of art museums and interludes.

Sometimes I still get nervous standing by an open door, feet hands arms legs trembling with the effort to stay put. To not run, kicking off these sneakers i've worn too many winters, bare feet scratching across the smooth cement landing, tangling through metal gridded fire escapes -

"let's run away, get out of this place for awhile."

please.

We could see the city, a pareil of lights spread glowing amber white like emergency levels, blinking distresses set to grids and reason, pulled apart until the individual glow was nothing, only the mass of buildings and streets criss-crossing filtered into our eyes; I never wanted to let go of your hand, only jump.

You were leaning against the rail, dirty converse stars swinging from even dirtier legs; there was the beginning of a hole in your right knee and i wondered if it would rip all the way through when we ran.

    If we jumped, and the ground caught us up, swept us along with the lights and the cold air and the dreams. oh the dreaming. like black slots before i blink, and then all i see is your face. and i wonder how much you've changed in the moments i didn't see. when i was busy in my head and you were barely existing, only the flicker of an arm, a hip. but i don't know who you are without me.

i'm only human.

and if we jumped, maybe my ankle would twist, maybe the tiny threads that keep us beating and together would miss a beat and the only things rushing into me would be your hands pushing open my chest.

cramming your screams into the little hole behind my sternum.

but i'll still be me. and you'll still only be you. and we never did jump, the beauty becoming too much in those vague predawn moments of open mouths and silence.

In the morning, when the cold finally penetrated our bones and sent us tumbling back into your room, I would find the tiny bent diamond pattern of the fire escape stitched into the back of my thighs, over and over and over again.


Now here, in this tiny vintage apartment with brick kitchen and reagan era fixtures, metal too cheap to price with more than the shake of a head; here, i've found you again.

I was leaving, minutes before midnight with only a few pretty faces between me and free; and then you're at my arm. fingers bruising me with the brutality of your question,

"are you running?"

yes. i don't know. maybe.
the weeks that i was away from you, when i woke up before december and felt only the need to be away from you. to be myself and whole without this anger turning me into the shrew you lived with,

when i left, i walked away.

i didn't run.


you never came, lost in the aftermath of a thousand cliches; things that words could not hold, that nobody could fix. stripped of our patterns, the endless codes of you became just another random. the braille of the sighted (my holy grail).

and you're here now, but i can't recognize myself.

and i think of your questions, the hardness that back then, i didn't know.

i still don't know.


and sometimes i still get confused: what is 'goodbye'?




(my god, the things we did for love.)