I DON'T KNOW ANY OTHER WAYS TO SAY I MISS YOU

A Poem by Ali Guerra

Here,
I am nothing but memorized syllables
from nights where I've had too much to drink
and can't seem to stop coughing up honesty.
Here,
there is always background noise but all I can hear
is the sound of our breathing during nervous silences
and our bodies shuffling around on the grass
at midnight behind your house
right before I morph into you.
There is a quote on the pavement downtown
that says, "you love everything you're not"
and I wake up this morning with an empty,
burning stomach from trying to
heave out my emotions into the toilet bowl last night.
It turns out I couldn't get rid of them.
It turns out there is too much darkness inside of me.
It turns out I haven't perfected the act
of mourning something
that was never mine.