A few ground rules.

No sad music.
Keep my room clean.
Avoid wallowing in self-pity--he's just a boy.

and I've still got my whole fucking life. 

When I walk

down the street at night, and I see

a man

scad in black

walking toward me,

I automatically cross the street,

bearing in mind the words of my teachers, newspapers, TV,

my mom “the world isn’t the way it used to be,”

but as the stranger and I

stare at each other from across the street,

we exchange a long blink

and keep on--I look back behind me,

and ( Read more... )

It’s the times he’s not around,

I notice how diluted I am:

when I can’t hear his breathing, I hear mine

and I’m scared of it,

serenity in solitude

now swapped

with self-confinement,

where have I gone?

love has never been a promise

of anything

other than the feeling

and yet I wrap it around my finger

like a wedding band.

I make love like a morning treat

and ( Read more... )

love has never been a promise

of anything

other than the feeling

and yet I wrap it around my finger

like a wedding band.

I make love like a morning treat

and leave condoms

like candy wrappers

littering my carpet.

I try to reclaim my space and break the habit in his I love yous.

For god's sake,
when I tell you to leave me alone
do not leave me alone.

You could have a living room,
He said.
I would have someone to help me put the bedsheets on.
We'd mix our laundry together. 

I wish my ex-boyfriend didn’t hate me so much.
I wish I felt more secure in my skin.

I wish I didn’t feel like crying whenever I’m out in public and see a dad with his baby daughter.

I have all this love, but I don’t know what to make of it,

I don’t know what to do with it.

Will you take it?
If you take it, will you keep it?

Sometimes--people come into your life
and exit,
pleasantly enough.

Other times--they take a piece out of you,
they leave a hole in you.
I wish the two of you could have coffee together,
maybe compare heart pieces.

love has never been a promise

of anything

other than the feeling.

A taboo inheritance

So I walked around, days after the funeral,

with the mud surrounding his grave still cemented on my boots,

Sipping

On flat sympathy that I didn't deserve,

because most know more about their distant aunt than I did of him,

and the projection of other people’s pain, at the thought of losing a father, is enough to make me cry,

and ( Read more... )