I never knew but did eventually discover

the calculus of our connection.

When you gossip, you twist the truth

like a little tree in the wind

or a snake in a cell phone.

Could you stand to know that No One replaced you?

That your misogynist predictions didn’t come true.

Not because they couldn’t, but because I didn’t want them to.

God, what a joke—

Animal crackers burnt up in smoke.

You keep on checking for any sign

that I’m still suffering whereas you’re fine,

but I now count your canary’s frowns

—she makes her rounds, the rumors fly—

So sometimes she writes me cryptic letters

to mark the passing of time,

and lists the things you’ve done to her,

which seem so close to mine.

All sacrifice was theoretical,

not mathematical.

But for this I would have been a little bit better,

a little more radical.

Last for heartbreaking

reneging and misbehaving

But for some unknown reason,

the people saved me

Collective conscience chaos

because this is a split personality,

poor paradox with a linear mentality

and reluctant ombudsman of uncomfortable reality—

corrupted by circumstance,

tainted in totality

Should we just nurture the peacefulness here?

I don’t want to move one step

for fear a complication may appear

There’s a convenience to the inarticulate

and I speculate you feel the same,

which is why I never say your name,

even when I murmur in your ear

Why would you wait for me?

Why would you wait an entire year?

I curl up in a ball,

somehow smaller when you’re near