You have condolences to give
Tonight
You feel the need to chip at the ice
Before you turn and run
With no more ties to this crumbling estate*
Aug 12, 2015
Aug 12, 2015 at 8:10 PM UTC
We set off nice and slow, I was nervous, uncertain.
Don’t get me wrong, I knew what I was doing,
I had ridden before, but nothing like this.
She was so beautiful, the best I’d ever had,
Trembling beneath me I knew she could move.
She responded delightfully to my delicate touch.
With accomplished skill I flicked HER gears,
Feeling her pull a little as we truly got underway.
Negotiating the first deceptive bend,
She gave a little shimmy, a sensitive wiggle,
Forcing a tightening from me, till I gathered her up.
Assuredly taking full control once more.
Hands gripping her firmly, slowly twisting the throttle.
She bucks; growls pleasurably, we are as one.
Revelling in wilful abandonment;
Gliding in unison, so enjoyable.
Cornering sweetly, high exhilaration,
missing NOT a single beat,
Accelerating at speeds-illegal,
Too soon, too soon,
Our destination arrives.
Catching my breath I tease the brakes and relax.
Tension flowing from me; while she: she purrs like a wild cat.
I know we made good time as I gently apply the clutch,
Easing her down through the gears, she gives a little SHuDDER.
I dismount, sighing, smiling, a playful slap, yes,
Acknowledging mutual appreciation,
Already anticipating another ride,
And believe me,
It was a ride.
©Paul Chafer 2014
Mar 7, 2014
Mar 7, 2014 at 4:15 PM UTC
The noise of the seashore.
Screaming summertime children, drown out their decibels.
Those thieving flaming seagulls.
Still they hover over seaside dives.
Humming, squawking on the rob.
Fearless pirates steal from the unwary.
Not mysterious albatross or any sailor boys
These birds,they are true ancient mariners.
Sail not upon the sea, but bathe in harbour lights.
Flying on the warming drift.
Carried on sunshine.
Immense, scary birds.
Just to pinch a pasty.
Cornering a cornet, the eater hath no place to hide.
Tussled and tangled in flowing summer hair.
They want your pasty, you are their victims and they really do not care.
Fearless Herring gulls, not just after shining fish!
(C) Livvi
Apr 5, 2014
Apr 5, 2014 at 10:53 AM UTC
The end result is a losing battle for both sides
The fear encompassing has no place to hide
Bequeathing a new type of thought
Insanity, psychotic all symptoms of brain rot
Was I taught because all knowledge is gone
Using my pen to write a memoir of things I never did
Plenty of things seem to relate
In a way never before, such a feeling with power so great
This thing is now a part of me
Speaking truth in a voice of blasphemy
In each ear I can hear it so clear
Scary, pervasive, sometimes brings me fear
X, y and z you see
Just letters of dimensions that contain versions beautiful to see
Another you another me
We have spoken
They are truth
They are it
Inside my mind speaking of theories that here can’t be defined
His name is mine and we finally agree
Gained intelligence 6 and 7 8d
Cornering a thought that was chased for too long
A relief or reason why I’ve become so strong
Emotionally blank awoken by my own stank my arms are pinned so tightly to my chest
Padded room hair is sprawled in my face, ***** and feces everywhere
A man approaches plugging his nose
Force feeds me pills and speaks non sense
Then another with a hose
Cold, wet and feeling so ashamed
I wish to speak to the man from another that carries my name
Feb 15, 2014
Feb 15, 2014 at 1:31 AM UTC
Wave your arms above your head
singing
sha na na nana na, I see the joy
when others are fit to be tied,
they can't keep their anger inside
controlled
yelling and waving their arms
madly
shouting at the top of their lungs
till hoarse scratching
sounds
are all they have left, they are spent.
Sha na na na na na na na
Wearied men and women wander the street,
Some are too, behind a steering wheel, pedals at
their feet, their hands lead busy lives,
texting,
talking,
dialing at will, cornering while drinking coffee,
phone by their ear and cigarette in their mouth,
who's driving the car?
Sha na na na na na na na clap clap
I can't carry a tune, hit or miss each note,
Given up on memorizing anything by rote,
Be a bringer and giver of peace,
Don't distracted drive for there are police,
Sing with me, drown me out, when I go flat,
You are the best,
You are the king or queen
of your domain,
and I yes, just tell me and I will make it so,
Make it so, make it so, don't let it pass,
make it so.
But, please do not hurt me, I cry easily,
I will hide my face, the streaks of dirt,
will be the remains of my pain,
marking me sad.
Sha na na na... enough na.
Feb 21, 2013
Feb 21, 2013 at 2:35 AM UTC
I think about the odds against me
And i know why i hate math so much
I dream of God's touch
Assuring me i'm the man my grandfather wanted me to be
He's no longer here for me to know
And now this bridge isn't as golden
And my pockets aren't holding
All this change
I wish i could properly rearrange
Without going through an uphill battle
But some people are as carefree as cattle
And hold life in a very small window
But i hate being a spider with two legs
So i decided to hold my podium higher while i speak my words
I think to not get anything accomplished is absurd
But i'm looking for a better word
Cause that's not good enough
For me
I want to be the best man i can to be the world
But i have a few losses on the road
I wonder if i'm still making playoffs
I guess i'm just crossing my fingers
As time lingers
I'm holding onto something that might or might not happen
I'm tired of cornering myself into living this life
So i'm going to solve this puzzle
While you bring more for me to solve
I got more problems fixed but many more coming up
Don't worry, i'm used to this
I'm now a professional
That's the only response you should have
To this roller coaster with no wheels or rails
You see all the details it entails?
