I look for lost pieces of me everywhere-
In all the ugly things
And all the nameless people,
Pills with names I can’t pronounce.
Men too-
In places I can’t remember
And nights I can’t forget.

I never find them.
I think in searching I get distracted
And forget
What I needed to find in the first place.
I never find them.

Sometimes I think I see glimpses
In empty bottles
And rearview mirrors.
I can almost touch them in our tangled bones
And hear them in the beating hearts
Of all the strangers I know.

But still,
I never find them.

I am from the Midwest.
I was made there.
I grew up there.
I often say that I hate it,
Everything about it,
But that’s not true.

I love the storms:
The hot summer rain,
The chaos erupting in the sky.

My mother used to tell me that the thunder was the angels bowling
-I always liked bowling-
And the lightning
That midwestern lightning that
Illuminated all the skies there ever were,
And put the sun to shame
Even in the dead of night.

What beautiful violence that was.

you can walk away from most
anything

as you should
but you would be a fool
to think that anything ends
where it started

walk away
from the good
and the bad
from all things you no longer require

but do not

do not think that
you won’t carry it with you
because
you will.

4.23.1

I see you in and out of my life
like all the people I know
and used to know
and may someday know again.
you’ve made me who I am:
over the years I have become
bits of you,
as much as you have become pieces of me.
– the bits of you in me are the parts of me that I love the most –
thank you for that.
I’ve missed you over these times,
but never too much
you are only a phone call
and a memory away
no matter how far we go and grow
I hope you remember
and always know
I’m still in your corner
today and all the rest
you’re still in my heart
you’ll always be my best.