I never knew how much I’d see you after you left.
Horse stickers stuck to telephone poles,
A lizard in a gum wrapper in my backpack.
Undressed played on the radio and
your ex girlfriend’s ponytail on the elliptical.
Your cup of water still by my bedside,
It reminds me of you, I won’t pour it out.
Your picture under my pillow,
because everything is you and I
cannot bear the day that it isn’t.
The bar on my 21st and animals on golf courses,
every beer tastes of your lips.
All poems are a dog whistle to you,
so is the toy you pulled from my mouth
and so is the slobber you left behind.
Every girl I meet that stole your name
never wears it as well as you.
I use your shirts as pillowcases
and your hoodies as hugs,
every step I take in Chicago without you
is a dance around your arms.
I hope to never stop seeing you
in the empty space between stars
and in the air you used to occupy.
I see you more,
now that you’re gone.

dont use utensils
but scoop it up with your hands
one line at a time, please

wait at least 30 seconds to swallow
hold the line under your tongue
make sure you taste each word

feel where it goes as it travels down
does your throat burn
do you feel oceans in your eyes
or does your heart expand to every inch of your body

if you feel nothing dont force it
move on,
for if every line was life changing
there would be no constant life to live

there is a poem for everyone
just as everyone has a favorite food
how would you discover it
if you always ordered the same thing

I wouldn’t say I am a
mosaic of the people I
surround myself with,
nor a quilt woven of
threads of heart.

Nor am I a window of stained
glass, yet instead, I am
the colors of light that shine through.

For each person to me
is a pigment,
and together we crush rocks
and weave together grains
of sand,

Creating the glass that others look through.

My hands are rosy and opalescent,
learned of love to stay soft
and hold quietly.

My collarbones shine like
leaves in the forest,
their light a reminder that
roots will always be tangled,
no matter what the surface brings.

My ears reflect a
golden musicality, and
that light brightens all the rest,
those who see me, hear music,
and know it is gold.

My head is pooling with sky blue,
as well as the looking glass in my eyes.
This light is blinding, this one I
cannot escape. Poems are written
in the beams and I cannot see myself
without reading them.

And my heart of people,
of their laughs, the unique tightness
of individual embrace.
Light of the sun explodes through,
and with luminosity comes
the knowledge—

For all who have seen my translucence
know the hands that created it.

I didn’t know the stars
could come down to earth
until they blinked at me
through your eyes.
I saw a strange Little Dipper,
tipping over and pouring my life out  
until it had reached the very last drop.
You looked at me and
pointed at the sky,
Hand extended up perpendicular
from the asphalt the sweat on
our backs stuck to.
I didn’t see what you saw.
The space between your pointer
and the sky felt immeasurable.
Why is it that the sky needs to feel so far away?
Doesn’t the night sky extend
all the way down to where our skin ends?

The world has always felt so big to me,
but that night the atmosphere
reached your arms.
Your hand was in the same hemisphere
as the Pleiades star cluster,
or, the “silly Little Dipper” as you called it.
For a moment, I could almost
feel the stars beneath my feet.
You cupped your hands to catch my life,
so I could walk through space once more.

I don't want you
to softly kiss my forehead.
I want a thousand bee stings
with your lips
in rapid succession
till my heart and face are
swollen with you.

I never knew I wanted that until you did it.

I don’t want you to
softly drag your nails over my skin—
who am I kidding,
of course I do.

But when it is you
it feels like you are
sculpting me from clay,
like you are finger painting
a landscape and using your prints
to draw rivers.

I want to show up
at your door with flowers and
see you on your tippy toes
staring through the glass
with flowers to give me.

They’re both plum lilies
and both bought because
no perfect person should go
without flowers on their countertops.

I want to hear you **** in your sleep
and snore simply because it means
you’re next to me and
that music is more heavenly
than the silence that accompanies your absence.

I want to go to the store with you
and feel maternal towards
all the stuffed animals that
lay piled in the kids section,
and buy each one and say
“this is our last stuffie, no more”
before returning the next week
on a quest to adopt one more.

I want to walk through an art museum
and be convinced you’re a time traveler
because how could the murals possibly
be so beautiful if they weren’t inspired by you.

I watch in real time as sunflowers
turn their petals towards your face
which seems impossible but
they know as well as I do
that the brightest light is within you.

I want to learn what it feels like
to have my skin stick to yours
and to feel the sting of peeling you
off of me in the morning.

Nothing is complicated when it
comes to what I want in this life.
There’s only one common denominator—
I just want you.

A heavenly grotesque poem about being apart from you while I am on vacation

I feel the familiar stretch of
you extending your fingers from
beyond my iris,
Puncturing my cornea
to try and grasp the Boston Harbor
That I stare across

You draw my upper lip
Into your mouth as you kiss me,
Your tongue sliding
behind my front teeth to
Taste the ice cream lingering
On my tongue from the street
Vendor on the corner of Fenway Park

As you breakdance through the
Canyons in my brain
Your steps accentuate the beats of the
Drumming in my ears
I think of how you would love the
Sounds I am hearing right now

It’s as if my senses only exist to
Pretend you’re next to me,
When we are apart I only
Enjoy things because
I know you would too

All things beautiful
Remind me of you
And you remind me of
All things beautiful