Poetry | Journal

I want to drink your coffee

just before sunrise on a work day

with snow collecting below the tailpipe

and the cats keeping our ankles warm.

It’s hard to explain so I don’t,

I just watch your reflection in the window

and try not to let the smiles without reason raise question.

That thought racing sensation of reaching for your hand

is narrated by prayers for rejection

and the bailout decision to pretend

I was reaching for something else.

And it’s silly to have such thoughts

and never speak of them directly

the fear around how putting something into words

makes that something more

than a daydream in a train window

I can look away from

and replace with small talk. There’s just

something in the way your hair curls over your scarf

and your laugh rumbles between words,

all the subtle things I can’t help but notice.

Like anchors in a storm keeping me present,

making me want to finagle some situation where it’s not odd

for me to ask things like why you entertain this thing I’m doing,

this identity hodgepodge I’m living;

you were the first one to tell me

attraction isn’t always black and white

and every time we hang out I’m kicking myself

for being too drunk to remember anything else you said that night.

I just want to play piano with my rings against the cup,

the snow coming down just out of reach, let me look

through those eyes in comfortable silence to know I’m not alone.

Then do me a favor and say anything

and free me from myself.