Saddest Poem

This was meant to be the saddest poem in my book
The one that would leave me feeling fresh
The one that would get it all out,
Scream out your name in excorcism,
The one that would clear my emotional sinuses
So long clogged with liquid green-brown tears of self-pity and villification
This was meant to be the poem that would sneeze so loud and hard that I would never need another night of inhibitory intoxication to sleep peacefully again
The sneeze that would free me from the white paper trail beside my bed
Leading nowhere but you
The sneeze that would let me go out into the bright spring air,
Eyes no longer swollen shut, nose red, voice lost
No, I would breathe in purple as deep as I could and be left nowhere amidst the branches of a mountain laurel counting its petals and laughing that I ever thought it mattered whether I ended on a loves me not,
This was meant to be the winter poem to precede that spring,
But I am tired of writing sad poems.

I am tired of writing poems that wallow in their own self pity and repetition of the abuses rendered me, rendered the world as if people were more motivated to action by tears than by anger, by memory than by promises, by compassion than by disregard.
If you want another sad poem from me,
I will wait for you at the bar
Because that is where I have exiled you.
Only there do I wish I could still cry over you
Exorcise those feelings I have towards you
Scream your name in the night
And pray to God for daylight
But country music only carries you so far before it starts crying red white and fucking burn and alienates you to watch him touch her as if he did not want you
Conventions of relationships get old and, dare I say, trite when you hold them so close in that lonely extra long twin bed at night
When exams and papers crowd the door, slipping themselves silently under and waxing your floor
The once welcome carpet now ice, keeping you in bed through snooze after snooze after snooze
You see, as useful as it may have been once upon a time, to cry and bewail our manifold sins together
To work through the consequences of inconsequential gestures motivated by stress and stifling proximity
That shit gets old and there just ain’t the time
And Friday nights in college are sometimes just meant to fuck

You see this was meant to be the saddest poem in my book,
But sadness requires you and my words are just a bit too precious
So, I’ll save them for things that might matter someday
I’ll save them for reliving nights in Mexico
Long walks to and from raunchy clubs where straight boys stand on tables and in broken English sing Shania
I’ll save them for the tiny girl holding such a large cup so thirstily you thought she might drown
I’ll save my words for recalling injustices against my mixed parents in the bordertowns where things don’t mix so smoothly
I’ll save my words for recounting hometown football games and high school dances
i’ll save them for talking about who I am, without you,
and you know, I’ll save them to scream someone elses name in the night,
Not for loss but because I’m fucking about to come

You see, this was supposed to be the saddest poem in my book
But then I realized how sad that really was, and how easy
I am tired of writing sad poems because I am tired of being sad and not angry
I am tired of filling emotional experience with tears and not with laughter
I am tired of living memories and thereby pre-empting life
I am tired of acting like you mattered.