i think i'll always think of him as the ocean
with his eyes made of tidal waves and
a voice like a current that could always
pull me closer

i was the weather,
a pair of glass eyes that would rain
when i could no longer find reasons
to fall in love with the sun, and
i remember the days when he would
hold me in his arms when i could no longer
find shelter inside my skin, and
how our intertwined fingers became
my newfound reason to live

and letting go always felt
like i had run out of oxygen, gasping for
a feeling i thought i would lose
because i was taught that
love always dies, that it would only be
a matter of time before i would be left
suffocating in silence alone once more

but i am able to breathe on my own now
without feeling as if my chest could collapse
and swallow me whole
because i know that even the darkest skies
hold beauty within them, and if i just look up
a little farther,
i will see the moon

I often think about how and why our lives intersected
and how strange it was that we used to be nothing more
than two bright-eyed five-year-old kids
in the same kindergarten class over a decade ago
and how now we were lying down side-by-side listening to Hozier
through his beat-up headphones and stargazing in the back of someone’s pickup truck

and it’s strange how
neither of us had the courage to point out
the fact that there were no visible stars in the cloudy sky that night
because
that
didn’t
matter


all that mattered was the fact that for an eternity and a half,
I had felt more like a glass left half-empty and yet now I wished
that this moment would never end,
that we could just lie here in the freezing cold that burned my bones to the core
just because my head rested fine on his chest and that was enough

and I wonder why it’s so hard for me to open up to him
even though he unfolds himself for me,
opens up doors to his beautiful soul just so I am able to peek through
the cabinets where he stores all of his reasons to live, and
where he hides the parts of him that he would get rid of, if he had a choice

I want to tell him about the poetry I have found in the way he walks,
he talks,
he breathes, and
how staring into those ocean eyes makes me feel
like I’ve suddenly hit the bottom, permanently gasping for air,
but
I love it,
I love it,
I love it,

and as we stare up at the sky
in the back of an old pickup truck
by an old crumbling church,

my God, his voice matches the silent hum of the street lights,
burning in sync with our imaginary stars
and at this moment, I am no longer an almost-empty glass,
I am alive

if you can hold her hand
without feeling torn at the idea that
one day, you may never feel its warmth again,
then you are not in love with her

do not keep muttering worn-out
i-love-you's
under your breath
just to fill the empty spaces in the air
even if they no longer beat with passion,
do not try to explain the thousands of reasons
why you love her
if you don't

because if you can live with the thought
of her name being engraved in
someone else's mind,
her fingers running through someone else's hair,
the thought of those beautiful words
whispered into lips that don't belong to you
then you have never loved her, even for a second

and the bitter fragments
of the love she gave away
were never worthy to
belong to you

when i think of you, my brain fills with white noise
like the muffled static on a TV screen, you were always something
that filled the void, that kept the emptiness occupied
but you're gone and i'm left here wringing my hands together
when the chorus of your favorite song comes on the radio, and
i cannot breathe, i cannot breathe, i cannot breathe
with all of these words draped around my neck,
with the weight of a thousand sharp memories that
still sting despite the thousands of times i've tried to demolish them

i used to dance endlessly to the beat of your heart,
but a music box can only wind so much, and now
i'm stuck listening to the same silent scream of
i want you, i want you, i want you,
i'm still addicted to every part of that familiar old voice
though i swore i was finally clean

every day that passes feels like the last page ripped out
of my favorite book, not even worth reading anymore
because i wouldn't want to waste my time reading a story
that ends without you by my side

I look at you and I see half-finished poems and words that don’t exist, your eyes are like indigo oceans I keep drowning in but somehow I don’t mind not being able to breathe.  I wish I knew more about why you are the way you are, what terrifies you the most about yourself, and why I find it difficult to catch my breath when you look at me as if I am a stolen daydream. You make up for a lot of things, really, like going through fourth period half asleep because last night it took me three hours to stop thinking about you. You make up for that, and everything else. You are made of electricity and good intentions stitched together with a voice that could shatter a million hearts, and I am just a lost soul wondering why I trust you with mine. And I do, I do, I trust you with my stupid old heart, and I want to memorize every single corner of yours like the back of my hand. I want to know how a heart like yours could love such a wounded one like mine, but maybe that’s what love is, sacrificing perfection for something tragically real. I look at you and I see fluctuating potential, like the morning sun peeking out behind tired gray clouds, and how sometimes that has to be enough. Ever since I met you, my heart has remembered how to beat, my hands have remembered how to hold, and you love me enough to make me forget how much I don’t love myself. Maybe you are temporary and maybe you’re an illusion, but I still cling to the hope that maybe, this is why I held on until now.