It shouldn't have to hurt so much.

You said her name and I knew that 
something had already changed,
the slightest curvature in lips 
can move an entire world while
enraptured by words that glow inside me,
you always knew how to go much deeper,
to do more than just break the skin. 

I still see the sun stream through your hair,
the glimmer of soft fire splashing against crimson,
the way your eyes held a certain distant spark
charging behind two gorgeous evergreen orbs.

I still drew closer for a kiss and read
the braille living on your craned neck,
wondering if you feel those marks 
far more you can ever sense me,
a phantom I'll hold too close.

Maybe I should've been more.

I never wiped away the tears 
with the soft pad of my thumb,
nothing the moisture seeping before
there was this ghost of DNA between us,
this evaporated heat that galvanized you 
but made me feel nothing but more alone,
nothing but another secret for you to keep.

I did cup your heart and remembered
how gentle I was because yours 
had been broken too many times before
but never moved your palm to mine,
you would've known how scared I was. 

It shouldn't have to hurt this much.

I just wanted us,
I just wanted us to slow down.

You always seemed to know the pain,
our separate wounds bled the same 
where we fled from ourselves to 
soothe our most unanswered ache
as the lamplight receded and you drew
closer than you ever have before,
but I can still feel you saying her name,
still feel it just breaking the skin.

Sometimes I just need to be exempt
from how you find me in the dark
where touch is amplified the most
and half whispered words are never remembered
but thrum through labyrinths of joined bodies
shaped like letters immune to any other lover,
perfect curvatures that should never leave again.

So please always hold those phantoms close.

You said her name and I could 
feel something start to break,
that pain is the most quiet, 
the one beyond our skins in this 
ghost of DNA forever between us.

Maybe I'm supposed to be more,
but you should've known how scared I was.

Because it's not supposed to hurt this much.