there is very little to say anymore

about anything really.

i remember when you stopped saying "i love you" when we parted ways.

cause it wasn't a bad day.  it was just a day.
it was just normal.  and i went into the world unarmed.

for the first time in years without the banner of your love.

and your love left after that.
part of it had been gone, maybe part of it never bloomed.

but one thing is for certain.  on that nothing day, in that small apartment, surrounded by a pack of animals, i said "have a good day babe" and you kept reading.

we didn't fight.
fuck, we might've even have attempted sex recently.
you just didn't know i was up.
or packed and leaving.

you honestly didn't care.
not to say you didn't tell me you loved me after that day.  that was just the first time it didn't matter if you did.

shortly after that i worked a marathon shift.  bike shop and bar all in one day.
i was tired.
i was beat.
but we had to drive to nebraska.  it was that time. time to go home and see our people.
it was the last big trip we took in that volkswagen.

that trip may've killed it.  that trip may have been when you decided to leave.

i've never asked, because i really don't care about the logistics of it all unless i'm up late
or  scotch drunk

but i remember waking up part way through the day
the stale smell of rolling tobacco and weed
fall pouring in through the windows.

a collection of mixes i had made for the trip were oddly untouched
and that fucking adele song was kind of playing through the
static of a radio station we were just barely too far from.

and you were singing.

but you barely sang
not even for me, the fool who knew every line to every song.
sure you would
rap along with salt-n-pepa
wail along with billy corgan
sob along with fionna apple

but not if someone else was listening.
and not with any genuine feeling.

certainly not like this, to this song.

i heard you sing like this one other time
but your emotion was different
it was again, some radio crap
but in his truck, before i knew about anything

i was awake this time.  but barely present enough to catch the irony.

it wouldn't land til months later.

and all of this bothers me.  it haunts me today to consider how long i was just practical
a means to an end.

i didn't know that day in the truck.  i should've in the volkswagen.
adele v. taylor swift
good lord what terrible music.

hate
pure and blinding
disregard
without reason

a fire swept forest
will be green again
but hearts
they're of
the same sausage ingredients
as the rest of us.