in this lifetime I think I’m meant to understand loss

(perhaps there was a time when my path led somewhere lighthearted 

maybe I remember that joy and I unknowingly carry it with me

I’ve already learned laughter

I’ve memorized smiles 

can you truly understand the value if you haven’t felt the deprivation?

that old lighthouse of some made-up time is a beacon 

look hear, come ‘round it says

this one is missing the feeling 

of sand slipping down trembling hands 

of sand crumbling over bloody lips 

of someone collapsing under the weight of a heart 

have I ever truly watched a moon disappear with time

knowing I couldn’t stop a sun from withholding it’s love

what strength it must take to be able to hold onto those you cherish 

slipping 

you’re already slipping from my fingertips)

I’m going

to watch you go like I’ve known it all along

(like I’m watching a play I’ve directed

stumbling, confused actors

giving their well-intended dialogues

I’m a candle setting

possibilities on fire to feel warm again and

it’s winter in my mind)

our conversations linger like lines of poems 

I will write them down to preserve

and bury

you

(that beacon says look hear, look at the person who 

hasn’t learned how to hold on tight 

a petulant child who’s had too many things stolen

at an age too young

I’ve learned the harder I fight 

the more it hurts)

I will leave

the door open to let you fly out 

I will wait for you to go

 obsequious in my patience

(my hands could never catch you 

these hands of mine are clumsy not clever

I couldn’t teach myself the tenderness it takes

to keep anything more than mementos and)

I want to hold you close

(the most beautiful things are the most free

so I build shrines of tombstones of

bones and blood and I watch with

a heart that knows how to pound remorse 

hands that know how to paint desolation 

words that know how to write melancholy 

it always comes back to my art regardless

of the destruction I evoke

can the two live without one another?

I’m trying to hold them apart

I’ve never succeeded but somehow

I think this time will be different

And when it’s not)

I’ll tend to your grave long after you’re gone