pillows

You feel the left side of your face
get hot a second before the right;

If action defines what you own,

then your words are my laws
and I am yours.

If emotion defines what you own,

then your tears are my blood and
you are mine.

Yet I am the agent of your question marks,

and you bury me in the back with your hardened
paint brushes

like a given. 

You sleep soundly on me
until the sheets feel tight,
and the nighttime incites readiness.
I see her all behind your eyes.

You think that since I've been here before

that I should feel nothing.

I've slept on both sides of the pillow
and I certainly don't feel cool;

I'm burning up with a fever
until I remember
I'm silent.

I see through the blank stares at the phone
I'm awake and it's
morning where I lay
sun rising behind clouds
and you dream about her
but can't bring yourself to tell me.

I know you tell her but can't bear
to tell me. 

So quiet now, so very closed it seems
she changed the locks.

You're guilty for the feelings but
they sink into my atlantic -- colder
than you imagined because I
try to understand and
can't see anything but the kaleidoscope
of confusion in your words.

And you think I don't know because you're smiling but
I know everything

I know everything because you're smiling

I play your sentences on repeat
but I can't understand what you're saying
seeing as you can't understand it yourself.