I quit you without cigarettes, red wine 

Or suicide

Not gonna lie

Maybe 

you didn’t cause as much damage as I thought

Or 

maybe 

what I said is true

We can’t say the wrong thing to the right person

It’s also quite possible 

I never really loved you 

Or

I believe in our love with such complete absolution that I know this was merely the act of two 

One scene in the play of our story

inner children retreating to their respective corners to face the wall and think about what we’ve done

wrong 

What I’ve done

Was 

wanting you 

such a bad idea

Since all I can do is think in the silence

Sink in

Detoxing hot baths with countless hours of scripture, sermons, frequency, divination

Which only serve to magnify a multitude of aimless assumptions

you miss me 

For all the wrong reasons,  

you died

After the seizure

the arrest

Questioning dreams 

After you disappeared 

I will too if

you’ve fucked someone else

assuming you wanted her 

to be me

you got a burner to troll for digital hookers

Who?

assume you’re sleeping all day

Cause you never were good about 

texting back

assuming you’re drowning in anxious self-loathing your ego defending itself with every innocent spin imaginable 

you’ll blame me because 

you still blame all of them

assuming we’ll get back together

regret it if we do

go crazy if we don’t

assume your cell felt like a self-imposed sentence…as if you had no choice but to 

publicly

recklessly

helplessly 

turn your insides out 

to show everyone your broken heart

instead of facing your ACE’s like the rest of us

confessing sins to total strangers 

Forgive us 

brothers and sisters 

For we have sinned

And for this I must be  

assuming you did it to keep yourself safe 

because you’d lost me 

and happily ever after only comes 

after the Fall

assuming you don’t sabotage 

a cry for help 

because 

so would I if had balls

Men can do that 

Go off the rails, 

flip tables, 

crash cars, 

destroy nations, 

breathe fire from mountain tops 

and we idolize them…or 

just terrified into submission 

Perched on sofas like shivering chihuahuas pretending we don’t think 

you’re completely insane 

while boiling in the stew of our own shame 

for feeling so unloved and lonely 

that we even 

considered letting you near us 

Women die a thousand deaths while doing dishes

self-reinvention and laying there pretending nothing’s happening 

so everyone can get 

some piece

I quit you quietly 

Before you ever said a word to me

Assuming what you really wanted 

Is something I’ll never be

Accepting your request for my name 

With resignation 

from a lifetime that led me to falsely believe we didn’t deserve 

what we prayed for

And therein lies our problem 

A pale light of recognition I both feared 

and could not resist 

Was all around you

Was all around us 

There it was again

The both and of familiarity 

You never prayed for me

Did you?

I certainly never 

once prayed for a man 

to scream insults at my face 

in my own home for countless hours till 

I finally escaped only to have him 

chase me down the street 

demand that I 

pull the fuck over 

and talk to him cause 

You’re not gonna outrun me!

You need to talk to me 

The funny thing is 

I chased you 

For the better parts of a year 

With my words

Outpourings of offerings

Quiet invitations of our hands clasping 

under the cover of night

With a level of honesty even I sometimes 

could not bare to witness 

I was right there 

And we did talk

For hours 

Romaine and shredded carrots 

Juan Juan Juan

Babble on 

I was hoping 

eventually you’d say something 

But your prayers came served with Cesar dressing 

That performative ritual I endured each night as my food and your heart grew equally cold

Was not the same as the howling truths inside 

Truths we’re forced to ignore 

Because conscious healing requires 

so much more 

time than most of us are actually afforded 

So we settle for justifiable madness 

The barking of which echoes 

in the paperboard of these walls

The very worst part is

I want them 

or you 

or both to enfold me

Because you promised 

you’d never hurt me

It’s just 

our pet dragons awoke each other 

blew up our life 

And every time I assume I’ve quit you

Becomes proof 

That I cannot in fact 

outrun you~

Sometimes poetry comes out like this xo