name a mistake & i’ll tell you if i’ve made it / they were all so beautiful i could write a song or paint a mural / or cross stitch them into the world’s largest & most uncomfortable pillow / & i will give you that pillow because i am a taurus / & you deserve everything.

i don’t know how time zones work or why they hurt / i rarely answer the phone / instead i make lists— / ugly hawaiian shirt / turbulence / old man coughing loudly / sometimes i adjust my glasses when they aren’t there.

if this plane dove i wouldn’t pay attention to whose face i saw first / instead i’d hear every color & feel every sound at once / remember any trans person who has smiled / & every scratch my cat left on me / & i know the ocean will grow hands to hold me—

cold & safe like my mother’s when i reached / across my brother to hold them as she cried in the back of a cab / the ocean will grow hands to hold me & i still have trouble sleeping / since i realized that any picture i take of water is different / the ocean / grew hands to hold me the last time i saw my grandfather & when i say last time

i mean remember when he held me with everything he had left in him like the ocean? the woman in the room across from his was yelling hadi gel, come on now come on to no one in particular over & over until the birds started to repeat her.

he was all bone & fake teeth & i could’ve sworn i felt something between us like a wave of relief.