When it matters more than it did.

Late June, I think:

I will never forget, but I will never again be fooled by the radiance of skin salty-bitter-sweet.
Oh, how many words must be written to innocence before it dies crushed beneath the weight?
Idealism is not flattering on you, my dear.

I have a brush and a life somewhere, I say, and dig into my purse.

Was it you who promised to protect me in the never-here and the wasn’t-now?
I’m sorry.
I couldn’t hear you over the roar of tomorrow’s sunset and the thud, sickening, of my own mortality.
Forgive me if I fade before I speak.

It could have been worse, you said that night. It could have been us.
I would have laughed, but you were serious, then.

I ran so they could not see the veins on my ankles, the moisture messy beneath one eye—
Isn’t it true, love, that only poets and prostitutes get the endings they deserve?
My curtain call won’t be so sharp as to draw a gasp, and no, I didn’t bow in your direction.

You were never attentive enough to catch the raindrops before they broke on the surface of our words.
I resent you most of all, for that.