Loading...

(Your laughter will always be in the back of my throat)

He held his knuckles against his skull, as if the pressure of his hands would stop the wind inside his head–
My mother told me ever since he left
there has been a hurricane inside of her.
She asked me why I thought love fails in the same sentence that she asked me to pass the salt-as if something that heavy could be a casual dinner conversation.
My mother drove me to the train station last Monday
With tears in her eyes she asked me how it felt to lose my family
I looked at her hands and for the first time realized she had gotten older
I told her I no longer recognized the word.
 
Monday had passed as did months and the earth turned into snowfall.
I covered my heart under heavy sweaters, so that no one would hear it’s voice–
It kept on long after they  stopped listening.
 
I carry another year on my back,
For the first time in nineteen years when people ask me if I feel any older,
the answers yes.
When you ask me how it is I feel older,  I want to reach down under my veins, I want to show you the wrinkles beneath my skin;
(I’ve aged more this winter than you will ever know.)
 
So I set my spine against your crooked headboard
 
I’ll lay in your kingsized  bed until I forget how empty it feels–
I’ll pull apart my bones because maybe I could still fit us back together,
because maybe there just wasn’t enough room for all of us,
because maybe we were too much,
maybe we weren’t enough, because maybe, if I sit here in this silence long enough, you will finally, hear me–
 
because maybe,
I know I have asked you 327 times now, but maybe, If I ask you, just one more time....
 
I want to go back to the days where we carried our laughter like kites wrapped around our ribcage,
I want to go back to the times where the sky lived inside us and we were sad but we held each other’s hands anyway.
I want to go back to the
times when dinner reservations were for four, and Christmas cards had all of our names printed on them–
to when flowers reminded you of her, and the ocean still made my knees shake;
I want to go back to when your laughter was in her throat, to when our hands were still the same color
To when loving someone,
still meant loving them
I want to go back to when home,
was still home.

Liked or faved by...
Other works by Julia W...



Top