ex's lament

I hope she makes you happy

But I didn't tell you that

Because I don't want to know.

time and space, timespace

Friday afternoon, March 6th, 2026.  Theia takes me to lunch in my neighborhood so we can both get out of our apartments and feel "more human." I think she also feels bad that I got laid off the day before. We go to the tamales place that's also a brewery, where we have mostly good conversation. In the middle of it, she does tell me that the person she's been hanging out with a lot--who she's told me about before--that they're seeing each other. I immediately, nonchalantly, wave it off and say it doesn't bother me. Later during lunch, I notice the spot between her neck and her collarbone--not a very hidden spot. She also puts her finger to her ear canal and mentions Ellie "really got in there." I start to realize that the things Theia used to do with me behind closed doors, she's now doing with another person. Hands. Mouth. Probably grabbing thighs and stomach fat. My face gets hot. We end up walking around the nieghborhood after lunch and then she goes home to meet her grocery delivery. I go home to a sad realization and to cry. When I go downtown later to have drinksw with Danielle, I tell her my ex is seeing someone else. She hums sympathies.

Somewhere around 7:15pm, Saturday, March 7th. I go see Monica's show at Theatre Off Jackson. I know Theia will be there, and she's bringing her new...flame. Sure enough, she finds where I'm sitting and comes over to say hi. She introduces me to Ellie, who smiles politely with a drink in hand and says "It's nice to meet you." She's beautiful, of course. She's shorter than me, with dark full hair, no visible dandruff, a dark red lip, and a fuller figure with a better hips. She's meant to have them, I think, thinking of my skinny chicken legs that don't fit my bulbous torso. It's awkward. They go back to their seats on the other side of the center section. Thank god for Avril, who shows up a minute later. We end up sitting next to a former classmate from undergrad, Sierra, whom neither of us have seen in some time. We catch up. I am grateful for the honest distraction.

The show is very moving. About grief and loneliness and letting go of someone you love. Monica is brilliant, of course, and moves me to tears for the second time I've seen a show of theirs. A now-former co-worker co-stars alongside Monica, Mariah. I feel the tiniest pinch of an actor's crush after watching their performances.

Later that night. Avril graciously gives me a ride homea fter dropping Monica off at their place. Avril asks me to tell them what's going on, because they could tell from how I acted in the theater that I didn't want to be around Theia and her date. I tell them that I said to Theia that I was okay with her dating someone new, but that I realized later that I wasn't. That I had thought all those sad, one-sided conversations about how lonely she felt--even after she'd broken up with me, sitting in our--no, her--bed, me biting back the "you made that particular choice, it doesn't have to be that way"--all of those times she said she needed more time and space to herself to figure out her own shit, that she'd meant that. But I guess not. "I think I need more time, and more space, before I can come back to her as a friend." Avril wholeheartedly agreed, "You need to do that for yourself, if not for yourself, then for the future of your friendship with her. But you should do it for yourself." They're right. In the middle of this conversation, we miss my exit and spend the re-routing singing very loudly to the first Phantogram song I ever heard with the windows down. I remember every word and feel fifteen years younger.

10:23pm, same night. I call Theia as soon as I walk in the door, she's doing dishes. I tell her I need more time and space. I don't want her to avoid events that I'm also at, and vice versa, but I tried being the cool ex-turned-friend, and it's not working. I can't follow the lesbian trope of immediately being friends with one's ex. She says she thinks that trope is bullshit anyway. I tell her it wouldn't be good for me, or fair to her. I have a jealous ball of iron in my gut that I need to remove, and that will take time (I wish had been that poetic when I talked to her). She said she understood. I said when I was ready to start a new chapter of our friendship, I would let her know. We said goodbye.

Lake Superior

There is a gulf in the middle of this house

It started with a drop and got wider and wider

There is a graveyard of freighters at the bottom of this well

the same taste

Listening party for Clarice Jensen’s

In holiday clothing, out of the great darkness

Near-silent on the couch

You sniffled a bit

Halfway through,

You said, through tears, that this album tasted like powdered sugar snow.

I said, “oh”,

Knowing that you’ve told me multiple times that that’s what my voice, my laugh taste like to you, and it’s part of what drew you to me in the first place

And then you said, “…and asphalt at night.”

And I wept with you,

Quietly, 

Apart from you,

For the rest of the album.

It’s a beautiful record.

field notes on some closure

12:52am

This is what you have to do.

I feel slightly better. It still sucks.

/////

9:25am

People don’t have to destroy each other

Sometimes, when you think you have the best guided heart,

It’s very hard not to

/////

5:52pm

Meaning returns on the downbeat,

on resentment?

I don’t think that we’d resent each other if we stayed together. I think we’d resent each other if we really did break it off for good right now without trying harder to save us.

field notes from the worst day of my life

11:12am

I didn't want this.

I never wanted this.

I relied too much on a supposedly guaranteed future together that I didn't plan for anything else.

/////

12:08pm

I need to stay alive for Clifford.

