I was going to write a poem.
I thought it’s what I wanted
but
sometimes it feels similar
to wanting someone
to embrace you
until everything makes sense
but
it never will
so we settle for love
and lessen our grasp
on reality
and when it happens
it’s so fucking beautiful
that we can’t
leave it at that
So we write our poems.
But I don’t want to write
a poem
I just want you to hold me
and right now
you’re many miles away
so I’ll settle for sleep. 

I wrote this two or more years ago, but I still enjoy it.

You were looking so beautiful, dreaming of love,
So, I gave you a kiss, I’d hate to wake you up,
Ever so gently, my lips met your cheek,
I told you “I love you,” while you were still asleep,
I laid so silently, just hearing you breathe,
Watching you smile, I was filled with a peace,
“Don’t you ever wake up, just keep dreaming of me,”
but the light slipped in, and unraveled the seams,
then I arose from my slumber, to find out that my lover,
existed only under covers, where the sheep are all numbered,
You were looking so beautiful, dreaming of love,
So, I drifted off once again, I’d hate to wake up.

We opened up the windows
as if it would let some
of the emptiness out.
Barely breathing in the black holes
and bedrooms,
where we had learned
it’s best to keep our doors
locked
and loaded.
On the back of a map,
I traced the hope of an escape
with my trigger finger.
My index.
My indescribable emptiness,
written in an otherwise
cryptic dialect,
behind seven sad continents
also contemplating
suicide
or salvation.
(Not finished) 

We fell asleep
in the arms of each other’s
innocence.
Woke up to
beauty
and abandoned it.
I cowered in corners,
with the cobwebs
and confusion,
where we’d hid all our
flaws
hoping we’d lose them.
Failure never falls short,
even when misery misses her mark.
After all,
it was a shot in the dark
aimed at persuasion.
It shouldn’t take
a rocket scientist or a
life sentence to realize
we’re all serving time.
Solitarily confined and stitched
into fabrics
our feeble minds can’t fathom.
Sewn, lonesome
and then torn open
over a frayed thread.
A thread afraid to adhere,
because he had already heard
there is only death
in the end.
Sewn, lonesome
and then never again. 

We locked the doors of our little houses.
Our secrets were sterilized in the light
that slipped past the blinds
just before sunrise
and sunset.
Emptiness was a way of life
and we became so good at living.
Perfect children,
never a burden to mother
or any other successor.
Never allowed to talk at the table
during dinner.
Maybe afraid
we might mutter out something
meaningful,
some brutal honesty they just
couldn’t bear.
Maybe afraid
we might have learned
to care,
and we did, and it hurt
like hell when the swelling
just wouldn’t go down.
Internal injuries
from abuse to my algorithms,
and my only oscillating organ.
It’s half-past a heart attack
and the clocks have stopped working.
The calendar’s running on empty
and every year
it gets a little harder to refuel.
When half-empty just won’t do,
but we can’t afford anything more
because a future is something;
something valuable.
Something hard to grasp
and as mysterious as air.
Gasping from far inferior
gases.
Daydreams of striking matchsticks
and reducing my life to ashes.
Slipping past the blinds
just before sunrise
and sunset. 

I don’t know if this is waking up
or if I’m just getting back to sleep
Better thoughts are emerging
but who really needs another dream that won’t come true
The circles beneath my eyes might attempt to suggest
how long I’ve stayed awake
These eyes are liars, don’t believe them
They are bruises I wear to remind us
of better times, better days that never came
I push the pen, past pointless, to pensive
but my defenses have been down for too long
I can’t get this ink to stain the paper
I’m just trying to change the way you feel things
Call it poetry, I’ll call it alchemy
But I can’t promise it’ll be golden

we were merely matchsticks in the rain
our flame wouldn’t dance for the last time
you had miles of freedom on your mind
while I just sat back and drank mine, silently
down to the last little echo of hope
I’d soon drown you out

I’m just trying to make my father proud
by being nothing like him
It’s the same heart but better habits
A more frequent frequency
in a symphony of static, It’s September
and I hardly remember your voice

It’s your lips I can’t forget
or regret
and the little kisses of sanity
that used to sing me to sleep
I feel distance in the sheets, these days,
we were merely music on the airwaves.

I wanted to touch her.
I really wanted to fucking touch her.
I liked her
enough to want to fuck her.
I could love her.
I could leave her.
I wanted to fix her.
A fix from her.
I wanted to ruin her.
Would she let me touch her?
Fuck her?
I was afraid to ruin her,
so, I ran from her.
I wanted to touch her.