I crave the days of innocence.

The days where I could act before thinking.

I crave the days of high self-esteem.

The days where I wasn't compared to her.

I crave the days of freedom.

The days where I didn't feel trapped.

I crave the days of company.

The days where I could express my emotions to others.

But most importantly,

I crave the days of happiness.

Life is just one big dream

Everything circles and the cycle repeats

Never knew I could be so empty inside

Never knew how bad I wanted to die

A place that was so familiar

Is so foreighn

I get tunnel vision

And my thoughts are frozen

Floating through a time warp

Seconds are lost

Minutes are gone

All I have left is a voice

That taunts the words “move on”

Walk away on glass and strain

Ears ring every time I hear your name

A bloody note labeled “you’re in the wrong space”

It’s a dark place

Everything is laced

Turn around

I can’t face my fate

I can’t face a huge mistake

Life is just one big book that screams collateral damage

Everything spins and I always get hit

Never knew life would go like this

Never knew someone so sad could exist

A place that was so sweet

Is so sour

My heart turns cold

And my brain has expired

Crawling through an apocalypse of lost souls

My mind is lost

Is anybody home?

Can you take twenty years and waste my time

This is not my prime or anything divine

This is what heaven and hell feel like

When their worlds collide

Tears of blood I bled

Get me out of this bed

Get out of my head

These are all the words I should've said

But I let them control me instead

The remnants of parted lips

On his neck

Loose enough to sink a life

Betrayal of twilight and a soft foyer glow

His eyes read like pages

Juvenile lines

Fresh from words

He's never spoken before

And never intended to speak of again

A back pocket night

February air and its shiver

To trade love and life

For 30 pieces of silver

I woke up next to someone new

    Anxiety inside me grew

Who is this man in bed with me?

    Where did we meet, who could it be?

I shook my head to clear the fog

    Tried to dispel hangover bog

What had happened late last night?

    Possibilities gave me fright

Another eve of drugs and wine

    Now I lay here in a bind

Ensnared in sheets and coverlets

    Drowning in morning regrets

I stare down at a stranger's face

    Trying to recall his embrace

I sit up slowly, aching head

    Carefully slip out of bed

He stirs and mumbles in his sleep

    His beauty makes me want to weep

Try as I might, his name won't come

    For all I know he's just some bum

I light up my last cigarette

    Wondering just how we met

Oh where did I end up last night?

    Nothing seems to shed the light

I cross the room back to the bed

    I gently sit down near his head

I softly brush a lock of hair

    Out of his eyes and then I stare

He looks a bit familiar

    I wonder just how close we are

I feel like there is something more

   Than strangers dancing on the floor

I crush my smoke out in a tray

    I try to make my mind replay

The memories seem close to me

    But just not close enough to see

I jump when he begins to wake

    Opens his eyes, I double take

He smiles and touches my hair

    "Good morning, love, my lady fair."

Finally it all comes back

    My memory is no longer black

He is no stranger after all

    We were married late last fall

I have a haunting brain disease

    Sometimes I lose my memories.

I sometimes wonder

How we all view each other

In this space for writing

Is it a few seconds of judgement

Based solely off of one word

How much does a profile pic

Sum up everyone's view

Is it the mood we're in

Or consistent themes we see

The number of likes received

Maybe the added poetry pics

Just some thoughts

How we perceive each other

And on the criteria it's based upon

I wave goodbye

standing at the top of a building,

vultures gliding waiting for my morsels.

I skip ropes of my ambivalence,

rip off your crimson bandage of hatred,

throw it to the soaring currents.

I look down to see the damp rocks

in the onyx river of concrete,

pore over my life of closed zippers.

I take a running leap -

the toes of my shoes catch

on the edge of all I have lost.

Flashlight gripped tightly in my hand

spotlights the hopeless leap

of no tomorrow.

The elevator of my existence

wings downward in a spiral

as a little semblance of me

floats above rubbernecking

in abject fascination of

cutting edge flight of no return.

Inundated by contradictions

I can’t turn back from intimacy

of cancelling my reality.

I do it for you, I say!

This old apartment

Dusted with long years

With good times and bad times

And all the times in between

Standing now, dark in dusk and shaded golden in memory

The street before it catching my tears

The sun is rising somewhere else

Even as this one sets

I turn my heart, my mind, my soul, my body

To that distant sun

And I move on

I would rather you remember me as I was. Before.

Shining beautiful, tingling with desire, crying easily, talking and stepping too loud. Embarrassing, but funny…or so I thought. Remember me pinching your armpit where my head, tucked, was always the coziest, making you wriggle, squeeze tears and snort laughter. Remember me snuggled up tight with our babies, snoring and stealing your covers… with one eye open.

Forget this exhausted shrunken husk, dehydrating in the late summer air, begrudgingly giving feed to the tumor that used to nip and graze sometime, but has finally settled in for the long banquet.

So that when my soul, afire, spills open into the autumn wind, coating golden spinning leaves…and you…and them, you can shake me loose and dust me off. And help the kids do that too.

And remember me as I was. Before.