poetry idk

and i wave to her across the square below me. as children play in the darkening night, and busses continue along their routes. and she waves back.

she waves back with a grin and a wink, because sitting next to her is the one person who cant be with me. and he lounges on bench that is surely older than both of us combined.

the lights of the city reflect into my eyes and just as quickly as i saw him, hes gone. and grief, oh she laughs. she clutches her sides and i hear his laugh rise above the sounds below me like a taunt.

she will sit below me and count the tears that fall, until i slip back through my window and lay my frozen feet on solid ground. she may even watch until way past when i latch the window, and turn the lights down low. she will likely watch until the soft sound of my breathing evens out.

but ive used the same body wash ever since you told me how lovely my skin is when i get out of the shower

and i always scrub just a little rougher to make sure im soft and supple when i step out

and i dont dream about your voice any more

even when i wake up in an empty bed and wish someone would roll over to hug me

and instead i just imagine my lips on a strangers

i still dont know who i am at all

but you never made it any easier to find her anyway

although i think she is far better off without you

but someone else will feel the softness of my skin one day

and they will cherish it

and hold me

and brush their fingers through my hair just to feel it

because you still linger like a cough in my mind.

and maybe ive always held on to long

because no one taught me to grieve

and to let go. but you have stayed the longest

crossing the roads of my neurons like you couldnt

possibly be hit by a passing car. for 18 months and some change

you just wont fade away. but i digress.

this poem is for you

because i dont like you.

i dont like the anger you carry like a sword

or the words you throw like stones

i dont like your hatred or your fear

i dont like that you saw vulnerable parts of me and laughed

i dont like the way you forced your way into my head and my heart when you knew i would drown in my tears

but i think mostly i dont like that we are so similar. because i see me in you so deeply it scares me. it scares me to be like you.

and i hate that you saw that too, because it scared you that i was so open. you saw the weakness i had that comes with being vulnerable and you hated it. so you took our similarities

and you shoved it in my face like it was wrong. stupid. dumb. you ignored the twinge you felt knowing it was also you. instead you made me feel how you felt.

and yet you sit in a chair behind my eyes and replay the memories. good and bad. and i dont like you because

it gives me hope.

i see myself, and how deeply i loved. i see your anger and how deeply ingrained you held it. and i even see when we reverse places

i see the way you held me as i cried in that parking lot,

how you rubbed my back and let me be sad. when 30 minutes earlier

you had yelled at me.

and i see the way i tried so hard to care for you

but my anger at myself made you wary of my love.

i guess what im trying to say is

i know why you linger. i know that i hold hope for you to be better. to show that love to someone else. and for me to find that love from someone more prepared to give it back.

you linger because i hold hope that we both grow.

i see everything wrong, the bumps, the dips, the creases. i see all the slimy slurpy slugs that love to crawl across the layers of my skin and bed down in the folds of my brain

but sometimes i see the pretty. not a pretty you see in the magazine, nor the pretty you see on instagram. not the pretty you see on the street, strolling carefree with music in her ears. not the pretty you notice in the middle row of the classroom, her hand is always the first one up.

no i dont see that pretty. the pretty that smiles for every camera, or the pretty that you pass in the store that makes your heart stutter and you almost turn to get another look.

the pretty i see is different. i see how my pretty looks when im driving and my favorite song is playing. i see how my pretty looks when i try to sit up straight for my posture. i see how my pretty looks when the wind blows just right and my hair follows and suddenly maybe i am the pretty you see on the street even just for a moment. i see the pretty behind my layers of iron and stone.

the little girl pounding her tiny fists so hard, smudging the pristine door.

being ignored. not cared about.

shes so fucking scared cant you see her? cant you hear her? LET HER OUR LET HER OUT PLEASE.

what does it know? how to read the signs

so sweetly in my ears and send them bubbling

up to my eyes. in that parking lot at dusk

with pink macchiato clouds to the east,

droplets flying from my fingertips

and feet sliding in my shoes.

a bomb planted in the cracks of the concrete

slowly deflates and weeps

because it was set to go off

till it saw me.

how symphonic, to disarm a bomb with nothing

but the breath through my lips. i dont think ill try

to love ever again.

but then

i think of the way you looked at my bare back

and said “you have acne, did you know?”

and suddenly i had a new insecurity i never thought to have.

i think of the way you left me that one night to wake up alone. i was so confused

i think of when you looked into my eyes and lied to me, saying it wasnt goodbye while you watched me cry.