potency

bloody march

I.

i let your insides die
and rot on that bridge.
let them call 911,
let the police handcuff
your teary eyes until there
was nothing left to hold.

clocks had slowed,
for it had been months since
i was on your bathroom floor
trying to keep you alive
so that i might as well,
not hours

i got my way and
that's what killed you.
after the clawing of wrists
and baring teeth,
we ended the extravaganza
we plagued with the word
love. on a bridge.
the wind whisking
through your hair
and begging you to jump.

they joined us
as the congregation of our choir
which we had thought to be holy,

but was shouting to no one.

II.

once white cars
had driven you away,
i sat with my family,
ready to not feel any of it.
so we gazed at the
black and white holographs
the piano creaking to
fill our blank space
and rattled in our seats.

but as the holographs burnt up,
the moon prowled as a memory
that we keep on dreaming,
i tousled the wave,
the crash,
the ice pick
on my temples

III.

and suddenly
it wasn't about you at all.

i
laid
weeping
on the floor,

finding god in the
blurry lightbulb above,
and asked him to take me.

with
naked arms,
i opened my body

so that he had a clear view
of my bruised, bruised heart.

i
didn't want
him to patch it,

i wanted him to examine it,
grab it in his fist

and
tell me

it was an unticking watch
with rust beyond repair.

i opened myself to him, and
instead of reaching for the heart,

IV.

he held my cheek.