He never even kissed me
and I still wake up
like I survived a car crash
I begged to happen.

I memorized the cadence of his typing bubble
like it was a heartbeat.
I stared at his “active now”
like it was Morse code for almost.

I drafted messages like legislation.
Held back like it was holy.
Called it chemistry—
it was just inconsistency with good bone structure.

I Googled, “how to be wanted by someone
who never said they wanted you,”
and got ads for perfume.

I blamed Mercury.
I blamed my softness.
I blamed the ghost of the girl
who asked him to visit.
Kneeled down to ‘crazy boy ****’ like it was a prophecy.

He didn’t break my heart.
He drained it—
with a bend, sip, thanks
that left me lightheaded and poetic.

I told my therapist
he was a metaphor.
She said, “For what?”
I said, “For me.”

I should’ve burned something.
Instead I wrote fourteen poems
and shaved my legs
like closure was coming.

Now I bite down on his name
like it owes me blood.
I spit it out
like it’s still in my mouth
because somehow, it is.

I was a god once,
but I got bored
and turned myself into a girl
just to see what it felt like
to bleed on a schedule
and be underestimated at CVS.

I used to throw comets for fun.
Now I throw up from anxiety
and pretend it’s acid reflux.

I traded omniscience for online shopping.
Traded lightning bolts
for a Bic lighter
I keep losing in other people’s cars.

I used to be prayed to.
Now I pray I don’t get ghosted,
pray my Amazon Chase card wasn’t hacked,
pray I remember why I walked into the room.

I’ve lived for centuries.
You can tell by the way
I roll my eyes at time.

My bones know Latin.
My knees speak Morse.
My spine hums with prophecies
I keep forgetting to write down.

I was a god once.
But now I’m just really good at parties.
Really bad at sleeping.

Really into ChatGPT conversations
and spending 40 minutes at a time
inside my ear canal
with an inner-ear camera from Shein.

II watch body-cam arrest videos at 3AM
and wonder if I’d beg prettier on camera.
Sometimes everything that comes out of me
smells burnt.

I think I’d make a good Saint,
so I keep my eyes open for miracles—
but I only feel fire in my bones
when I’m overstimulated.
And I feel really sleepy the rest of the time.

I still have revelations,
but they only happen when I’m doom-scrolling.
I still search for splendors,
I just call them coping mechanisms now.

I make eye contact with hawks.
I smell rain before it happens.
I know who’s going to text me
before they do.
Then they don’t.

Sometimes I float—
but only in conversations.

I leave my body at least once a day.
Usually in traffic.
Sometimes while folding laundry.
Always when someone says,
“You don’t seem like the type to cry.”

I was a god once.
And now I’m this.
A walking myth in leggings.
A fallen star with a Dollar Tree receipt so long
it reads like scripture.

Don’t worship me.
Just don’t interrupt me
when I’m talking to the moon.

I brush my teeth like I’m getting ready for war.
Or I forget to for three days
until my canines are wearing sweaters.

Temu moisturizer like battle paint.
Who knows what’s in there.
Who cares.

Upside-down Claddagh on my ring finger like a threat.
And it might be.

I put my hair up like a woman with secrets—
on the days I brush it.
A bumpy bun the rest of the time.

I shed like a stripper.
I strip like a thief.

I walk out the garage door like I invented sorrow.
I get in my car
like every song from Reputation to Tortured Poets
was written for me.

I wave to strangers like I’m about to die.
Cross the street like it’s a choice.
Clock into work like I have a hit on my head.

I **** Elf Bars like they’ve got confessions inside,
and blow out like they won’t give me cancer—
because they can tell
I approach them with pure intentions
and a positive spirit.

I know how to make an exit
that feels like a funeral.
I know how to hold a coffee cup
like I’m accepting an award
no one else can see.

I take bites of dropped chocolate chip cookies
but spit them out before they ruin me.

I spend too long staring at my own reflection,
just to make sure I still exist.

