Dating : Love Language

“You’re nobody until
you’re somebody to someone.”

Speakers,
headphones,
billboards
drip daily poison into the
wrinkles of our brains.
Black mold grows and
we’re told it’s romantic.

“Everything means nothing
if I can’t have you.”

Codependence advertised
like a chrome-shiny new drug
with a great beat;

Ask your doctor if Love is right for you.
Side effects include insanity, depression,
alcoholism, drug abuse, shitty metaphors
and,
in some cases,
death.

I want to vomit.
To spit acid on the words
until they fall away
like the flimsy lies
they are,
and you can see the raw
moth-eaten money-bones
that keep them standing,
all cotton and clothespins
and sharp paper.

“You’re my heroin. You’re my novocaine.”

Love is a drug.
Poison that
makes us think we’re sexy
when we’re sick.
And drugs don’t care about you.

“You’re nobody ’til somebody loves you.”

And as we take it
they hold out jaws shut with
photoshopped, Christmas-card fingernails
so we can’t cough it back up.

The glitter cuts our throats
but they smile and nod,
‘We did it, too!’

So we drink up.

We live on colored glass
and saccharine.

“If it doesn’t hurt it isn’t real.”

And we always hurt.

And we’re
always,
always
hungry.