Poetry: The Consequences of Fearing Loneliness

I fall asleep in the bathtub to be closer to the ocean.
I invite others to sleep near me. Their bodies
keep me warm like water: cold, cold, cold,
and then you adjust.

October becomes November and I can't distinguish
my breath from smoke. Think of me next time
you drink lukewarm soup or touch a girl
who can't stop shaking.

I am sorry for thinking
the wrong people are wonderful,
for thinking I am wonderful, for thinking
of he and me as we.

I’m sorry for holding his shoulder when he tried to leave.
I apologize for the kiss on the mouth. Don't remember me for that.
Remember me by all thirty knuckles and strands of hair
in your mouth and Sunday mornings.

Let me get ahead of myself now. Let me think of
sharing a grocery cart and doorman greetings by name
and waking up under flannel and down.
Don’t ask to know what I am thinking.

Or, teach me to stand still. Teach me to be quiet
and steady and comfortable in this moment alone.
Teach me to stop expecting the best for me
to be what I expected.

I apologize for lingering too long. I apologize
for kissing him when I tasted only like beer.
I woke up with his elbow in my face.
I licked his elbow. I am sorry for this.

Touch my thigh in the morning. Think of the last bed
and its inhabitant— think of her short hair and lazy mouth.
Teach me indifference. Kiss my mouth and
go home and stop answering the phone.

Go back in time to a favorite moment.
The winter at the beach—the way my feet
sunk into the sand. Choose to stay here;
claim there has been nothing worth returning to.

Consider my ribcage and wrists. Consider
coin tosses and drawings passed back and forth
and the tops of my feet in the cold.
Return to me.

Stop missing the small things: toes and teeth and eyelashes
left on the pillow. Or miss them more.
Go back with me to that beach. Breathe only fog.
Reach as far as you can reach. See if we can touch.


Stephanie Willis