I listened to a song you showed me
for the first time in years.
It put me back in that room,
with the large windows
and strangely warm floors.
Those months we had
feel like a lifetime ago.
So much has changed, and yet,
here I am, writing a little
poem about a memory of us.
We talk less now,
as we grow older and further apart.
But I know there are little
strands of gray and black thread
tying us together.
Despite our distance,
I know you are there.
I wish I was
as oblivious as the woman
driving in front of me,
who has had her right blinker on
for three miles.
I wish I was
as peaceful as a church
at night.
No righteous to tell me I’m wrong.
No saints to pray for my sins.
I wish I was
better at all of this —
the thing we call life.
I bite my nails when bored,
and I light candles to feel less alone.
Have you ever watched
flames dance, shadows on the wall?
I pretend each is a different ghost,
with their own story to tell.
I’ve got another year under my belt,
but I keep making new notches
for the buckle to fasten.
Sometimes I feel like I’m shrinking
as everything else gets so much bigger.
I never imagined making it this far,
and yet, I’m grateful to be where I am.
I’ve been thinking about you
and how you would understand these thoughts
of mine, without question.
You’d nod, dropping your gaze
just enough to appear as if in prayer.
I hope you’re doing well.
From what I gather, you are.
I’m happy our paths crossed
when they did, and I hope they
continue to as we zigzag through
this maze of truths and fiction.
I took a walk today
to clear my mind
and take in the world.
I pondered about
my life as I listened
to a playlist of songs
meant to carry me
in the quiet moments.
I stumbled, thinking
about you as a song
from a past love
(yet not love)
came on.
It made me laugh
and question
my line of thought
about you —
and that’s when I saw her.
She and her fawn,
enjoying the shade
of deciduous trees,
stared at me,
a clunky hiker.
I paused and smiled,
happy to share a moment.
As I slowly moved
to take a picture, I spooked
her and her babe.
The motion,
the desire to make a
moment in time last longer,
cut short the time I had.
I felt near shameful
for changing the energy
of the situation.
As I moved forward,
listening to a different song
and finding myself lost in a meadow,
I forgot what it was
that made me think of you.
I did think, however,
how peaceful it would be
to take shelter in that meadow
amongst the sumacs and blackberries
with the sun beating down
and a feather in my hat.
I talked with my papa
the other day.
I stood on a picnic table
trying to understand
the overlook I stopped at.
It showcased
the highway and trees
and a sliver of water
in the distance.
I pondered at him,
thinking about what
it would feel like to be
loved.
Loved in a way that
is not a parents love,
nor a platonic, tectonic
best friend kind of love.
He talked about
reassurance, and how
it’s hard to know someone’s
love without reminders —
words and actions
that point to the heart.
I nodded and yeah-ed,
watching the cars drive by.
It felt naive to think
I would know, that
I would feel it as if it were
a ray of sunshine on bare skin.
He said to love
is more telling.
To love —
to give parts of oneself
to others —
that is beautiful,
that is poetic,
that is more important
than being loved.
I smiled,
watching a family pull
up in front of my car.
I have loved many
in my life
and for that
I am grateful.
It’s funny how distance
makes the heart grow fonder.
I thought *this* would be easy,
but I also thought *this*
would be different.
Let’s be friends, you said.
Well, I’ve tried,
over and over again,
but nothing seems to stick.
Maybe you wanted to let me down,
gently.
Maybe *this* is too hard for you —
friends — for reasons unsaid.
Maybe I’ve played *this* through
my head too many times
to understand.
But I thought *this* would
work.
I want(ed) to be in your life,
in whatever form,
because you are worth
the heartache.
Yet, what I am doing,
does not serve me —
nor you, I suppose.
(I would drop everything,
everything,
if you needed me.)
But what does that mean
with how we are now,
and this world we live in,
and this skin I cannot shed?
I’m trying, trying,
to set myself free
from this tether of
ligament and bone.
I don’t know how to break it,
but damn am I willing.
