halloween, we walked home after
midnight, our hearts ironed to perfection on

frilled sleeves. the cold seeping in through our
thin polyester dresses,

i’m thinking, your costume,
my pillowcase,
the chocolate bar we shared

on the street corner. halloween,
the sky spilled diamonds over the
horizon and in our desperation we prayed

to a god neither of us
wanted to believe in. it’s a strange time

for a love poem, i know, but
last week i imagined tasting

your laughter on my
cut-up tongue. we don’t

have much longer until
the sun rises again, but i’d stay

in this twilight, if you’d
let me. is there

something on fire inside your chest?
the next doorbell says, but i think

they’ve got it wrong: halloween,
we were storm chasers trying

to become the storm. these hands
tested fate, your eyelids

fluttering and head thrown back in laughter--
this dream that pulls me into its arms

and refuses to let go. (you gave me
too much. you didn’t give me

enough.) but you gave me this and i want to be let in
tomorrow. i don’t want to

have to give it up. halloween,
arms and ribs and teeth and cold sweat waking up

in the middle of the night still thinking. the repetition. the
afternoon light peeking through the curtains, wondering if

i’ll see you again. wondering if my mother would be proud of me,
of the ghost i’ve become, trying to trap sand in

a sieve and forget that pain has
the same name whatever you decide to do with

your hands. i think you loved me, i do, but
it wasn’t in a way i can understand.

above us, the clocks were striking our final hour.