I walk back upstairs to my dorm,
and I wonder how long it will take you to stop thinking of me
as you drive home alone.
We are pioneering this new planet.
We are two explorers paddling through the stardust.
But, you drive home. You get to land back on Earth every night.
You drive home, while I float through the empty space
running low on oxygen.
You drive home, and I sit up awaiting your return.
I sit up wondering if I still take up space in your mind.

I cry like a child in your arms every time one of us is going to leave.
I am sure that you think it is because I am going to miss you.
But I am sure that these tears are for something
so much bigger than that.
I am not crying because you are leaving.
I am crying because I am already gone.
I feel the world melting around me
as I shoot further into the stratosphere.

When you’re here I try to convince myself
that distance is just the static on the other end of the phone.
I tell myself when I hang up it will be gone.
But when you leave it’s still here hanging off my bones
like a baggy t-shirt I cannot take off.
And with very passing moment my pulse screams out
“go-home,” “go-home,” “go-home.”
I’m not sure where that place is now.
I am convinced it only exists in the breaths you take between the thoughts
you whisper to me late at night.
But maybe it never existed at all.

I let hot water rush over my skin
for a little too long that night.
I hear your voice in the droplets running down my spine.
I hear your voice everywhere I go.
I dry off with a towel that still smells like you,
and I let myself feel the empty slots in my ribcage
where your hands used to sit.
Eventually, I allow myself to drift off, succumbing to sleep.
I dream that you are in every car that passes under my window.
I dream that you are every face in the crowd.
I love you when I am asleep yet I still wake up alone.
I wake up only to remember you are not here anymore.
It feels like this is all a dream.
When I dream of kissing other men who have lips like Jupiter,
his thunder pulses through my bones,
and we crack our skulls hard against each other
both trying to knock some sense into my mind.
I wake up sore in the spots I tried
to crawl out of my skin while I was sleeping.
One day I might wake up and not be here.
I might wake up and be gone.

I wake up the day after you leave.
I rush to get to class on time,
and in my hurry I forget that I miss you.
A New England morning reminds me that fall is your favorite time of year.
I remember you breathing those words into my neck
and my bones creek.
I am falling into the realization that filling my emptiness with another person
has only made all my holes deeper.
The open space is my mind has only expanded since you’ve been here.
But now that you aren’t I still can’t untangle you from all my thoughts.

I let you float around in my mind
as I try to find ways to breathe without you.
But I am learning carefully that
I no longer only want you in my life
I only want to have a life with you.
Maybe one day I will wake up from this
and float gently back down to Earth.
Maybe one day I will wake up to this
and swim through galaxies
sailing smoothly back into your arms.