Silly heart,
You opened the door
Again

You promised this time
You would be More careful
With the guest list

Try and remember
They are only
just visitors

This one

Has you thinking
About coffee pills
And the smell of
Rain from your
Hometown

He even learned
new ways to
Light up your soul

But too late
Too long heart

Brain has learned
To take over

There are moments
that have imprinted in my mind
that will long surpass
when my body goes

It is adjusting to me, knowing
that I feel the shift in the temperament of a room,

the moments when
my body knew long before my mind
that my heart was safe

Walking me back through the dark corridor
and yet I did not call it love then

When you hid the
terrible taste of the ice cream,
I felt myself turn into
a kid
curious, I wanted to taste it too

And then all you asked
was for me to repeat
myself, because you
interrupted me

An empath will never call it love,
but my heart found home with you


But one year later,
as I’m
driving
down a dark lane
lost, my thoughts distracting me
from reading the signs
it was not to you
that my heart looked for
Safety

Princess.
He called me that
after two days
of talking.

Sorry, Mr. Prince Charming—
nicknames are for those
who know my soul,
or who’ve seen me tear up
at Harry Potter.

Mr. Prince Charming replied
he had advice
“for my future.”

Not all emotional intelligence
needs to be shared.
But I stayed quiet.

“You should try to be more open,”
he said
to the girl
who pours her heart out
when the key of a smile
is turned

Tell me,
oh loved one,
grandson,

do you know how I cared?

As you said your goodbyes,
I removed
myself,
blending
into the
shadows.

I wonder
about
your life
as you lay
in the quiet
of the side room.

Yet three months
ago
you were the
laughter
of the bay.

Being Irish
was not just
a personality-
it was our connection.

Who knew

in those three weeks,
the brown notes,
black ink,
set at the top desk
for someone
to complete
your ending,
would bring me to tears?

Resilience was meant to be built,
yet I carry your accent with me

And it breaks me,

for every word I speak,

I hear you.

They say this is the princess era,

but what I crave in you

is the masculinity-

the kind that holds my heart

in two hands,

never shaking,

not once trembling,

as I bring

the chaos of my mind

into your world