the only boy to ever really kiss me during sex
now lives in michigan
with his girlfriend

the only boy to ever pull my stomach out of my throat
lives at home waiting on his girlfriend
to have another kid

i am here shaken
wanting to tell you that i am trying to end
my bad patterns
i am here trying not to tell you
that i want to escape in you
but it's late

and i suspect there's no way
to not scare you

i want to tell you that i am a substitute
i can be your stool until you climb on
onto the next one
i am the middle man or you know what i mean

i can be the rest stop til you drive by
to the rest of your life

i can try to pretend it doesn't bother me
let your mouth open and close the holes in my chest
becoming a second heartbeat

i promise to remember you
after you leave

warm beer and movies about affairs

it's the worst time for this

fantasy isn't just fucking

it is wanting someone who doesn't know

all your secrets

to want you

and having that be enough for then

or now

2am 

you cannot hear me

sticking to a leather couch

kate winslet is crying on the tv

i think about empty pages

i think about your bottom lip

2am and it stings this bad

every single night

like this

i cannot pretend to be her anymore
we are all strangers
but i felt your body under the light of the moon
i have no proof

the last time was when that kiss on my neck
said goodbye
i took it as a see you soon
i am usually wrong

you never heard me
i send you telepathic typed up messages
can you hear me
can you hear me
hey are you awake
hear me

no

i miss you most at 4am
the weight of the past few years sits
it plays my ribcage like a violin
you hit my heart like the refresh button
nothing ever changes, does it

i am not option one
i am the meal you eat when you have no money in the bank
i am the porch you sleep on when the keys are inside

i was your bruise
a temporary tattoo
you were a stain on the floor of my favorite room

the let go feels like surgery
you left your instruments in my organs
so i keep bleeding

i was wrong
i miss you the most now
when i forget what you smell like

when you don't try to remember me at all

you got me again
hook, line, sink your teeth
and nails into every metal part in my body

you are human radiation
i am delirious and thirsty

your body is a temple
i pray in you on my knees

i've been quiet awhile

http://pressboardpress.com/2012/05/23/two-poems-by-karissa-satchwell/

i wonder how long i can go on
pretending i don't want you
like a need that breathes in a human way
but waits and thaws in the heat
surging forward quick as blood flow
quick as a whirlpool that leads to a place
only i can go to

i never thought i wanted to be anywhere alone

you have hypnotised me
i didn't not ask for it
with feelings bare like fresh roadkill
open and inviting the vultures to come
just one vulture here picking at me
at a frequency audible only when i choose to hear

i choose it
my nose runs like a cold that doesn't end
i am winter incarnate
sagging like trees iced over
turning branches into weapons
but can't you see the fragility

my hands are small and cold
i want to hold you and inhale
smells like freedom smells like
cloud nine sex during sunset

devoid
that is it exactly
gimme my medication
gimme my god for fifteen minutes
i pray indian style with eyes closed head back
pupils change heart rate
pounds

altering chemistry
feeling everything at once
to lessen the blow

i wanted to write an ode or a sonnet
an epic telling or spelling out a story
of something true and whole but really
something borderline therapeutic to make
the clutter of my nerves and brain
chill for minutes long enough to let me breathe
in and out completely

i cannot
all i can say is i forget what your face looks like up close
it has been too long and distance makes the heart grow
but all mine does is pace and twitch in a chemically
induced manner i choose so i can just fucking deal

the water is gone but the lightning still strikes the same place
gone is the word of the day kids though it is so overused
or over discussed and my hands would love to spin the tale
if they could just stop moving but this is impossible
my hummingbird hands used to rest i think before our eyes met
some things should be left alone
this is a character trait or skill i never possessed

to just be blunt now i will say that while outlines
and laughter sounds fade i know what it feels like
to have your body hover above mine while you smile
i'm pretty sure you smiled as you spoke nontruths

that's how this always goes isn't it
insert two people, one says words because they are easy
words that float so close they can be grabbed
we both reached but when you spoke them aloud
i sewed them in the surface of my lungs
i smoke and inhale nicotine and pipe dreams

you have the globe on your fingertips
no it is under your fingernails and you scratch at it
gaining everything you ever wanted
i float in wave pools that resembled oceans from far away
i could still drown like this but you will never be affected by knowing
what it is like to gamble away the only bet i had to put on the table

your back is the table when you begin to stretch
i wanted to be the legs under it
but i was hardly even a place setting