I catalog new moles.
Curse the milia above my eyelids.
Buzz off my mustache.
Denounce my chin hairs.
I think thin.

Sometimes I blink
just to feel time move.

I keep novels in my bag like armor,
and a journal like a last will and testament.

The expensive pens from Amazon
that don’t crawl up my left hand
like a disease.
That don’t smudge the page
like I have something to hide.

I pay for Spotify.
Skip the songs that hurt.
Play the one that ruins me.

I cry on the train
like I’m filming something important.
Because I will be.

I want everything I feel
to mean something.
I want every single ache to echo.
I want my poems
reverberating in the minds of people
who are emotionally legendary.

I want the world to apologize
for not feeling it first.

Sometimes I walk
like I’m being watched
by everyone who’s ever left me.

Sometimes I smile
like I know something God doesn’t.

Sometimes I think I was born
just to document
what it means to be alive
in the most dramatic possible way.

Because I am the first girl
to ever feel anything.

I woke up with glass in my throat—
slivers of something I swallowed last night
when the sky was peeling itself open,
like skin stretched too thin.

I remember standing on the curb,
watching the streetlights flicker like eyelids,
thinking about how no one ever
means to slam the door that hard.

My breath was smoke in my mouth,
hollowed out like a bitten plum pit,
and I was talking to no one—
just mouthing things I couldn’t finish saying.

Maybe if I kept my lips moving,
he’d appear
like a coin behind my ear.

The wind dragged its nails down my arms,
and I swore I could feel the sky
swallowing me whole—
clouds closing in
like a body bag zipper.

I said your name into my own collarbone
just to hear how it sounded breaking—
sharp, jagged,
splintering against my ribs.

Like I was still wired
to the sound of you.

I wanted to scream
until my throat blistered,
but all I could do was spit out the glass—
small diamonds catching the streetlight,
like I’d somehow turned the hurt
into something that glittered.

I stood there,
staring down at it,
thinking how beautiful it was
to lose something sharp enough
to know exactly where it hurt.

And maybe that’s what we were—
a wound dressed in glitter,
a myth I kept retelling
until it sounded like truth.

Maybe you never loved me.
Maybe you did.
Maybe I was always going to bleed
either way.

I almost made it through today without thinking about you.
But then I smelled something like your hair —

dusk in early May,
like lilacs giving up,
and July the rest of the time —
like someone’s still grilling down the block
even though the party ended hours ago.

Like a memory that keeps overstaying its welcome.
(Like I’d forgotten how to forget you.)

(Anyway,
I started googling “what’s the opposite of nostalgia”
but halfway through I forgot
what I was looking for.)

Got $9 boba with a friend I haven’t seen in years.
There was too much ice,
the grass jelly kept clogging the straw.

I told her I was fine.
(I wasn’t.)

I teethed each tapioca like a guillotine
to feel something smash.

(I kept biting the ice too —
felt like breaking tiny bones in my mouth
and pretending they weren’t mine.)

(She kept talking about her new boyfriend —
I think his name was Ben or Matt or Disappointment.
He was younger than us
but just as dumb.)

Anyway, I saw our old dance professor at the grocery store.
He asked about you.

(I lied.)
I said you were doing great,
(but I was lying to keep you in a cage
of things I never wanted to admit to myself.)

He looked at me like he knew I was just rearranging wreckage
from a storm we used to dance in.
(Get it?)

(Oh, and by the way —
I still have your sweatshirt.)

It’s at the bottom of my laundry basket,
but I can’t wash it.

It smells like October
and a bad idea I refuse to stop romanticizing,
a wound I can’t stop picking at.
(I tried throwing it away once —
but it felt like pushing someone
out of a lifeboat.)

I almost wore it last week,
but I couldn’t —
like putting on a ghost
that still remembers my name.
like putting on a bruise
just to see if it still hurt.
(I think I wanted it to.)