I’m sitting here, 236 miles east
of where I was this morning, thinking
about you and the overwhelming desire
I had to do something,
anything.
I read your email, twice,
and watched a beetle scurry across the floor.
I felt like a flood.
Everything I could possibly think to say
rushed from mind to hand
as my fingers typed furiously.
As the waters settled and I pressed send,
I could only think to drive,
to move, to go, to do something
that took me away from everything.
It’s a romanticised idea,
to pack a bag in five minutes,
leave a note on the table,
and walk out the door.
The need to rush
left me winded
and a bit dehydrated,
two hours later.
I blasted CDs from the stereo,
one after the other,
voice cracking as I screamed above the wind.
The drive gave me clarity.
It helped me think of you,
of us, of what I want,
and what you can give.
Our connection,
however fleeting and intense and scary
it has felt these last few weeks,
is all I can think about.
I don’t want to lose my confidant,
whom I see more clearly
than the stars on a cloudless night —
this person who cares for me in their way,
as I care for them in mine.
I know we are in different places,
but isn’t everyone?
We are all pages in some great journal,
notes taped or glued or written in the margins
of someone’s book.
Sometimes, we share a page,
a smudge of penciled-in remarks,
a whole chapter.
The difference, to me,
is the intention,
the coming back,
chapter after chapter in some form.
It’s why we have novels,
create anthologies,
share spoken word that goes beyond
what is scribed.
I’m not writing this poem to say
this is only a typo
in what will one day be our chapter.
I’m writing this poem because it is all I know.
These words commanded my attention,
and so I gave them a page to exist on.
I don’t know where we will go from here,
but with you, I’m not worried.
The rain falls,
mimicking tears that could trail my face,
but none come.
A smile creeps across my lips.
I can’t really control it,
spreading rapidly to my eyes,
and my goofy self doesn’t know what to do.
My friend smiles at me as I smile to the world.
She knows as much as I do
that my poker face leaves when I think of you.
Maybe it’s a blursing —
I don’t know,
but you know what that is
and why I would say it.
I wish I could, simply,
be with you right now.
The smell hits me first,
having walked across the wooded island
and gotten used to the damp smell of the earth.
I feel the sharp salty air filter into my lungs,
coaxing me to take deeper and deeper breaths
as I shed my backpack and run to the water.
The tide is low today, extremely low.
I run down the ombre of sand,
becoming more and more steady
as the sand grows darker and cooler.
The crushed shells dig into my feet.
The water soothes as I go splashing in, ankle deep,
taking the sting from the shells and hot sand away,
washing the dirt and campfire smoke with the retreating tide.
I turn to watch my friends emerge from the woods,
eyes blurry from the salty spray and swelling of emotions.
I smile wide with my hands thrown in the air.
The sound of the sea and the breeze
are like sweet murmurings in my ear,
telling me secrets about the world.
***
Our destination is the boneyard,
a scar of land where live oaks, anchored
in the sands, and the ocean come to kiss.
The dead branches are akin to my arms thrown out wide;
the roots a tangled mass.
My heart feels like the water running over our feet,
pooling around our toes in the soft sand;
I can’t seem to expand my chest wide enough
to fit the thumping love inside.
Tonight,
Orbitals align as
Friends gather
Allured by
Thumping hands, in prayer, a
Homage to the
Obscure
Multitudes within.
Moonlight dances across their faces,
shining through the cobwebbed windows
and tapping along their lips.
It waltzes over the plane of their cheek,
dipping into the dimples
and trotting around the nose.
The moon shifts higher into the sky,
and the waltz becomes a series of allegro pirouettes,
each spin carrying it closer to the eyes,
until collapsing on the iris,
out of breath,
shining.
Laughter raises the light once more,
coaxing it into a tango,
weaving through the eyelashes
and up between the eyebrows.
Clouds obscure the moon,
and the light completes it’s last dance.
A Pas de Deux,
adagio,
across the smooth forehead
before taking its final rest in the crook of their ear.
So It Goes 