It doesn’t need to be easy to love you
I want to come into your grief house and sit beside you.
We don’t need to open the windows, we can lean against
opposite sides of the couch while it rains outside. The windows
are navy, the Christmas lights make it worse make it better, make it
tolerable, make me love you. The first few lines are always easiest
as they’re the time before the space full of my fullest hearts, the beginning
makes sense but this is second beside third, resting beneath first, what
do I gesture to make you know I care, how do I angle my hands, when
can I be myself around you. But we’re in the grief house, rains are
oh-my-god status, I’m dreaming of tracing my pains into the fabric
of the couch with a knife, I’m easiest to love when I know what
kind of love you’d like. Might you hold me in my own grief house,
no, I cannot be beside anyone when my heart is unflaking, numb,
quiet, can you look at me sobbing or would you prefer other salt,
maybe make me sandwiches on week-old bread, give me water, take
my socks off when I’m sore. Grief house is full, the rain could stop
but I like humidity and winter coats, standing with a hand over my eyes
as our lashes grow, heavy, easiest to want you and I know we’re deep in life
now, I hide my language, I’m underwater, but will you see me, swipe
a beetle off my arm so it doesn’t bite, carry me despite the house, despite,
despite. Used to hold your words, made a new star to carry the blues and violets,
I tried to sit beside you despite the distance and here I am still. When gentle
rain coats the roof, when sleep is a fight, persist in easy ways. I thought I
could tell you now, but it’s not time, can we remain friends even in this thicket
of grief? Maybe I can break my promises to myself, admit to you how night
warms, sometimes warps, my history, how I cry easiest at the thought of you
disappearing, been up late to make sure I don’t miss your teal sounds, we’re
nearing rain’s end but if you don’t know how much I care at this point then
I don’t know how else to tell you. Except besides all the haze-gray dreams I
clipped for your ears, lost light and almost risked losing you, I’ve been given
access to the house but I don’t have a key. I enter under rain roads and silliest
jokes, I’m beside you as you sob, one hand on the fridge handle, one hand
on your chest, I’m not peeking, I’m counting tiles on your kitchen floor.
maxilla
lost, time twists into days, then come three in the morning you’re
near, teeth at my throat, hands pressed to sides, hands to me, warm
from the Tuesday sun. I thought I’d said goodbye to our energy yet
here you are, begging me back again, brilliant beneath the kitchen
lights, lovely as ever as you reach into the fridge for a handful of
dough. We pick at the fruit with our bare hands, which is never
a good idea because everything good bleeds and also I am in love
with the way that you eat strawberries from your palm. Cross-legged
in soft work pants our backs are pressed to the cabinets, I only care
about catching your gaze, I am swallowing every honest thing I’ve ever
wanted to say, I am untrue, I am unchanged, I am still here. You gazing
at the moonlights, bulbous and full, wondering why we’ve run out of
words to say yellow. Outside, the deli is still open, all pink then lilac
reflected in wet streets. Do you miss tasting me? I’m starting to think
I can’t write unless I’m enamored with you. Perhaps that would explain
why I took a break for over a month, took a whole month trying to rid
myself of your presence yet you linger in every stanza and line break
I can see you leering between bursts of language. I guess I missed you
I wonder if you can see it in my jaw.