I slink around in my one-bedroom apartment

wallowing in my loneliness.

It feels like everyone who I have ever loved has

absconded from my grasp.

Shockingly,

they all fled in their own unique fashion.

 

Some moved away.

Some I moved away from.

Some turned out to be different

from whom I thought they 

ought to be.

Some transformed into something more

sinister

with time.

 

I slouch and become one

with my puke green sofa I convinced myself

I loved

to avoid offending the gift-giver.

 

Why can’t I just be grateful?

 

It doesn’t matter what I want

if the lovin’s free.

 

Why can’t I be grateful…

 

These ashes that I rise from

have me looking more like a 

feast overdone

than a phoenix.

 

That mercurial muscle in my back pulls

as I throw myself 

further 

into the couch,

begging

“Swallow me 

whole and

without remorse."