This is when I remember that if I am dark it doesn't mean you are 

If I am sea 

You might not be

We are separate seeds 

I could grow without you

To put all of your skin onto a canvas 

The color of your blood

The lion of your lung 

Fawn of your pupil

__vulnerability

You 

Soft like lace 

With the spirit of electricity 

They say that yellow first attracts the eye

When people leave your house 

You have painted all of their skin with it

It is the loudest 

Most unsettling noise 

_to be too busy

To be an artist 

Without rest 

In your own home 

_your body

Father's Day

"I'm so sorry"

You mention

And hold up your hands

They are shaking 

There are pills full of water 

Collecting in your eyes 

And out pours all of it 

The violent hurt of a father 

you cannot celebrate on a day you should be able to 

The man you almost loved surrounding all four sides of you at the church water fountain 

A man your daughter almost called father 

And a divorce from a man who

Left you alone with Emma

You apologize over and over again to us

While we watch the trauma in your fingertips  

_no apology necessary 

"I'm over here "

He called out to the cops as they 

With their guns at their hips like soldiers circled the garage 

She was going to leave him 

Because recently his behavior was different 

She had taken a few strokes across the face and wasn't about to take more 

Slowly she would take the boxes she told him

Maybe it was his slow attempt to push her away because he had a gun rattling for his attention on a drawer somewhere

"It wasn't because she was going to leave me" he had stated in the letter 

And on Facebook it says in his status that he loves wood, and Cindy

She could hear the gunshots from where they had put her in the back of the police car And he requested to not be remembered at all 

Cremation

No gravestone 

No funeral 

I was probably mixing my Mac and cheese over Lindsey's stove when it happened or taking in air as I slept 

And his spirit was leaving his body 

Cindys hands pressed to her face 

_You can never save a man he must resolve it himself 

"I was raped last night"

She said rather carelessly 

And then pressed the matter in

Like an iron on a white crisp shirt 

By glancing up right into my eye 

slung her leg around

Propped the plastic part on the metal footrest and told me she wanted to be platinum 

She sucked tea into her esophagus 

While telling me about the chronic headaches 

And I found a large arch of a scar along the right side of the back of her head 

Where the tumor came out 

Hatred of yourself will not be punishment enough 

It can't pay for all that you've done or the things your breathed under breath and into the air

But 

He has taken the razor to his wrist (nails to his hands) for you

So that despite your flaws my flaws 

we have no flaws 

_you have no flaws in my eyes either 

I wish you knew that I don't want you to be hurting 

Or drinking your way out of feeling 

I think you should flood the house with grief if that is what you need 

And recover when your organs have emptied themselves of him 

Someday he will simply be a pasture you once walked through in a storm 

_ive been there