1. There will be several days that you daydream about stepping in front of a city bus. Don’t. It will not be beautiful. It will not be brave. It will be selfish. It will be broken. Your mother will cry.

2. Don’t write for him. Write for you. Write for others like you. Write so the girl that thinks about stepping in front of public transportation doesn’t. Don’t be selfish.

3. When you will yourself to sleep and it doesn’t come- get up. It doesn’t matter that it’s 3 am. There will be other 3 am’s. Take a shower. Take two. Wash him out of your hair. Write a poem. Read the same book you’ve read 202 times again. The 203rd time might tell you something different. Don’t stay in bed- you will think about the bus again.

4. Don’t kiss him because he’s broken. Don’t kiss him because his laughter never reaches his eyes. Don’t try and fix him. Fix yourself first. Be selfish. He can’t save you.

5. Date yourself. Take yourself out to eat. Don’t share your popcorn at the movies with anyone. Stroll around an art museum alone. Fall in love with canvases. Fall in love with yourself.

6. Dress up and wear red lipstick and get drunk with your friends. They’re the ones that will pick you up. Don’t kiss him. Or him. Don’t fall asleep on strange couches with strange boys. When his hand slides up your dress walk away. Hit him. Don’t kiss him. He can’t save you.

7. Get another tattoo. Get five more. Get another hole in your ear. Don’t listen to your dad. You will still be able to get a job. Did you really want to be employed by someone like your father? Haven’t you had enough of judgmental old white men anyway? Get fuck you tattooed in tiny letters on your hip.

8. When you feel the yearning for a new city- start over. Take 200 bucks and a three suitcases. Work anywhere that will have you. Meet strange people and forget your name. Call yourself Ruby. No one will know the difference. Remember to call your mother. Don’t be selfish. Come home when you find yourself in the strangers and the small one bedroom apartment.

9. Don’t whisper evil things into your own ear. Other people are going to shout them at you. Be your own hero. Keep a sword on your key ring.

10. Don’t step in front of a city bus. It will not be beautiful. Live. Stay up all night with a boy that promises you everything and means it. Live. See shitty local bands with a friend. Wear a different band’s t-shirt. No one will care. Live. Have a baby girl with tiny fingers and tiny toes someday. Pour love into her until it’s overflowing. Live. Wake up. Staying in bed all day is not poetic.

Live. Live.

Live.

Do you hear that? It’s me. It’s your life. Wake up.

We lit our cigarettes off of each other’s. We were never meant to be, no. We had sex, but I could never let her touch me. She couldn’t have extracted my soul from all the places it was hiding. That’s okay. We were what we were, when we needed it.

She was out on my balcony, late one night. I was in the kitchen, when I sensed a change in energy. I walked out onto the balcony to find her sitting with a cigarette in her fingers, trembling with tears streaming down her cheeks.

I sat down in front of her, and said gently, “Come here, sweetheart.” She slid into my lap, and sobbed into my shoulder. I remember the exact feeling of her back beneath my fingertips, as I ran my fingers up and down her spine. My god, I held her, and for the first time in so long, I felt something in my heart that resembled softness. It was a heartbreaking, heartmaking feeling.

She melted my permafrost in that moment. I cared. Suddenly, I could feel tenderness again. That was a frozen ocean melting and surging to meet her. I owe my change in seasons to her. My summer finally returned.

I.
When I was trying to quit smoking
and we drank white wine from Mason jars,
you called my freckles cocoa powder
and I called your green eyes
celery.

II.
I am learning how to be a grown-up
who pays bills, cooks her own dinners,
and doesn’t cry at words like
I think I just want to be friends.

III.
The thing is this:
Love is an organic thing.
It rots and softens.