chrysanthemum

she's counting down the days they have left
throwing orange peels to the floor
and picking the pulp from underneath her fingernails like a
bad memory.

chrysanthemum
half crushed and bloody
but why would you ever bother counting if you'd learned your lesson and done the math and found the average and knew ahead of time that the answer would always be
not?

i remember the night we drove in the dark, your arms wrapped around my stomach,
and i remember the moon hanging like the heel of my shoe in the small of your back
and i remember so much that i tore out half of my own brain just trying
trying
trying
to claw away the memory of your eyes.

does that make me psychotic?
or was i always this way.

soon it'll be the anniversary of the day
they pulled me out of my blood and laid my corpse on the table.

and i've always thought that some part of me
the biggest part of me
has been trying to return to that day.
to that silver table in the middle of a hospital, and those bones that hadn't even tried to fuse together, and those violet lungs without anything in them except the last breath of my fair share...

i'm supposed to be dead.

and everything around me keeps reminding me of that.

the chrysanthemum stings, corners of my fingers already going red and puffy.
am i allergic?
am i allergic to the way you tried to tell me to slow down, pleading that i had time, pleading with your hands on my back in the parking lot i can't pass without seeing you there, pleading with those eyes i'd seen in the field full of dead grass where you couldn't tell me you loved me. and if only i could tell you how much they burned when you looked at me and asked

why can't you let go?

like we had clocks ticking in the back of our eyes
i screamed into your face
your beautiful face

you have
more time
than i do.

and i knew.
the moment i said it, i knew.
that i had set the timer on the box in the back of our minds. and we would never recover, because finally, finally, one of us had the balls
to do what pandora had always told us not to.

and the next time i heard your voice
you smiling
and you were leaving.

thank God.
He saw the end.
and He made it quick
and if that's not love?

i am on a rocket headed for the ground.
i am on a train with tracks off the edge of a cliff.
and you, with your beautiful brain and your horrible dreams, are going to get off long before that day comes, and i don't blame you.
not for the person i've become.
i blame you for pain, and misery, and happiness, but not for this.

if you hadn't jumped
i would've pushed you.
you, with your lit up face and your too-big heart.
i would've killed you on accident at some point
and i'm glad i never got the chance.

i've been dead since i was born, kid.

and running on borrowed time changes you even when you try to stop it. they always told me that. but i never believed them.
you have time to live a life, and to find out what's around that next turn.
but i'm on a one way road out.

and when i finally crash into the ground, burnt out, charred with memories and sunrises that ended way too fast,
i hope you'll know that i loved you.
and i hope you'll be proud of what i did.
and i hope you come to my funeral, sweetheart, chrysanthemum heart and all.
pay your respects
because you never gave me enough in this life.

i'll be resting in power
glad that death finally caught up.

because i hate being in debt.

x

the cynicism i'm bringing to my twenties, mingled with the hope i kept from the rest