Terminal E

The sun was just about to break the horizon that morning.
We were about 35,000 feet in the air,
at about 7am on a Saturday,
somewhere over, what I can only imagine,
was the French countryside.
(Forgive the lack of details,
I had been pounding wine
since about 4am.)

I was officially 36.

I noticed a set of jet trails just below us
and it only took a few minutes
until we caught up.
You know, they call them contrails,
those white cloud streams.
Sure, they’re filled with gases and poisons,
but all it takes is something
as simple as water vapor
to make them noticeable.

That was the beautiful part of the birthday.
The weird part happened earlier.

In Dallas, we entered Terminal E
and I felt a familiar sucker-punch
when I noticed the newsstand
where we had our first kiss.
That was two years ago.
Thanks a lot Terminal E,
you duplicitous shitbox.

Later, on the plane,
I thought about flushing the heartache
of seeing you with someone else
and letting that shit rain on you
instead of me.

But I loved you too much once
to not feel the guilt.

Forgiveness

Forgiveness
is finally being able to fuck someone
with your new boyfriend’s name.

It’s Not About You

There are times
where we have days that feel like months
or months
that wear us down to a fraction.
We felt whole,
those months
we were carrying eternity in our veins,
scrawled “I love you” in our canals
and on steamy bathroom windows.
It was a rush,
our love energy.

Jet-fueled from the start
by the magazine stand in Terminal E,
where the clerk ordained our first kiss.
It was always that way with us,
people coming to sip from our love joy,
to try to see what brave looks like
through the bars of our ribcages.

Sometimes I felt like a celebrity,
the way you could put stars in my eyes.

Every time I hit the small escalator in your airport,
my heart started beating my chest to bruises.
I cried every time I had to leave,
that maybe I’d let you bust out my wobbly knee caps,
so I wouldn’t have to walk away.

It’s not about you.
In the year after our break-up,
I’ve filled my vocabulary with those words.
Like, the day I realized
we translated the word “home” in different languages.
That our languages were war-torn,
bursting through our throats
to attack each other’s defense mechanisms,
even though both our religions
were based in love.
The flaw in my religion is
it’s not about you.

And even as I write this
I realize that, even if you never read these words,
I couldn’t care less.
It’s not about you.
For the first time
in a really long time
it’s not about you.

III of Wands

III
Chance. Magic. Fire.

III of Wands
Never stop learning.
Keep your ribcage unlocked
to the beauty of knowledge.

III of Wands
Write your heart out.
Wave a single wand, spill ink,
for art’s sake.

III of Wands
Open doors over horizons.
Stretch your bounds
to become blind to borders.

III of Wands
Promise to love again.
Don’t waste your heart
on the failures of your past.

III of Wands
Promise to love yourself again.
You’re beautiful
—even the cards said so.

III of Wands
Love your spontaneity.
Even if it means
you don’t finish this sent—

Paris Song

Even though it’s a warm evening
in Texas,
I sit up in bed
and wonder what Paris would be like
if I were with you.
I’d hum a song
that would stick on you
like honey
and we’d call it
our “Chanson de Paris”.

We had so many songs together back then.

Though it’s been so long,
even still,
every time I hear the words,
“…let our hearts discover”,
I remember you in the kitchen,
chopping vegetables,
and it was so pitch black at night
I could spend the whole time
watching your face reflected
in the window
(that’s how dark it got there).

Even though it’s midnight,
I’m hearing your morning voice
echoing from downstairs,
soft, but full.
Padding
footsteps,
cold, wet curls
lick my forehead;
I realize, suddenly,
I could call in sick,
if only to spend all day long
holding on to that moment for memory’s sake,
so I would have it there forever and ever and ever.
But I didn’t

and yet I never forgot.

Even though I don’t live there anymore,
I envy what’s inside that apartment now,
absorbing what’s left of your exhalations,
breathing the air and dust that held our sparks.

We loved there once.

And now I sit in a room
where the only thing I have left are possibilities.
A lovely little room
awash in memories I’ll never shake off;
the floor,
a thin film of yesterday’s ramblings;
an open window,
the answers to tomorrow’s questions.