We need better bridges in this town.
Once we’re through, they’ll all have burned down
past the ground
to drown,
which kind of defeats their purpose.

This is our passage:
bridges built on foundations as delicate as the dust floating in the lakes from which we’re carried.
Bricks are beaten, held together with cement as weak as the bond that you and I share.
They crumble, unappealing to the eyes of passer-bys—
Stop!
Improvise-
find a way to make this work between you and me because we have been fooled, believing that what we’ve built will carry us over our sharks of problems that nibble at our
dangling toes.
We cannot avoid them together.
I need to learn to do this
on my own.

I want to travel.
These passages you and I have built have gotten me nowhere, and I need a bridge to escape with.
I want to
cruise to the sky,
fly
away from the earth because that’s where you are,
but let’s be real, here.
You’ve never been one to ‘stay grounded,’ have you?
What’s it like living with your head in the clouds? I guess I’d try it out.
I want to
caress the clouds
kiss the condensation
be intimate with nothing but the sky around me;
a breeze cannot hurt me.
Not like you.

Not like you,
who has the word ‘love’ stapled to the back of her throat.
Not like you,
who thinks that kisses are but keys to the pants.
Not like you,
who, when we sat with a flashlight under your ramshackle shamrock sheets and I shouted,
“Oh my god! I am so in love!”
responded with,
“Oh my god! I am so inebriated!”

I don’t fall for girls very easily, but when I do,
I plummet.
I’m sorry to have assumed that you did the same.
Understand that I give more than I can stand to lose
and that reciprocation has never been your forte,
but
I
am
screaming.

We once kindled this relationship.
And though you may not feel the same way,
I am on fire.
But it’s about time
that I suck it up
and use this flame
to start
burning our bridges.