different oceans
sorting through your summer clothes, packing winter away in a closet just dark enough to forget. you say, “how does this shirt look?” it looks like sixteen previous springtime rituals with you and other shirts — handsome, sharp — like women have no chance but to adore you. and my stomach lurches because there once was a girl half your age, and three months of tears, so long ago but just like yesterday. she idolized you in a manner only the uncommitted can love, an exhilarated rush that caught your oh-so-human ego and swept you far out to sea. i told you to swim in the ocean of your choice knowing, before you answered, that i’d be spending my nights alone. years later, you’ve forgotten the tide but i still drown every time. i say, “you look handsome. really sharp.”



I LOVE this. So sorrowful, so wrought with yearning and never forgotten pain. Just beautiful.