Every moment I am not somewhere else— Portland, Los Angeles, Europe, god damnit—I am that much closer to majoring in mathematics and slowly wasting away, teaching ungrateful students my least favorite subject, for the rest of my life. 

I’ve always been dramatic. It’s soul-crushing here.

You, you’re no help at all.
You snuff out all my candles,
force me to walk forever with my arms outstretched.
There aren’t any footsteps in the dirt for me to follow.
You took special care to make sure you hid those.
But now I can’t even make any for myself.

We exaggerate every day. 
“I told you a million times.”
“Everyone is raving about it.”
“I love you to the moon and back.”
If it isn’t true, why say it at all?
I’d rather you keep your mouth shut tight,
so that no syllables can slip past your lips
and break my heart.

I want to be held in your cigarette-smoke embrace forever. I want to close my eyes, be able to smile and hum and know that you are mine, even if only briefly. Que sera, sera.

What more could I ask for?
I have you to admire, five times out of seven.
Never am I able to touch—never.
But it’s like a museum. 
I love museums.
You are the piece of art—
My Thinker, my David, my Discus Thrower.
I will never be able to own you,
nor will I be able to take you home with me.
It’s tragic, it really is.
But you are beautiful,
and I love museums.

Waking up was a mistake. Removing myself from my warm bed, rising with the disgusting sense of hope that somehow got me through the day and led me here, to this terrible moment.

I should have known that this would happen last night, when I couldn’t catch my breath, and was too afraid to fall asleep.

Would you like me to tell you what I see? I see forest green—woods, thick, dark, and deep. I see the tops of trees lingering in a dark blue sky, the stars nonchalantly splaying our future out above our heads in languages indecipherable. I see hiking boots and tall cliffs and you, the elusive you, holding my hand. I see kisses in frigid, mountain air, hazy photographs documenting our love, and you playing a familiar tune on your guitar. I see darkness, the orange glow of flames on our faces, the salty smell of the sea in the air and the sound of each wave’s death in our ears. I see eyes closed, praying to anything, to the stars, that this feeling never goes away. That we are always in love. That we are always surrounded by insurmountable beauty.

In your face, I see an atlas.
Everywhere I could go.
Everything I could be.

I am waiting for an enigma dressed in nice clothing,
With a tongue that speaks in riddles,
And eyes capable of making the perils of a young and foolish girl’s life seem insignificant.
Hands that not only touch,
But feel,
And tell stories through fingertips,
Transcribed into a language that only flesh can understand.