It's loud out here but the self esteem is soft
And that's a terrible crime
I'm finding ways to rhyme
And all this garbage is happening in the world
I want to be be able to stare into a kid who has nothing in the eye and give them the world
It isn't about me
I'd brag about my fat stacks going to other people not for myself
These fat stacks have meaning now
Isn't that odd?
I like giving things meaning
It's what keeps me going
Have you ever seen a person bloom so much that you can smell the nectar nearby?
Nov 12, 2015
Nov 12, 2015 at 9:53 PM UTC
"You dont know what your mouth says"
I scream into the darkness.
Tripping over the drugs
I take to cover up the pain,
The pain of 15-16 years of verbal abuse.
My own family,
You took me, adopted me,
You should have known the risk.
Your words left scars,
Left tears the stained,
And wholes never mendened
Everytime you told me youd stop
But you didnt.
And soon it began to feel like I was
Never enough...
Not good enough of a daughter,
Not good at picking friends or the person I dated.
Not good at getting ok grades.
Not enought in general.
And now,
Thats how I usually feel
When im supposed to feel good.
Im not enough for you or anyone.
Till I met him. ..
He tore out all the pain
He stripped away all the fear
All the yelling and cornering,
And replaced it with love.
Now I am healing
And my scars pealing in to
Someone beauitful
Nov 11, 2013
Nov 11, 2013 at 8:19 PM UTC
I used to zip, round
Little School corner.
Metal sparking from the road.
Throttle wound back
For a swift attack:
Excitement on overload.
The brave foolishness of youth,
Slickly defying, gravity’s truth.
I used to roar, round
Young-man’s corner.
Tyres squealing in the night.
She’d buck an’ slide,
Giving a rough ride:
My experience holding her tight.
Pulling through, going on our way,
Looking forward, to yet another day.
I used to charge, round
Middle-age corner.
Knee scraping along the ground.
Holding my breath
Kissing, cold, death:
My fear becoming unwound.
Somehow, I gathered her sweetly up,
And continued drinking, from life’s cup.
Nowadays, I never know,
What’s around the corner.
My biking days are long gone.
I don’t get my thrills
From near-miss spills,
And the years roll on, and on.
We travel a straight highway, so it seems,
But me! I’m still cornering, in my dreams.
© Paul Chafer 2014
Jan 27, 2014
Jan 27, 2014 at 8:01 AM UTC
Unrealities can
now be held true
Because every
bodyevery
day is stuck in one
When one reality is projection screened
Shining straight into the eyes
It's blinding, luciferic
Floating up and away
Into void
Where safety and utter loneliness are assured
While even as we
close our eyes
disproving boogiemen
They clamber around making changes and destroying lives along with you
Your unseeing feet
Crushing the innocents
Beneath a comforting rug
That spares our soles
The pain of walking on shattered bone
Following the points of lines firing from the pupils of whiches and witches
Enrichéd and stiffened to stone
Has dragged me down to the bog and I stink like a dog and I live a dog's life too
Circling myself and waiting for the invisible a'ni himu to happen to me without a statement
I don't know Being
I don't know it in itself of itself
Some told me it spoke with the voice of a child, some destroyed them-
Selves dressing up flowers and archways in those orders
And cornering us ants at the intersection which creep crawls
Crazily down from its
Geographic space and happens to face the way yr sitting
Eating meat or drinking tea
And bam he flips and crushes you
And what do you do
How can it be
When do you know it was your destiny?
bursting open your skull on the sharpest brick beside the softest memory
Of a 42nd birthday of the end of a dream
Nov 19, 2012
Nov 19, 2012 at 12:17 PM UTC
The ride from Starbucks was too quiet.
We sit crossed on adjacent couches.
All six feet of him cornering into my couch.
He sweating in his black ninja shirt and jeans
because my house is always 10 degrees too hot for him.
His half-smile retreats behind your tongue.
I am too bright for him in my pink T-shirt.
The couch I lie on barely runs the length of my legs.
My hands fiddle with my blue wristband,
snap it across the room. I lock my fingers together.
The clock coughs loudly with each tick.
He was suppose to be home four hours ago.
The pillows and I lean in. This conversation
starts as a reflection. He wants to know
why people are friends with him. Why I keep
claiming him as my best friend. I admit
it is because I want him to be mine.
He saved me from the black undertow.
Threw me a fishing hook. Reeled me into his boat.
His phone rings. His mom and dad are furious
that he has ignored dinner. Slowly, he drags
himself across my carpet. He wraps his palm
around the door handle. His shoulders roll back-
this has never happened before- he say stiffly,
*I've been dating another man for two months now,
I didn't tell you because I didn't want to lose your
friendship. You are the best friend I have ever had.*
He slumps through my door,
face too blue and low to say good-bye.
He didn't expect me to cry.
I sit here jarred as we once were.
Trace the tears on the floor.
I can't find it in me to pelt him against my wall
like ****** There is only He is still my best friend.
The whole house shakes with me.
My lungs are jellied.
Mar 5, 2014
Mar 5, 2014 at 10:43 PM UTC