DAY 773: something beautiful

The first thing you said when your back was flush with my chest
is that no one is allowed to fall in love
you laughed
and I felt your smile tremble across my collarbone
all i did was hold you tighter
trying to convince myself that being that rational was possible
that i could actually choose not to fall for anyone,
especially you
that i could use my lips to turn your body into a temple
without finding myself making home somewhere inside of you


in that moment
i promised i would learn to use these hands
to do nothing more than touch
definitely not to build
pillar after pillar
not even to imagine
the blueprints of what a future of ours could look like
like Saturday, Sunday, Monday afternoons spent gliding through these waters
how our days could be lit by the smiles and laughter of your loved ones
because I have already fallen for the way their happiness hovers around you like a halo
and am terrified that our home could be built
with the same palms i would use to hold you
in that moment
i was hallow
happy to be connected to something
someone
who seemed so alive
so happy
to just sit there in my arms
in silence
watch the waves do what they do best
crash
and rebuild


i wanted to leave the stickiness of it all behind
but somehow
everything about our days seemed to fall off your body
like silence
and im stuck holding handfuls of sand
like a promise
and yes,
maybe a handful
is enough for a bridge
from california to rhode island
but maybe a bridge would take us in the wrong direction

Ke'ala
i said it before
but i find myself having to repeat myself these days
please dont mistake me for a promise
you know
more than anyone
sometimes i say things because they are beautiful
and because i wish them to be true
sometimes they arent
sometimes
a love poem
is everything you want
but not even a hint of what you need
and everyday i spend writing them
is another day ill spend alone in my car singing along with sara bareilles

beautiful,
listen closely
because i can only ever say this once
'run in the opposite direction'
i care for you enough to say
there is nothing inside of me that will bring you comfort
i am only a siren
a mermaid
flinging my poetry into the distance
no matter how honest
you are coming too close for your own protection
because when you feel near enough to taste i cant help but say these things
to ask you
to remember the songs we sang into the ocean
"Na pua riki te vaka of ru..."
remember the way the tones bounced off the water
turned to mist and disappeared
how the way i would hold you
would bounce off your body
turn to mist
and disappear
or the songs we flung into the airbags
"in the morning it comes, heaven sent a hurricane.. not a trace of the sun but i don't even run from rain"
how the words fell to the steel under our feet
rattled
and then silenced
how the way i said goodbye
fell to the street
rattled
and silenced
how you were completely out of sight before i allowed my engine to roar
leaving me
alone on your street
until i could convince myself that you were already gone
that i had to leave


now
there is silence all around me
and i've spent last couple of nights singing hoping you too would memorize the way your body moved under me
how my lips
turned you into a tide- crashing and rebuilding
how your breath bent me backwards
how the sounds you called silly slipping out of you
was the closest i'd felt to heaven beyond climax in too long to recount
how finding that heaven without traveling through its eruption seemed poetic
how recounting these stories
alone
on the same couch that i found you smiling into me
seems pathetic
how no matter how true these words are
they will give you a false impression


do not forget
you are not the only love poem i've ever written
somehow i have developed a reputation for doing just this
its starting to make sense
why every single one of our friends warmed you and not me
maybe
I wasn’t there’s to warm
Maybe when I left this ocean
I sacrificed my right to be anything but a tsunami in my return
or maybe
there is something about their silence in my direction that means something


maybe its a lesson in growing
that they believe i cannot be changed
and maybe they are right
but maybe i think you could change me
today i think that’s it
but growing up means admitting that its possible that
thats just something beautiful
that i wish
were true