If
I woke up
In Temescal more than once
I would have fallen in love

Not with you
But with your neighborhood
Which had already carved itself
Into memory in real-time
Burned with luminous skin
In the late morning sun

And the perilously foreign-yet-familiar feel
Of someone’s hand in mine
The treacherous ways I was at your command
Gave in completely
Because I’d found peace at long last

Is each successive rejection
A Russian doll
A little smaller but rеally just the same
Mocking me
Evеn though
So few of my stars were hung on your tree

I will mourn every loss
I want to tear out your heart in response
But you would have to see what you are missing
And we know you are blind
To the charms I tell myself I still wield
You’ve tacitly declared
Them
Invisible
So I punish myself
With an overdose of my beloved solitude
I will never know how much pleasure I negate
By setting my body off-limits

It could all just be a delusion
I might truly be as worthless as you clearly found me
At best a lovely and damaged illusion
To those who can’t touch me
To those who can’t touch me

If I woke up
In Temescal again
I would have written
Another song about you
No
I’ve finally cut you off from the honors you never deserved

If I woke up
If I woke up in your arms again
Nostalgia is
The worst drug I’ve ever tried to kick

How close did we ever come?