i am acquainted with monsters;

how do i know you're not one of them?

i am blind

and i am stupid.

life is perpetually not what it seems.

i seem happy, but who am i?

it breaks my heart.

i break my heart over and over again,

wondering who you are. picking at the

dirt on your soul and trying to see what's

underneath, please, let there be more

underneath.

giving you up would break my heart.

none of it was a secret,

and jokes are rarely jokes.

which just means i can only blame myself

for lying and deceiving myself. for

pretending that any of this is ok.

ok?

maybe it's unfair.

but that's what i hate about myself.

i am weak, and malleable.

i do not stand up for my people.

i can barely stand up myself.

it breaks my heart.

it breaks my heart.

naïve . eyes like shiny seashells .

you don.t see what you choose

not to see .

so . what do you desire . the

love of another or for their

mind to pulse at the same

rhythm .

how long can the sailor hide

his rowboat from the storm .

when he's traveled so far as

to no longer see the shore .

stranded forward . stranded

backwards too . left with a

single lantern still lit .

you believed you could have

what only the gods may have .

you believed the lantern

would be enough to guide

you . you are alone . you

are stranded . you don.t know

who you are without this ocean .

naïve . tired . and terrified of

using the oars to reroute .

you must . the saltwater is

bitter . it splits your tongue .

young. heart swollen as the

sun . too reckless and too

careful . built of deep sea

sand and shiny blue shells .

using the oars to reroute .

you must .

he said autumn's the best season to be in love. it's true that it's the most romantic, or, seems like it anyway. walks, hand in hand, through the ever-changing leaves. a muted color palette, and the coziness that comes from temperatures just a little cooler. i like to listen to fall music from the 60s; it's all about falling in love, enjoying the weather, how lonely hearts drift and want for another. so sappy. in the best way.

it felt like fall today, in every way. i baked cookies; the air was chilly; i'm still in love. some days everything's ok. i'm still afraid of the planet spinning, but i'm alright for now. i think too much, but i never decide anything at all. head full of loose piles of fall leaves and nothing else, sometimes. i caught the sunset out my window. opened the blinds and then closed them again, like an eye blinking, to watch the pink sky.

i like wearing tall socks to keep in the warmth. i like how he smiles when he knows he's in love, when he looks at me. i'm sure i have a smile just the same, it's just that i don't know mine, wouldn't recognize my own face. my ears get too cold, and i'm thinking i'll need to start wearing hats because i want to walk every park in the city during fall. i want to see every leaf before i go. before they go. i like feeling the weight of his arm over me, the comfort that he's there. we watched a show i used to love and i sang the theme song. the nights are long and warmer with him. the days still drag, the sun still cackles at my back, hidden, because i don't look at her. i want to know if autumn is the best season to be in love, but the only way i'll ever know is to be in love every other season as well. i want to. i want everything i've never wanted before. i want autumn walks and days and nights and warm drinks, telephone calls, long dresses, nose kisses, weekend cafes, silly keychains, reading side by side, blankets up to our necks, dinner with friends, strolls in the dark, leaves under our feet. this time, i want it all.

-

10/14/24

like water lilies

across an open pond

holding the heart

of the cosmos

just beneath the surface

rippling, trembling water

surely nothing

compared to falling

from the sky

flames racing to engulf

this precious heart

floating to the surface

tired

the sky knows not who it is

or where it ends

or where the water begins

the universe becomes alive

as never before

and releases song after song

in longing, in loving,

in losing

everything perfectly alive

10/13/24

this world isn't mine.

i've got one hand buried in the ground,

holding the roots of the peach tree

planted so many times over in the

backyard of my parents' house.

one foot here, in an apartment

that no one visits unless you're

staying the weekend, arms full

of new-plastic-smelling board games.

an ear in a newlywed's white house;

half my face a few states over on

the phone screen of a girl i grew up with.

a few fingers still in a cabin in the woods

somewhere.

a crescent of my soul across the country,

in the closed eyes of a forest i've never been.

teeth, scattered at the doorsteps of

relatives i remember and forget.

one foot firmly placed in the side of a lake,

ankles enjoying the waves,

skin soaking in the sun.

my heart, firmly tied to a rusting door hinge.

to the trunk of a beat-up car.

to the feeling of being and unbeing.

committed to getting torn apart.

all mine, and not a shred of it belongs to me.