Anyway, did you know
memories leave like party guests —

half of them forgetting to say goodbye,
the rest lingering in the kitchen,
picking at crumbs
like they might stay forever?

(I kept trying to swallow my gum
just to see if I could.)

I keep thinking about the time
I tried to make you laugh
by pretending my hand was a spider —

(I got tangled in my own fingers
and you called me impossible.)

(I set alarms for stupid times now —
4:13, 7:29, 10:04 —
like if I time it right,
I’ll wake up different.)

Anyway, I saw your name
carved into a bathroom stall in the city.

(Unless it wasn’t yours —
but what are the odds?
Pretty high, actually.)

I stared at it too long.
Some girl in a bucket hat walked in,
gave me a look
like I was unraveling in real time.

(I was.)

So I smiled at her
like I was chewing glass.
(I hope she’s having a great day.)

Oh, and I found your zippo lighter in my trunk last week —
matte silver, your uncle’s from ‘Nam.

I swore I’d lost it.
I keep the lighter in my cup holder now —
like a threat I don’t know how to make.

(I tinker with it at red lights —
like I’m trying to burn something down
but forgot what.)

(Sometimes I imagine flicking it open
and holding it to the sleeve of your sweatshirt —
just to see if I’d go through with it.)

I stopped going out for a while,
but last month I had three beers
and told some guy on a barstool
that I still dream about you —

(That’s not true.
I dream about losing my teeth,
then hiding them in my ears,
getting in very slow motion car crashes,
and realizing I’m too drunk
to perform the play I’m the lead in,
but I think they mean the same thing.)

I saw a crow yesterday.
Anyway, it reminded me of you.

(It perched outside my window
like it knew something —
kept tilting its head
like it had a secret
and didn’t care if I figured it out.)

I almost followed it,
like maybe it was waiting
to lead me somewhere
you never made it back from.
(Oh, and by the way —
I still love you.)

Anyway, how’s your heart?
(And why can’t I stop writing
like you might answer?)

(Anyway, I’ve started talking to myself in the car —
Sometimes I pretend I’m singing with you.)

It’s really fun.
It’s sad, but it’s fun.

I keep writing you into my poems
like I’m building you a place
to come home to.

I keep retelling the ending
like I’m trying to dig you out —
like if I say it soft enough this time,
you’ll remember how it’s supposed to go.
(Anyway, that might be the worst part:
I’ll never know if you hear me.)

Maybe I haven’t been healing,
maybe I’ve just been waiting.
Waiting for you to come back and tell me that I’m worth it.
But maybe I need to be the one to say it.

Anyway, I hope you’re okay.
(I mean that more than I mean anything else.)

And still,
I sat with my hands in my lap —
palms up,
like I was waiting for something
I knew wouldn’t come —
like stale air was all I could hold.

I traced the shape of your name —
sharp vowels, crooked consonants —
one letter for every season since you left.
I lost count at 14.

And still,
I can hear you —
laughing through your teeth,
saying you hated your name.

I poured a drink,
watched the whiskey pool at the 14 mark,
glass sweating like it knew,
and thought about swallowing the whole thing.

Instead,
I held the glass so long
the ice melted to nothing.

14 notes app confessions,
all timestamped at terrible hours.

"I'm sorry I always spoke to you like I was keeping score."
"I'm sorry my questions felt like weapons —
I just wanted to know where you kept the tenderness."

"I wanted you to love me more than you could."
"Forget I said that."
"I would have let you ruin me if you'd asked."

I deleted them one by one —
like stitching my mouth shut,
like learning to speak without a tongue.

I know you’re out there —
shaking change in your pocket,
like the sound might drown out your guilt,
ripping napkins into tiny pieces,
thinking about calling
but never meaning it.

I know you drink with the lights off now —
like you’re scared your own shadow might tell on you.

I know you’re out there —
but I don’t know where.

And still,
I sat with my hands in my lap —
not calling,
not crying,
not moving —
just waiting for something
I couldn’t name.

