I don’t know, please

why do I clean the messy
rat-tails in the evening
when all I want to do is
lie in the cluttered piles of
papers with your name and smell
steam blend with your hair
the shy girl never fades away,
your desperate friend forgiving our speechless grip
there are moonlit nights when my voice is raspy and
I am awake and jeering
there it is
the ugly reminder of what happened to us
I’m shaking my fist at some
sick cusp of reality
you’ll never know that
I keep these things on a
lockdown with the key burnt dead
we could be wasting time
together
but instead you fish sadness from
the pools of your eyes and I waste it
alone
don’t
leave, don’t turn away
just stay, just be here
one time is all
I have courage to ask for

(c) Caitlin C.