If anything, I need to give him a good life.

/////

1:19pm

All the meaning has left.

The meaning in everything has left everything.

/////

10:50pm

It was you and me

In this life and the next

And the next

And the next

And the next

You said in your vision two years ago

That you'd seen to the end of time? I think?

And that it was me, it was always me

you keep saying (to the tune of Wolves Where I'm Going)

You love me very much,

Very deeply,

But do you write songs about me?

For me?

It's hard to tell

Because you talk about you and another person smoking

And I know you know that I kinda used to smoke, but not really

I'm enough to move you

Off the couch, and out of your chair,

And sometimes into bed

But am I enough to move you

To write me into chords and picking,

And open mic hauntings?

Because I would haunt you, too

If I die first, you know I would haunt you

fear

i never wanna be the one that loves them less than they love me

at least if they break my heart i'll be in the right

make no mistake

if you drifted apart

i would go to the ends of this world to find you

strange, i know

I know that you can't cast light without also casting shadow,

But the point still stands that I see that light in you--

I see that radiance, that life,

And I see the shadows, the draw towards death,

And yet I am here. I cannot help it, I will not resist.

I am here beside you, walking with you

Behind so I can catch you

Leading you when you need guidance through darkness too strong even for you to see through.

You mean a good chunk of the world to me and if you go,

a good chunk of my world goes with you.

You are important to me.

You are important to the world.

You are important to yourself.

Stay.

tenderness

I would elope with this beauty in a heartbeat

Fly ‘em up to the moon and slip into its crescent as if under a blanket,

Content to lie there, bodies in arms and temperature-perfect,

Resting in peak, blushéd joy for the rest of our lives.

Instead I hold their face in my hands and kiss it softly, all over,

Content enough knowing that, barring any apocalyptic reason to jump the broom before sharing a home, 

I get to savor this time.

This time is all ours.

way i go

We were walking so long I forgot

Where we were going

Found a place we did not recognize, and I

I'm alright not knowing

Hallucinating with the morning light

Cover me in fantasy

Getting swept up in a storyline, and I'll

Let it take me out to sea

Let it take me out to sea

Feel heavily

No gravity

You're the way I go

Unconsciously

We're winding like an open road

You're the way I go

So traverse the earth to come back home

Hear me without a sound

I am mystified that wanting you is how

My feet firmly felt the ground

My feet firmly felt the ground

Feel heavily

No gravity

You're the way I go

Unconsciously

We're winding like an open road

You're the way I go

A well that never dries

A fire that never dies

And through the stormy times

You will know me

And I will know you

Feel heavily

No gravity

You're the way I go

Unconsciously

We're winding like an open road

You're the way I go

a scene on the subject of death and dying

You: Y'know, I don't think my family's ever visited a grave for our own people. (pause) Once I'm in the dirt, I don't think they'll bother.

Me: If you go before me, you know I'm planting roses near your tree. (short pause) Unless you want a different flower.

You: Don't make a promise you can't keep, now.

Me: I never do. (longer pause) If you'll have me, you're stuck with me.

show-off

You know how some people, when they have feelings for someone, try to impress them all the time? Even sometimes in (what they think are) quiet ways?

Did you know that

some people still try to impress the person they like even after they know their feelings are reciprocated? Heck, even people they love? Who love them back???

And did you know that

by some people, I mean me?

I always want to impress you, because you always impress me.

go figure that i now sleep easier next to you than i do alone

Last night we were discussing how fast our relationship has moved. I was trying to think of an apt metaphor so I could feel it, and here's what I came up with:

Not the speed of a runaway train,

Not a roller coaster drop,

But rather

A plane in the sky!

Take-off, we could feel it,

But now we're in the air

and it feels like coasting, cruising.

We've got jet streams to ride

and we can see so much from up here.

Not to say we spend all our time in the clouds--

    it doesn't feel like it--

Just that we're not scared, it doesn't feel scary to me.

It feels right.

It feels as though we'd be able to land safely if we felt out of control.

We're communicating on radio.

And, to top it off,

we can eat on this ride,

    and the food is actually good.

circle

I didn't walk away the night after we met wanting you because I thought you'd be a good project,

    "I can fix them, I can heal them" etc. bullshit.

I just recognized that my heart met yours,

    side-by-side on parallel roads to some sort of recovery.

Different roads, different clothes, different bodies,

    but we matched.

Our voices go back and forth

    between matching melody 

    and clear harmony,

weaving currents through a jetstream.

I will come back around to you every time.

Every time.

looking forward

I want to welcome you back

    with pine needles

    cinnamon and turmeric and ginger

    sugar and warmth

    blood from biting my lip

    open arms

    thumbs on your cheekbones

    jaw cradled in my hands

I want to kiss you and taste all the cigarettes you smoked to catch a breath

    take it and give you the sweetness 

    and sound of the rain on the roof in return

Take the comfort I feel when you hold me

The safety I hold so close to my chest

when you're away