The air is singed, heavy

with the searing smell

of patriotic jubilance,

nationalistic propaganda

bullshit

over a nation

I have never felt anything more than

a deep abiding sense of shame

and humiliation from.

xx

You had eyes

like a polluted sea, you had eyes

that swam with the all of bottles

whose contents you rotted your liver with,

you had eyes that were so, so heavy,

slurring,

misleading.

Your simulated waves

of macho confidence

could bring me so high

only to be shot down swiftly

so as to put me in my place.

xx

I wrote you a poem for Fourth of July

and I didn’t hold back

and you didn’t like it.

I romanticize our

shared obsession with death, I

romanticize my bitterness, I

romanticize our conflict, I

romanticize the fact that at times

I felt so little

outside of those things

I romanticized that despite it all

I wanted you,

I deeply, wildly, romanticized

you,

and I think that scared you,

with words alarming, bright

and burning like fireworks.

xx

The air is heavy

with own dramatic battle retelling,

rose-tinted propaganda

silly headed sad girl bullshit.

But your eyes,

your words

I remember them so well.

That I did not let time

or my fear

or my shame

retell.

xx