I fell out of the top bunk once
completely naked
right onto the linoleum floor
of your dorm room,
praying that your roommate
wouldn't roll over and see my ***
at 3a.m.

I quietly crawled back up to you.
You cradled my spine,
I'm never letting you go again, I promise.
I told you I was fine,
so we both started laughing.
I had to cover your mouth
or else you'd wake the whole floor up.

You blare Kanye West from your speakers
when you're signing checks
or finishing that last math problem,
and I'll just sit next to you and grab
a piece of scrap paper to doodle on
while asking you stupid questions
just because I want to get you talking again.
Sometimes you take it out on me, but

sometimes we have cereal after ***.
You spoon feed me while I sit on your lap
in just our underwear
gasping when the cold milk
drops on our skin--
fruit loop kisses
and detangling my hair with your fingers.

I wear your Polo pull-over backwards
to the boys bathroom sometimes
just because it's closer to your room
and because my name is no secret anymore.

And on Sunday's I fold your laundry
on a gray blanket I lay overtop my ***** carpet,
because I love the smell of clean boxers
and you don't know how to iron dress shirts right.

But you kiss me with your mouth open,
and you hold me when I fall asleep,
and you're all I want to wake up to.

To be young with you,

(to hug with rusty elbows, screeching
beneath damp spring attire
from a hundred and seven seasons ago
to untangle the wrinkles of regret
that distorted our smiles
and rearrange our faces into hymns
for the lives we didn’t live
In the midst of it all: the comfort
of rediscovering
the shyness behind your ears)

To be young with you.

You come home on this day
and I taste the moist
of this afternoon’s snow, dying
in your hands
I won’t ask you if the cold
pressed your throat
till you breathed out
the ghosts you hid
Because I know:
you grew scales on your shoulder blades
but winter still nested
its crystals, cradling in your eyebrows
Even so, there are carols
in the shimmer between
your lashes

You are the most beautiful
when you sing

Hugging until our bodies
break
like your voice
as it stops speaking
anything but
me

When Fear glued my hand to your sleeve,
you put us in your pocket.
We’re about to blow out that pocket-sized happiness
until we run out of breath
and our fingers turn cold

Our eyes were always
untying each other’s seatbelts
knowing the loneliness
of driving on different roads

They set fire to our houses
so we looked for the sea
to ease our burns

we jump towards

togetherness

I finger the duck,
  with a plastic finger,
The blood flows,
  to the middle knuckle.

How we reflect
To construct eternity;
Gazing at stars.

Street lights
Building the same obsidian glimmer
To light the world.
Not so we can see,
But so when the stars gaze upon us
They can see how gloriously bright they truly are.

It's coming.
What I've been told to look forward to,
My entire childhood up until this point,
That this will be the greatest time of my life,
That I will build all of my happiest memories in these next four years.
And now it's almost arriving,
And I am scared.

When you're scared,
You like to take control of everything.
You will do anything and everything you can to stay on top,
And I know you wish I reacted the same way,
But I don't.
I shy away, I procrastinate, and I try to ignore my problems,
This rising fear I have growing in my stomach,
Which is not full of butterflies, but of bees.

I will do it,
I know I will, I want to more than anything,
But it would really help,
If,
For now,
You could leave that bit to me?
I will find my own motivation, I promise.