winter allergies

you roll these Tuesdays in the back
of your mouth like the peppermints you've gotten at
restaurants since you were a
child, taking things for granted you swore
you never would.
bitter store signs change
their name and i choke on the smog that's found
its way into the town.

you don't try anymore. and you say
you're not running away, but this slow walk is
more painful. i don't see your face around the corner
anymore. they don't know what you're up to.
it's just me on the end
of a payphone last May being sent to your voicemail next
Fall. they started calling me a stranger
when i wrote different names into the boxes on my
calendar. the vinyl i play on my record-player heart
is one of whistles in the
dark. maybe it'll be the sound that grounds your feet.
or maybe it'll be a l'appel du vide earthquake
and we'll never connect eyes in the
deep ever again.

i keep trying to clear my throat but i cough
out blood lined with the remnants of your
name, like the piece of a flannel that got caught
in the brush.
i am wanting, i am bated with- (hope)
this common cold frosted into the craters of my lungs.
summer will drift in soon,
and thaw the sickness that comes every year.
until then,
/x