A Letter I Found

My dear friend,

I know you've forgotten about me because your brain and I don't get along anymore.

We haven't spoken for three years.

She still blames me for making you sick.

I'm done passing notes with your brain, though, because

I know better than anyone that apologies are reckless.

I'm only here because you've stopped crying like the old days.

All glossy-eyed, washing your sheets in saltwater,

refusing to write in a journal because you'll "hate reading it."

Now you sleep with dry eyes, even though I get jabbed with needles,

so that means you aren't feeling me.

Please remember the arteries that keep color in your flesh.

Please cry more.
Don't shut me out.

I've had July by Youth Lagoon blaring in my left chamber,

next to a stack of hate letters you've written me for 3 years

strung together by pearls near the bouquet of dried roses

you caught at the wedding, remember?

Your brain was right about me, little girl.

Black machines and electromagnetic currents,

a doctor saw a too-small heart and told us it would hurt like hell.

And your brain blames me.

I'm too small for your busy lungs,

I can't even get blood to all the corners of your body.

And everyone shudders away from your touch because 

people aren't meant to be as cold as you.

It's my fault.

But do you remember the meningitis?

Half your brain shut down and you went blind.
The other half was a black hole filled with fluids.

I heard rumors from your spine, she said your brain was dying.

Well, I pumped blood for you.

I pumped blood and you lived.

Stupid brain. What a hypocrite.

We've been friends, darling, from the sunglasses we stole,

and the kisses we should regret (but don't).

and I've been playing your favorite song in my quiet chambers

hoping you'd hear it.

Sitting upright on the hood of the Mercedes in France,

listening to the cello and talking in a language we don't know.

Drinking Sprite like third-graders in the Jeep,

thinking about the panini maker we'd get in college

and writing a novel that sounds awfully like a Lana del Rey video.

That's when you loved me most, 

under groomed skies with warm-skinned boys and maybe pizza.

Stop feeding me pizza 

and start loving me like you did yesterday.

Please.

-Your Heart