foliage fall

Limbs on limbs
      Reaching higher as the footholds
            Lose their strength
      Keep on climbing anyway until
Slowly cracking
      Limbs turn into wings turn into
            Helplessness
      Rude awakening fast approaching
Back meets earth
      Like a thunder clap. Breath leaves
            Body like an escaped
      Convict; Doesn’t want to return ‘til
Warden Respiration
      Hauls him back in; pain settles but
            With temporary residence
      Not sure how it happened.
Won’t attempt that ascent
      ‘Til youth permits forgetfulness

sometimes

Sometimes, I miss you…

Like slow dances in the hallway to music heard only in our heads;
Like late nights curled up by the fire with a glass of wine and the
Sophisticated musings only Family Guy could provide.

I miss you like all-day text message conversations because our schedules
Don’t always allow us to see each other;
Like finally seeing each other and still having so much to say
Because every word from our mouths is important.

Like waking up and seeing you next to me and every time feels like the first.

Sometimes, I miss you like road trips to Louisiana, East Coast waves in July,
And sleeping on the air mattress in the guest bedroom at your mom’s house…
Alone.

I miss you like love-making on a beached catamaran that was too quick
Because we were both so nervous, but still amazing.

And sometimes…sometimes I don’t miss you.

I don’t miss you like double standards and unearned mistrust.

I don’t miss you like I can’t get lunch with another woman,
In public, I might add,
Whom I had known for five years before meeting you;
Like you can go on a four-day surfing trip with two men
I’ve never met and I am supposed to be ok with that, which I was…

I don’t miss you like Valentine’s Day blizzards when you are angry
Because I won’t drive across town in blinding snow to cuddle;
Like you thinking I forgot your birthday because
I was still awake at midnight but didn’t call you like your friends did.

I don’t miss you like…like…like a migraine;
Like you coming on to me only 3 times in nearly two years;
I don’t miss you like constantly questioning my own self-worth;
Like trying to live up to the man I think you deserve
While being constantly compared to the man your
Father failed to be.

Sometimes I miss you…but most of the time, I don’t.