Love Letters Only

I’m like the water when your ship rolled in that night, rough on the surface but you cut through like a knife…your Midas touch on the Chevy door, November flush and your flannel cure…eyes like sinking ships on waters so inviting, I almost jump in…it’s the kind of cold, fogs up windshield glass but I felt it when I passed you…what would you do if I break free and leave us in ruins? took this dagger in me and removed it? gain the weight of you then lose it? believe me, I could do it…I’ve cleaned enough houses to know how to cover up a scene…after giving you the best I had, tell me what to give after that? all you want from me now is the green light of forgiveness, I haven’t met the new me yet, but I think she’ll give you that…if you’re ever tired of being known for who you know you know you’ll always know me…do you miss the rogue who coaxed you into paradise and left you there? will you forgive my soul when you’re too wise to trust me and too old to care?…oh, goddamn, my pain fits in the palm of your freezing hand..now you hang from my lips like the gardens of Babylon, with your boots beneath my bed, forever is the sweetest con…I always felt I must look better in the rearview…the autumn chill that wakes me up, you loved the amber skies so much, long limbs and frozen swims you’d always go past where my feet could touch, and I’d complain the whole way there, the car ride back and up the stairs, I should’ve asked you questions, I should’ve asked you how to be, asked you to write it down for me, should’ve saved every grocery store receipt ‘cause everything scrap of you would be taken from me…seeing the shape of your name still spells out pain…when I was shipwrecked I thought of you, in the cracks of light I dreamed of you…did you ever hear about the girl who got frozen? time went on for everybody else, she won’t know it…that old familiar body ache, the snaps from the same little breaks in your soul

“My eyes are sore from imagining.”