Summer Nights

They say that you cannot lose what you never had. I breathe deep into the night as you smoke your cigarette out on the porch. Like a vigilant kitty, I sit on the swing and watch you out of the corner of my eye. The lights from the street swim their way through the cracks in the fence and splash onto you. You look like a 3rd grade arts and crafts project with different shapes and colors in splotches all over your body. You meet my gaze, then turn away.

They say if you love something let it go. The smoke is thick around us, and the only sounds are your rushing breaths and the creak of the swing. The occasional breeze picks my thoughts like a guitar. The tune goes unnoticed as it drifts above us, and sets the air ahumming. It's been so long since I've shared myself out loud with you. As the last embers of your cigarette set on your face like the sunset we've never seen, you slowly rise. In the empty darkness I can feel your eyes linger on me for a while. They silently take me in, as if the tiny shifts in your pupils were discussing the unspoken language of my body, asking whether I was ready for bed.

They say if you cant be with the one you love, love the one you're with. My ears pick up your footsteps falling on the carpeted stairs, the muffled vibrations pass through me without hardly a thought. Little remnants of you, of me, of us; have stained the floors of our home like stale beer, forever a reminder of choice and consequence. Like piles of clothes strewn about in a whirlwind of passion, to be later regretfully trod upon and wrinkled beyond recognition. So many years and tears have made these rooms what they are, they've filled the house like a nagging thought, always just at the tip of my tongue. The sounds of you have become instilled forever in my subconscious.

In my world it comes down to trial and error. You reap what you sow, and there comes a time when you need to get your hands dirty with the soil. It takes only a moment before I follow you inside, and make my way to bed.