I stood barefoot on the cold tile,
watching the faucet drip —
14 slow drops,
each one sounding like a pin hitting the floor.

I tried to count faster than they fell.
I always lost.

I counted the pills in the bottle —
just checking.
There were 14.

I closed the cap
and held my breath —
like it might open itself again,
like it was waiting to see
if I’d already lost something.

But instead —
I sat with my hands in my lap,
14 pointing to you,
if you know what to know.

I pressed my thumb into the bruise on my arm —
just to feel something bite back.
It bloomed like ink under my skin.
I counted to 14
and let go.

I still wake up at 4:14 —
lungs tight like I’ve been running,
like my body forgot how to breathe without you,
like something’s burning in my chest,
like something’s trying to get out.

I don’t pray for you.
I don’t curse you either.

I sit up,
open my palms —
the room holds its breath.

I listen.
I taste blood.

And still,
I sit with my hands in my lap —
palms up,
like I’m waiting to be handed something
I know won’t come —
palms up,
like I’m being punished for asking at all.

But my hands won’t stay empty forever.

14 pointing to you,
if you know what to know.

I kept waiting for someone to say my name
like it mattered —
like it meant something more
than the smoke curling from their mouth
or the pause before their next thought.

I kept practicing how I’d answer,
as if the right inflection
could make me worth remembering.
I kept hanging around
like a seat at a table no one was saving —
elbows off the surface, back straight,
trying not to look desperate —
taking notes in the margins of other people’s lives,
highlighting the parts I thought I belonged to.

I filled my pockets with reasons to stay
and still got left behind.
I burned through summers,
cut my teeth on promises made in passing cars.
I stood on porches barefoot, whispering,
Say it back. Please say it back.
But they never did.

I should’ve known better —
should’ve stopped twisting my ribs into ribbon,
threading my spine through the eye of a needle.
I kept breaking myself down into fractions —
a fifth of my pride, a sixth of my spine —
like if I whittled myself thin enough,
I could slip through your keyhole
and rise up like incense burning in your room.

But you were always somewhere else —
feet planted in some other city,
hands too full to catch what I kept throwing.
I was all green lights and loose laces,
always running to meet you halfway —
never noticing you weren’t moving.

I feasted on Adderall
and kept my phone on loud.
I swallowed nights whole
and called it hunger.
Or else I slept for days —
stumbled downstairs with breath like battery acid,
ate three bowls of raisin bran and no water.
My bones went soft as rotting fruit.
My dreams felt like something I could stream —
pause, rewind, resume —
binge-watching my pleading in real time,
begging the screen to glitch out a better ending.

I chewed the quiet until my teeth ached —
gnawed on the hours like stale bread.
Nights stretched thin,
a damp washcloth wrung out too many times.
I stayed up rewriting the last thing you said,
like if I shifted the punctuation
I could make it kinder.
Turned your ellipses into commas,
your cold period into a question mark.
I swore if I curved the words just right,
they’d fold into something softer —
something I could survive.

I spent that week pulling myself apart —
scrubbing my skin until it blushed raw,
stripping it like wallpaper,
scrapping your name out of my throat
like a fish hook.
I kept your words in a jar under my bed —
tight-lidded and hissing like a hornet’s nest.

I kissed the air where you should’ve been
and tasted copper and sweat.
Pressed my tongue to the place it stung
and thought,
This is what love leaves you with —
a mouth full of blood
and a story no one believes.

I kept the lights low for weeks after.
And one morning, I woke up,
swallowed the silence like a dare.
I cut my name out of the air with my teeth.
I let the hurt stick under my nails —
dark and jagged —
and I kept writing anyway.

I spit the silence out like a pit —
sharp, bitter, black.
It hit the floor and rolled,
and for the first time,
I didn’t follow it.

I let it rot where it landed.
Let the flies have their fill.
Let the maggots move in.
Let the earth swallow it whole.
Let it die twice.
Let the ground forget it ever lived.