dancing on lily pads
swimming in raindrops
learning from plants how to dance
teaching ants hopscotch

using cracks as trails
potholes are basins
leaves that fall never fail
to leave behind a sprout to replace it

i’m singing with spring
in my own springish world
hoping that all this light means
eternal spring for this springy girl

my favorite dreams
are the ones you appear in
am i in yours too?

a memorial
is still being held in my mind
why can't i say bye

it's a game now

picking out our memories like poppy seeds -
that didn't sprout on time.

pulling feelings straight from my chest
onto the table under white light
with a shaking knife not willing to dissect

it's a movie that i can't look up the ending to

i feel the jostle of every plot twist
it's cinderella but no shoe fit

it's guessing and waiting and being wrong every time.

it's writing our names in hearts...
calling you mine
when you have no heart to name,
just two faces and lies

it's thinking this is forever
when never is looking more like the right time

has a wound ever
made you grin like this one has
can i smile and bleed?

you live in the people i know
the books i read
the lips that touch mine
you live in my favorite songs
my poetry
between the words and lines
i close my eyes and you stare back at me
i open them and see you in the blue of the sky
no matter what i do you overpower any view,
song,
book,
person,
feeling,
memory -
each and every time

and so here we find ourselves surrounded by empty bottles
once filled with false cheer
and we use them to cap our sighs to prolong the inevitable
which is the only thing made clear
to us
we are open flames exposed to refrigerator frost
we are old wooden cabinets which become chow food for termites
we are laundry baskets beyond breaking because we are not satisfied with the clean of our clothes
we are empty love museums and countless bar fights
we were once everything and had everything in our hands
but we realized what we were missing was a smile that wasn't planned
a laugh that wasn't staged
a page of a long paragraph that wasn't written a day in advance
we had no surprise
yet we still thought we had it all, and it was tough
it was hard to admit that just us didn't make us happy
it was hard to admit that just us wasn't enough