The tears just don't stop. I feel like I've been crying for days. My eyes are starting to burn. I can't breathe from all the sobbing. My voice is gone. Screamed out. Nobody can reach me now. I've flooded my surroundings with the pain of your name and the questions you left unanswered. And now I'm an island. Incapable of being reached unless someone should swim to shore. But none will dare to cross that treacherous path. No one will find me out here. 

Lying in this cold air

September

came so quickly

and soon I’ll be a year older

remember

how you promised me

you’d take me to that concert?

you said

“I won’t mess up your birthday
this year”

but surprise, surprise
you’re not here

Just my naked body

alone

between these cold sheets

she’s in between yours

sewn

into the seams of your

broken, empty heart

single

that’s what you said you wanted

your lies

are an elaborate

work of art

But somehow, I’m not

missing

your touch on my skin

your morning

kisses

I stretch and I breathe

and I’m finding my voice

I thought I had lost it

but it turns out

it was just being drowned

by the sound of your rambling

endless noise 

4am questions

It was 4am today when I woke up. A little foggy in my head, but crystal clear were my feelings. The alcohol had lulled me to sleep but not long enough. In that dazed, barely awake state is when my feelings for you become far too clear. I am most vulnerable in those moments, when I don’t have you to turn to anymore with my aching backs and heartbreaking dreams that I begin to question everything. Like did I do something to deserve this? Do I bring loneliness on myself? Is it impossible to love me?

Everything about the situation is unfair. It is unfair that you left a bullet hole right through my heart and left me to bleed out; while you seem to have nothing but a finger prick from me that you were instantly able to place a band aid on. And it doesn’t make sense really. If I gave you so much more than you gave to me, shouldn’t it be that when you lose it, you are missing more than I am?

But maybe that’s the point. I lodged my love into you like a bee stings its victims. I gave you more than you wanted, and when you left, you ripped out my insides and left me to die. And maybe my damaged self continued to push my love into you even after you were gone. But you didn’t want it, because real love hurts. So you removed it and covered it up and tried to forget.

But unlike the bee I can choose to rise again. I can put myself back together and take back what I gave to you. And I can be more whole and alive than you ever will be, because my love is powerful. And the answer to the 4am questions I ask myself is a solid no. I am worthy of everything good in this life. It is you who do not recognize, do not deserve my love. Even if I hurt you, I never would have left you. And it doesn’t matter if you never see it.  Because I’m starting to.

I’m taking back myself.

Memories float past
like the clouds
of the smoke blown in my face
last time I went out
heavy and suffocating
but I can’t grasp
so I just inhale secondhand
as they blow past
drawing tiny bits of you
into my lungs
where they’ll cling forever
long after we’re done
blackening my insides
in a very slow burn
others have suffered
but now its my turn.

Washing your scent
out of my sheets
tearing up photographs
of you and me
boxing up memories
then
changing my mind and throwing them away

Washing the rest
of your toothpaste
down the drain
letting my thoughts go to waste
remembering
how you never cared how much that bothered me

Washing my feelings
out of my eyes
and nobody knows
how often I cry
because
without you there’s no one to really confide in

Washing my hands
of all of the guilt
tearing down all
the resentment I built
forgiving
is the hardest thing I’ve had to do yet

I wake up alone
and I roll to my side
realizing you're gone

I let myself cry
and I lie awake
and I realize
my nightmares: once calmed
by you and only you
now caused
by you and only you.

Images of you
are the absolute worst
waking in a cold sweat
seeing you with her.

I watch her in flashes
where I used to be

I see the look in your eyes
once only for me
and I watch her unfold

I wish I couldn’t’ see
you moving forward
but what I don't perceive:
you giving up
her leaving your side
she's not strong enough
against your pain and pride
and that space in your heart
only I could take
but when you reach for me

I'll long since be awake
leaving you in my nightmares

I’ll open my fists
‘til you don’t dare appear there

I’ll let go of this
aching and pacing
and pictures of her
I’ll choose to forget
‘til your face is a blur
then one day, entirely
you’ll disappear

and in the dead of the night

I’ll stop wanting you here.

            (a.s.)

And the irony is
before you left 
we fought so much
about your music
because 
it made me sad
and reminded me
of a time in my life
when I’d rather be dead
that only ended 
when I met you

But now that you’re gone
that music is playing
constantly
in my house
because I’m giving up 
on life again
and what’s weird is
you’ve been listening
to the things I like
and I just wish
we could have been like this
before it all went to shit.

This house is haunted
I hate the emptiness
my heartbeat keeps me up at night
a rhythm your hands once kept time with
on the guitar
making me fall for you
and now it just echoes
all night long
and I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again
until that beat ends
and the fear in my head
stops playing in time with it.

And the only thing keeping me
from bleeding out 
is reading your messages
grasping at straws.
I thought you’d always be here
I thought I could let go
…and I guess I was kind of right
because you’re still here
you’re part of my soul