9.27.24

it is the fire of the dragon

taken up residence behind my heart,

between my lungs, and deep

within the recesses of this flesh

i call my own.

intoxicating, intricate rhythm.

unique to you; unique to me.

i would carve you a home if you

didn't have one, house the

earth-worn clay you own underneath

the shade of the eastern trees.

even now the skies drip rain,

but the moon rises, as it always does,

and presses kisses to my forehead

just for seeing another night.

we are taken.

deep within the forest, in the worm-laden

grasses and the half-eaten cherry trees.

an imperfect eden, and we will

find our own shadows, one day.

but for now, take me.

common words in common places

my car smells like sugar flowers

sweet as the sight of you through a doorway

ghosts wander through butterfly gardens

and the stone gods watch, larger than life

- the fantasy is us together -

pinned like insects against the wall

tea stained pages, double dip,

books that have touched a thousand eyes

i want every forest to know you,

every rock to feel the memories through my feet,

seep into the dark earth below and

grow tiny flowers or crisp leaves or rough bark

that remembers this love

and tells the stories to the wanderers

long after our time has passed

i've seen snow

fall on the other

side of this window,

evergreen tree,

a million

closed eyes

and sun rotations

to prove we're

only human

only human

too many soft

sighs to count

touch my elbow

again, it's too early

and too late and

every minute is

only human

another reason to

stay,

flower in your

hand or in my

hair or across our

lips like promises,

your legs my legs

ours, we know,

now the sun's

too hot and

your window won't

roll down, woozy,

sick, stumble over

our own words

drowning in the

feeling

only human

your, my, everything

i want to see

another snow,

catch footprints

raindrops

penny heads up

argue with the sky,

but you're still there:

evergreen tree

8.25.24

The sun is just beginning to set, caught in those few minutes where the sky is the most vivid. Like colored tears draining into each other, a golden eye open for just a moment before it's gone.

I drive home with the radio all the way up, the windows all the way down. And this time when you cross my mind, I let the wind take the breath from my lungs. I can't say for sure whether I make any noise at all, only that the speedometer is approaching eighty and the sound of the radio is vibrating my seat.

Nothing we did was ever loud.

I drive by the water, you know it's not on the way home, but I do it anyway. The seagulls outside the car circle and swoop, cawing at the light as it slips away. They drown out the music, somehow, but I still hear your voice in my head, begging me to stay.

You never saw the ocean. Not with me, anyway.

I turn the car around, backtracking until the roads are more familiar. Not that I don't know this town, but some streets I've been driving down since I was in a car seat. This is the path back home. In a sense.

When can you move back home? I hold a hand out the window to catch the breeze, remembering the first time someone asked me that. My new boss, as a matter of fact. And my father shortly after.

Home, as if it isn't still across the country with you.

I try to turn up the radio, but it won't go. I have to stop at a light and a wrinkled man and a woman hidden behind a sunhat look at me. The man's mouth frowns deeply, moving in unintelligible complaints. I wonder if there's enough sunlight left to see the trails the tears have left on my face. Or maybe I look too normal, I never was very good at getting emotional.

This is only a step backwards, is what you told me.

But how could I promise myself, I muse--foot on the gas, goodbye old man--to the life you wanted? Now that my brain's cracked open with the thought of you, it's seeping out through my skin. I feel like I'm burning from the inside out, knuckles white and my every cell remembering how you used to touch me. Hold me. Cry with me. You wanted a family. You wanted a stable life in a stable town. You wanted to fall in love, and we accidentally did. Are you sorry?

I am.

These roads are winding, narrow. I could just about navigate them with my eyes closed. Everything here's just as I remember it, down to the smell of water, the soft dirt. The distant sound of traffic and tree limbs hanging over the road, almost close enough to touch. Like a bubble with every point accessible from the center, just nothing beyond. Contained. Or waiting to pop.

I park the car in the garage. The radio is off but my mind is filled with deafening roar. I still picture what it'd be like to walk through the front door and have you greet me. A fantasy, but my mind itches for it. Instead, I greet the silence.

I only wonder: does the silence greet you, too?

at once you may feel

too much of any one thing

or too little

(leave it all behind)

clashing of footsteps on the stairs just

behind you

remember when you used to think hands

would grab your ankles going down the basement stairs

just like the

fridge door shutting in the middle of the night

and

should you be afraid of the dark

or not

(leave it all behind)

its not the same sky

just

the same breath of dark