Brie

12/2/23

The weight was on my heart
from the minute I woke up.
I tried jerking it off
but my fingers kept fidgeting —
J-Fox pigeon holding my heart —
till I close my eyes
and wake up another night.

12pm. High noon. Cafe boys.
The weights’ still there.
Haven’t smoked in a month,
but I wish I greened out
the sun. I eye a beanie
and lose track of
what she’s saying.
Her dad died and she laughs.
I look at her with a
head-tilt and tear-eyed
empathetic attempt to call off
the allusion of acceptance.

I know that pain and thought
it was boy, but it was my own,
too, and I still reel in the weight
of pain atop my heart,
knowing she died and
won’t come back until
another life and all the
beanie-boys want the laughing
girl with a dead dad,
though I genie-wish three
that it was me.

I love this pain and
J-Fox pigeon-hold-true
that grief is never behind,
but aside, so when I close
my eyes to awaken
to another night,
know there’s another life
where I can hug my own
as a laughing girl
and a dead dad.