Fucked up goodbyes

I don't want to be profane
and I know that you already know this
but I fucked up our goodbye.

I couldn't look in the eyes and say anything besides "I should go."
your fingertips, eternally gentle, traced patterns around my waist and up my sides
but I couldn't even move.
all my muscles locked in a cold war with themselves trying to deny your warmth
because if I released
truly spoke my mind
I wouldn't have broken.
I would have shattered.

I'm not good with small pieces;
I don't even know how to glue a fractured mirror back together
I think it's the possibility of a bad luck curse that makes my fingers so shaky
or maybe I'm afraid I'll slip and slice my skin
adding damage to destruction

So no, I couldn't give you the proper goodbye.
I left you in New York.
and I've been back in California for a month now.
Just biding my time until I find something distracting enough can make me forget what your voice sounds like when you smile

I rode my bike for the first time in months the other day
right next to all the orange county traffic
just to hear the engines roaring next to me
and hoping that my balance was what it used to be
because those trucks drive so fast
they drive so far
and my wheels will never turn over enough times to bring me close enough to you.

I swam in the pacific ocean so I could forget how the atlantic tasted
so I could wash your memory from my flesh
let it be scrubbed away by salt water and sand that has always felt like home to me
but it didn't work.
nothing works.

You're still right there, you're always right there
you're right here
in the front of my mind
even though I'm in a new place.
I moved into a new apartment.
My neighbors have songbirds.
The other morning, I woke up to them
and thought I was still laying next to you
because it sounded like the forest outside your window
and I realize that I actually left part of myself in your bedroom
not between your sheets
but in the space between our eyes when we laid there so quietly
trying to memorize your face and knowing that I would want to forget it in a few weeks.

I couldn't say goodbye to you.
I still can't.
Now I know what it feels like to be loved.
and I can't quite let that go
just not yet.