there are just moments left
of this terrible year,
and I am weighed down
with decisions and consequence
and feelings of uneasiness…
did I make the right choice,
and will I ever be happy.

It’s terrifying,
trying to be an adult
when you and your partner
are both children.

I’m just praying next year
is better.

I have a winterflush
as always, cheeks: a cherry red
but I am as pale
as sun-bleached bones
left out under the desert sun.

I counted snowflakes
today, from the windows of my workplace,
counted snowflakes as I recounted
all the reasons I was unhappy,
all the people who had hurt me,
all the lies I had told.

I live in your voicemail box,
in those messages where you left me
laughing, where you once told me you bought
a stranger flowers, and you went swimming
in a puddle of candies.

It’s cruel
the way you can tell someone
they are everything,
but treat them like nothing,
make them feel important
but also invisible.

unsuccessfully,
I tried to write poetry
in the snow on the roads,
while I drove, fishtailing through
the cursive, curled letters
my tires left in my wake.

My reflection in a Christmas ball
was as skewed
as my perception of myself;
It was Christmas and
all I could think
is how alone I am.

It is Christmas Eve
and nothing’s normal,
with my older sister out of the house
and my family skipping evening church,
to watch Christmas movies and enjoy scented candles,
a mismatched dinner. the tree is decorated
with Santa’s sleigh emptied out on the floor.
My love is missing, home with his own
and I cannot stay awake or warm.

I want to be
underwater;
I don’t know why,
especially because
I am a terrible swimmer,
and I am terribly afraid
of drowning, always.
but in this moment,
I want to be encompassed by liquid
with my hair flowing around my face
and my limbs, absolutely
weightless

there is a room in my heart
where I sometimes hide,
where I like to play music on a whisper
and a whim, like the wind to sing lullabies
as I rock myself to peace.
there is room in my heart,
for you to stay with me.