I don't like to say these things out loud

I hear myself saying I’m not that naive, saying I’m well aware, but you don’t hear me saying I’m that smart either. Sometimes I get home, close the door behind me and spontaneously combust. I don’t like to say these things out loud.

You’d think patterns would be proof enough. You’d think history would be both a lesson and a teacher. You’d think personal experience is all it takes. “She has to figure it out for herself.” Yes, but what kind of fool wouldn’t have figured it out by now? I can hear you all talking. Don’t think I don’t see what your eyes are saying. You can’t hide your disappointment.  

“You’re letting your emotions get in the way.” What if they are the way? What if they are my way?

Blow out all the candles. This is a pipedream on a track to the edge of nowhere. The doomed rock face on the island of your ambiguity. Oh sweet girl, sit on the floor and eat chocolate almonds until you feel sick. It’s okay to give in to temporary if it’s just temporarily. Acknowledge it, and notice when you’ve been giving in for a little longer than you should. It’s okay to get distracted, distractions can be oh so beautiful, but remember that’s all they are – distractions, not places to call home. You must keep moving, home is not here.

I hope my heart wakes up. Somewhere warm. I’m hoping it digs my mind out of the ditch. I’m anticipating the moment I’ll stop slipping down the hill for long enough to catch my footing. I keep holding my arms out like I’m walking blind, feeling for something. My gut is trying to crawl out of the woodwork. I can’t remember when I last had it. I can’t remember when I wasn’t always about to walk into something.

“Keep being patient. It will come.” I never stopped looking for it and maybe that’s what matters. Because my gut appeared as a pair of scissors under leaves of all the falling. Scissors to cut the blindfold off, and all the obstacles that were in my way were in my mind. I wonder why my dog won’t jump the boards in the hall when she could clear them with a foot to spare. I ask myself the same question. Don’t let fear make you forget the length of your legs and the strength of your bound. Jump baby jump. And don’t look so surprised when you make it.

“My skin soft against your rough
Your rough tough against the heart
I am only holding on for love
I can only see your watery eyes in the light
that peaks over my shoulder
We’re not crying but we will be soon

The room is always on fire
but this time it’s burning down
and I have to be the one to go

I’d swallow fire and my pride
For you
But the room is burning down
and I’m not asking you to dance this time

We’ll both make it out
and we’ll be tired and we’ll be happy
lying on the sidewalk outside
We’ll dance when we’ve learned how
and the room will always be burning
But we won’t have to leave”

It's only for a few months

Some days have no sweetness to them. You can douse them in honey and they will still be black coffee and raw kale. The days you put the TV on mute in the background just so everything doesn't feel so static.

Some nights there is only unrest. Only tossing between ache and numbness. Ricocheting between stillness and hysteria. They bolted my balcony door shut and tell me it’s only for a few months. I have nightmares about what would happen if there was a fire – how could I jump if I needed to? They say that type of situation is unlikely, but they don’t know how flammable my life is.

The girl on my shoulder, I let her have the floor for a minute and immediately regret it. She starts shrieking in my ear for all the times I stayed level-headed when I could have detonated. She tells me she shot herself in the foot each time I swallowed my anger – she can’t wear shoes anymore. She tells me I almost killed her turning the scraps into gifts and handing them back to people like an offering. I try to interrupt her and she goes into a fit. Stop making excuses for treating everyone else with more humanity than yourself.

I want to throw myself into the puddle right here in this pothole. Strip down my wet clothes in the middle of the street, drop them at your feet, and walk away. I could hang sheets and shirts from windowsills and watch the storms shred them. I need a road trip where I can stop in diners to dump the crumbs of myself on empty plates. The crumbs that collected in a messy pile in the back of the toaster tray. The bits of me that I forgot about, lost track of time with, and let char.

When the mailman walks by, I want to slip my notebooks in his bag and let him deliver them to strangers. I hope he delivers one to you, and if you don’t cry, I will. I want to put my hands on a plane and crash them into the side of a mountain. I want to leave my skin out to dry and half-heartedly go back to check on it and then pretend to be surprised when it’s gone. I want to sit in the back corner of a coffee shop and put my life on time-lapse. I want the moment you come in and sit down at the table to slip by in a blur of espresso and almond milk.

These are all metaphors for the ways I don’t want you to know me anymore.

Sometimes you want something to make sense so desperately that you trip a switch in your brain. Sometimes you can lose yourself trying not to be unlosable. Sometimes you need to run away from where you think the answer is to find out there is no answer.

I think about the time I ran away from home on the coldest night of the year. It was too cold to cry and the only way my muscles wouldn’t freeze was to keep running. I could feel my pulse everywhere. I made it 3 miles before my dad picked me up in the car. I think about that every time it starts getting colder out. Except now it’s your heartbeat that I feel in my feet. You told me to write about that. I don’t think this is what you meant.

Meeting points at 2am

7 seconds goes by in a blink
and I say something to explain so you don't have to worry
I'm drinking water like it's going to stop me
from waking up with a hangover heart

The heavy fog sits on the bridge of your nose
and the back of your hand is pressed against my cheek
I'm looking up into your eyes between kisses and I'm seeing unfamiliarity
I know it’s you but it's still enough to make me look again

I've tried to write this poem 7 different ways and it will never be enough
I've even tried to not write it
but that doesn't work either
So the best I can do is this:

The universe hands me a diner mint from the pocket of my coat
and it tastes different
The kind of different that surprises you
The kind that tastes like your lips in a parking lot at 2am

I run my finger across the condensation on the inside of the car window
and I’m afraid I’ll tear the centre console from your mother’s car
Just to get to the heart of you
Droplets of rain sit on the outside of the glass and I want to drink them in
I want to wear them like crystals in my hair

There might be more oxygen among the blinking lights and falling coins
but I’m fairly certain you are the only reason I’m breathing easier

It's diner mint different
and I'm convinced I could live off this
I'm convinced if I hold tight enough
your arms will come searching for my hands
because they don't want to walk across the asphalt of life without them

Because every parking lot you walk through without my hands
will make your arms ache
Every casino you visit you’ll imagine looking up
and seeing me across the room next to the penny slots
Every headlight shone on a rainy windshield
you'll see a flash of me in the passenger seat with my boots off

Don't think you shoulder this alone
While this is happening to you
Know that I won't be able to get on a highway ramp
without seeing your goodbye arm out the window

My pockets will be full of empty diner mint wrappers until I see you again