I think I started writing you away before you were gone
I wanted to make sure I could let you go before I did
I wanted to feel numb when I pushed you away
so I wrote
I put you on pages,
typed chapter titles for every single time you looked at me
I wrote until you were a novel,
read you until you were no longer novel,
and put you on a shelf so I could start waiting to forget about you,
a memory trapped in unused synapses

and after I shut your final chapter
but before your pages had started to collect dust,
I realized what I had done
See, I had taken each word from within me,
harvested my heartstrings, plucking them and mixing them to make ink,
The pieces of you I kept in my heart
sat as words on a page, aging
while my heart, once strong, felt too empty
and cavernous to beat under the weight of the sigh pinning down my chest

In all of my preparing
I had forgotten that I am human

I forgot feelings aren't like a fountain
there's no faucet you can turn off to keep them from
running through your mind
no way to stop them from flowing
back through your mouth when you try to
swallow them, mixed with ***, in your best friend's basement,
days after you forgot that you can't turn off a rainstorm
you can try to catch the raindrops in a bucket
but the bucket you'll need is big enough to drown in
you can try to hold out an umbrella
but if the wind is hard enough
you're still going to end up cold and dripping,
tearstained and shivering
waiting until the sun comes out

I forgot that I can't control the weather,
or anything other than myself for that matter
The end of a storm doesn't equate to the appearance of a rainbow

I realized that just because my fingers twisted around yours until
they melted together doesn't mean you'll forgive me
and that you left tattoos on me that only time will fade
and we're both going to be mad
I found out that
every song that ever reminded me of you doesn't cease to exist
I have to re-watch movies because they're different now, somehow,
and just because my hair is probably still all over your clothes
and I talked to you every day
and you gave me months of memories
and thinking about you is gut-wrenching
doesn't mean that I won't spend days praying for patience
and hoping for healing because
***** it, letting you go doesn't mean I don't miss you

How do you smile when it feels like the butterflies in your stomach turned into termites? How do you laugh when they start gnawing at your heart?

I woke up this morning with a caged heart
and while the caged bird sings,
a heart can only beat harder,
trying to break the cage
or else it aches in its confined space
begging to be free again

your fingertips brushed up my bare back
you wrote poetry up my spine,
placed commas in the spaces between
my vertebrae

there are always certain places
to avoid after a breakup
because they remind you of lost love

I can't look in the mirror anymore
because I see you all over me

I don't believe in god, she said
and I tell her it's okay and it is
It's okay to choose science
It's okay to not believe in something you can't see
because a lot of people believe in almighty, invisible, love
and end up broken by people who have never heard the word
It's okay to be angry when things go all wrong
It's okay
I will love you as if nothing is different and it is okay
but when I stand in the pews,
surrounded by song and smiles,
I feel sorry for her*
because life has picked me up and thrown me down
and God caught me, dusted me off, took me in his arms, and said it's okay
I love you as if nothing is different and it is okay
I believe in God because of the two girls who hear the gospel and smile
like they are receiving birthday gifts,
their brows furrowed in concentration before they speak,
trying to bring His words to life in their voices,
trying to bring His vision to the eyes of everyone around them,
they smile all through Mass every time like it is the best day of their lives
you can't make up something like that
whether you think He is real or not
you cannot fake the look on their faces when they speak
you cannot fake the inspiration I feel hearing them
you cannot fake the community that surrounds me
as I am surrounded by singing and smiles
to you He may not exist but to me He is everything
I believe in God because fathers drown themselves
one night at a time in a bar
until they are washed away
and families are shattered,
leaving bits of glass and cuts on wives
and half-orphaned children
and somehow those children keep going
somehow they survive the worst day of their lives
and somehow they still hope for something better than what they had
even when they were dealt the worst cards,
they still smile and laugh and dream the biggest dreams
and somehow those wives still go to Mass
and somehow they raise three children alone
and they work too ******* hard for not enough rewards
and they keep going even though they could quit
and they are all scarred by this one thing, but He tells them he has given them to each other and to look at their scars and to look for shattered glass around other people and to minimize the cuts and scrapes they feel and to sweep it up before anyone steps on it
I believe in God because when I think about all of the things my life could have been
the only way for me to forgive him is to pile each complaint like coals in my heart and let the Holy Spirit light it on fire
I believe in God because two people who numb themselves with pills, hide themselves in selfishness, and deserve nothing but the worst
were blessed with an angel in the form of a four foot tall boy
with bright eyes and a quick mind
with a smile that lights a room
with happiness that is impossible to hide
with curiosity that is unending
with everything that they are not
and yet He gave them a chance to make themselves into something better
and, just in case, he gave the boy an aunt and an uncle and some cousins to watch over him
but his parents can not complain that they were never blessed
the proof is in the boy's smile, his young mind, still able to forgive them

I believe in God because nothing will ever be perfect
I will complain and be hurt and hold grudges and never know exactly the right thing to say
But, once, I picked up each of my fears like bricks, setting it down on a sheet of paper
and I watched it burn in His name
And I felt lighter than the smoke that the breeze carried up and into the night
And everything was okay

I believe in God because if I can't have one stable thing somewhere out there
what is left for me to believe in?

I hope she finds something, too

I knew I didn't love you anymore
When I could fall asleep without pills
My own exhaustion was enough to quiet my mind, to take my thoughts and smother them
I didn't need alcohol anymore to forget the way your eyes lit up and I can't remember how they made me feel when they looked into mine
I don't spend all day punishing myself for staring at your photographs because I've rid myself of all of them (the first one I burned slowly in my fireplace when I was too weak for anything else and needed to watch the flames lick at your face to remind me of reality, needed to pretend you had burned away too to convince myself you weren't coming back,and the final few I tossed carelessly in the trash as I cleaned my house after a party)

I no longer think of your smile in the moonlight,
Or the way your hair looked in sunlight
I have given away everything you gave me
(including the love, which now resides in the heart of a friend who lost her sister and needs it more than I)
And this letter, my once dearest, is my final goodbye