A Series of Short Poems

A series of short poems

This poem is called "Everything You Ever Needed To Know About Silence"
You will never be more wrong
Than the first time you say "I love you"
You'll mean it, sure, but you'll still be lying

This poem is called "I Didn't Recognize You Without Your Glasses"
But you chose to die five years ago Alex
I still write your name on chalkboards
And stray sheets of paper
I always leave out the "e"
I am not finished with you yet

This poem is called "How to kill yourself without hurting anyone"
Don't

This poem is called "Things That I Hope Are True About Heaven"
That the radio always plays what would've been your favorite song
That there's always coffee if you want it
That you're there
That it's real

This poem is called "Still Life With Pills"
I too have wanted to open myself
I too have stared at a razor and seen in it a doorway
I think I'm only still here because
I was too scared to make the first cut

This poem is called "Clatter"
It's impossible to imagine a color you haven't seen
Instead of dying the jellyfish simply ceases to move
I complete five crosswords a day because it stops the panic
Trucks are downshifting on Main Street
Hair is partially composed of cyanide
Napalm is just gasoline and plastic
I am just carbon and bad timing

This poem is called "The First Snow of the Year"
Alex, since I'm still here
I have to act as if I'm meant to be here
Once, it snowed and it wasn't that I felt great
I felt awful
But awful is better than nothing
Depression wasn't an endless gray sky
It was no sky at all
I've got to go somewhere Alex
I've got to go

This poem is called "I Don't Know What
'It' is, but I do Know Where to Find It"
It's in the light sifting through your bedroom window
It's in the street when the whole world is pinched and slow
It's in the basement where you left it
It's in the ground
It's in your head

This poem is called "Don't Give Up the Ship"
When the winds are picking up
When the sea around you turns from blue to gray
When the sky grows veins of light before you
Let your arms become sails
Keep the lighthouse at your back

This poem is called "I Cannot Answer You Tonight"
No one ever taught me how to pray
So, I won't
Instead, I'll just say this
God bless the shape your head leaves in my pillow
God bless your insatiable hair
God bless you
Though the hour is late, for you've come to me at last