August and September

I wish I could have told myself:

you'll marry someone born in September.

When it was August in college

and there was a three week stretch

of ninety plus degree days

before the new school year

and my pajamas were stained

with boys making mistakes

and sweat that kept coming

like the tears that tattooed my face

because it was endless, and the feelings

were permanent, a reminder of what had been

and what would become my illness.

I wish I could have told myself:

you'll be a writer.

In August

when I was presented

with addiction

someone forcing themselves

to be their own demon

and I had to be saved

by someone who later

decided not to survive

the mundane of the every day

or any day.

August smells like her

the perfume in her apartment

the summer she saved my life.

August smells like the rain

evaporating off the sidewalks

in New England

after a thunderstorm

the humidity too much

to contain any of us.

I don't tell people she saved me.

That in August, we went for drives

in my Prius

and sang songs that I still listen to

though sometimes they hurt.

That when I was faced with issues

at home,

she said I could stay with her.

That there are ways

to be free of those

who would hurt us.

She died in August of

the next calendar year,

and I remember calling my parents.

September came and it was

still stagnant with death.

But there's something

to the notion

of rebirth.

I knew her face

in all my ambitions, dreams,

the sun setting earlier

than it had before.

In September

it was okay to not be okay

and for that I thank her.