i miss your tires fighting the pavement under our legs
i miss the wind slipping into the cracked windows
i miss how everything turned into slosh as highways stretched

it always seemed as if they only elongated for us
all packed into one car
sharing slushies and eye-roll worthy jokes

nothing else mattered in those hours where we shared space
nothing else seemed more important than each other's company
nothing else sounds better

i wish i felt as cool as i did in the summer of 2016
and i wish i could feel the slow fade into the fall all over again

screaming our favorite songs out the car windows
while the neighbors hastily shut their curtains

in those moments i was free
more free than i ever felt over the weekends home from school

more free than i feel now
more in control than i am now

i watch the way your fingers touch the kitchen counter
so thoughtful and unaware of contact

when i notice my own fingers
they're gripping at the seams between the tiles

your eyes, half open and searching for words
when the night becomes dense and the world stays quiet

sometimes i feel it only stays quiet for us
for as long as it does

a seven hour vacation away from conscious life
a seven hour movie presentation
a seven hour time frame somewhere else

how funny it is
that back in 2002 we thought this was permanent
we thought our lives couldn't get any better than this

we were all so wrong
but very right
depending on various ideals

we didn't get the future we were promised
maybe that's a relief
or a panicked thought

no matter what year it is
i still have the same dream
the one i thought about for seven hours a day five days a week

a dream of my freshly washed hair
being dampened once more but by freezing rain
the impending feeling of doom

the goosebumps and standing hairs
the soft lights of the world grazing the snowy clouds
and for those few moments


i felt that i was the only person in the world

my body is in two different directions

almost like it wants to split apart

i catch myself thinking of the past more often now

i've stopped following my own advice

many different sounds can cause someone to go mad
i didn't think that a few seconds of eye contact could feel like hours
or if it would make my bones crumble

i used to hate the silence
i used to have to distract myself at every waking moment
just so the panic wouldn't settle in

but now it's the ticking clock
the loud. spinning fan
the noises that sound murderous

and vain

it doesn't matter how much time passes
if someone is really that bad
they stay that way

no matter how many changes they say they'll make
no matter how many chances you give
no matter what they've done and it's severity

you can't save everyone
you can't tell them enough to make them listen
you have to let them go eventually