how to run far and fast from anything good  •  May 2023 

 
You should’ve seen her face when I told her. that’s what i imagine him saying – 

You should’ve seen her face. She looked terrified. I think that was the first time

she was ever really afraid of me – I could feel it in her skin, her hair, her finger

-nails, all so wracked with fear that they buzzed electric, humming, engraving

lines and grooves into her body. You should’ve seen her face

so suddenly aged

suddenly sunken into her bones like

heavy ballpoint handwriting on

pale-lined paper like

footprints in sand her skin so

dull and pliable as if she

had never felt joy

or been young – 

that’s what i imagine him saying as he crosses the threshold to morality, crossing

t’s and dotting i’s, grinding down his teeth and falling asleep, whites of his eyes

red as cocktail sauce before he closes them. that’s what i imagine when i pass his

friends, stockily-built and smoke-scented, in brick-lined alleyways, nightmare after

nightmare in suede suits. that’s what i imagine when i wake in bed cold at three in

the morning and start shaking so bad you have to hold me down, iron out the folds

in my skin, pet my hair like i’m some lost broken thing

so suddenly just thing

suddenly retreated into the feeling like

dirt and rain into gutters finding their

true home reaching homeostasis like

digging a large deep hole in the beach

into which the whole world

can fit because that is how much

it feels like i’m trying to hold – 

but i stop shaking, eventually, and you get up to make me breakfast, for which i

always forget to properly thank you, and you

have seen that face, this face, looked in its eyes and

held it there – I’m not sure i hear him whisper

if her fear was my fault or hers but

whether or not it is yours or mine

you don’t look away