I can't know how your mind works any more than I can read it
We learned lessons, that love is this ownership
this “you are mine” *******
but no one is anyone's
we are beings, being, existing, trying to get through this life
and we bump into each other
sometimes it hurts and sometimes it doesn't

I can't make you be a thing for my use
to give me what I want, to make me feel what I want to feel
those are my responsibilities alone
alone
I guess that's where it comes back to
but I don't need you to raise babies
we're past that
biologically there's no reason for us to hold on to just each other
And you can't be here whenever I need you, you're there when you can be
you are not mine, and I am not yours

do you see that?
over there reflected in the window
what is that?
Behind me in the mirror
I feel hot breath on my neck
but something tells me not to turn around
it's just the warm breeze
keep going forward and don't turn around

sometimes I think I can hear it
making odd sounds that
seem hissed through a smiling mouth
if there is a mouth
I wouldn't know because
I never turn around, look under the bed
but it's in the corner of my eye
then it's gone
It hides in the horizon of my memories
in the shadows then it disappears in the light
or only hides better
but I know it's there
behind us all, waiting to lap us up
while we go about our meaningless business

the ones who do turn around, who look behind the door
we know them when we see them
but we pretend there's something wrong
something broken about them
because admitting they're right
means we have to turn around, face the thing

that's really only time itself
watching us waste it, waiting to lap us up

do I want that other
ruled by the heart like me
would that be better, one with the words like mine and the thoughts like mine
would I feel less different, less odd, less trouble?
Would I miss that dark pinch somewhere inside when the edges rub together
and they don't mesh
and it's more like sandpaper than silk
that thing that makes me try harder, live in the pain more, be everything good at 3 am
would I grow bored if he had all the right words
is the trying for the words that don't come more intoxicating than the ready flow?

I'm good at recycling
texts and touches and words
I didn't realize they were non renewable resources
but I'm smart, I saved them
and I've found I can live on very little
I'm an eco lover

I text him at 5:50 in the morning to tell him a group of butterflies is called a kaleidoscope.
Because it is.
And because I'd looked that up, having had the feeling that I'm full of an army of butterflies all trying to free themselves.
I worry that if I'm not vigilant enough they'll get free and I'll just scatter, not be anymore.
Maybe we're all that way, made up entirely of unruly butterflies.
I wonder if everyone else is just a better butterfly wrangler than I am.

I check the weather
you wonder why I feel this way
it's not that I'm unhappy but more that I'm empty
like a vanilla pod scraped clean