the protector

i grind my palm into my stomach
and it crumbles like the soft rock
towering the highway, crashing on
the paved road.

i am not at a loss as to how it is
i became so weak. i sat myself
down one night a while ago
as i shivered from your words,
and i said

soak it in, let it poison you.

i am not a drug addict. but in you
i looked for the possibility of feeling.

and you did poison me.

i sit within dreams where your mouth
is wet, and tugging me, and my
hands are pressed deep within the 
parts of you that stay warm. 

i am not cold. but my bones ache
as if they are, perhaps it is because
you are so close, or perhaps it is
because the air stills when you
are near.

in the morning i wake with my mouth
dry and my palms wet and my shoulders
aching. and my voice stumbles, as if it
slipped out in the middle of the night
to find you.

i can never find you.
i do not blame you
for the absence.

i know that if you were brave enough
you would stay. i know that if your
skin did not crawl with fever from
the possibility of me, the lack of me

you would be here.