Apologies

I won’t bring you bouquets of gardenias

After i’ve made you feel small
I won’t leave pink peonies in your mailbox

When i speak in hurtful absolutes
I won’t clip the hydrangeas from the yard

In remorse for scaring you
I won’t pick sunflowers on the side of the interstate

To ask you to stay

I never want the innocence of new blossoms

To veil my attempts to cut you down

The blooms that bring you joy

To wilt with the painful memory

The sweetness of a flower

To sour with association

I will never bring you flowers

Arranged as an apology

I will walk through fields in repentance

Sowing seeds for new growth

You deserve gardens.

someday someone will

On the count of three

i didn’t want to forget that we seemed so happy

I remembered the July heat and singing strawberry wine 

the backgammon board set up all funny.

I told you i was a crippled pony

and you told me you led horses into the woods to calm them

but you must have forgotten that.

I started counting backwards days ago

3-2-1, I know

you forgot the songs we sang,

the jokes i told were getting old.

All the self deprecation you said you hated

you nodded along and thanked me

for admitting my wrongdoings.

The question that was never asked,

“Do we each deserve a sad prince

with our own dirty records?”

Will we bandage you but leave our war wounds bleeding?

You were the first person to cry with me

and say no, never,

you deserve something else (but not better).

I took down the note you wrote,

“I have your back.”

I believe you didn’t know it,

but you didn’t mean that.

Telepathy

When you are very sick

remind me

the Tanbark tunnel held me like a cradle
the womb that let me down so long ago
i turned the headlights off
and let her carry me

remind me why
you can't carry me
do i not deserve
the reds and yellows before the fall

no flying, just falling,
just dead and i told you
this morning
i still may kill myself

you got sick to your stomach
and swore it wasn't me
i wonder if we can keep
each other happy

She held me like the body that could not hold me
with uncertainty
remind me why
we can't be happy

Run

Two Choices, a haiku

contact solution, hiaku

Return.

Just as New Orleans whispers to the water

You whisper to me, “I mean.”

“We knew it would return.”

I thought maybe not.

I hoped 

I could keep the water at bay

but we become tolerant 

and our levees break.

I wish I didn’t want to dive in

but here I am

underwater.

Here.

This might be where I love you the most, here,
with your nose in the cupboard,
sniffing the maple syrup bottle and cocoa dust

Here, at 2:02 am, when I hear you stirring,
kissing my hand just because and I turn to you,
and you play asleep

And later, when you woke with a bellyache and
couldn't make it to the door
the wet on your face and your oil-spill eyes

When you jumped and broke the vase
and I scolded you for chewing the Winterberry
only to find that it was caught in your hair

I apologized.
Here.
I love you the most.