Borrow (CONTENT WARNING)

[matsunosuperfan]

CONTENT WARNING for suicide & grief

Borrow

After Cam died time never seemed to know what to do
with its hands                 it started tearing out the hours too cautiously
along their perforated edges         it doodled me into
the margins of his past with you


I fall asleep wearing your spare heart      instinctively overstep
            the rotting planks on the back porch 
in your recurrent dream              
He is alive in the driver’s seat like he always used to be
                          red knit of your lungs unraveling inside my chest
                          match his curls lit up by brake lights


Folded in upon yourself in the cold kitchen                      I can't help stealing
drinks from the cracked-lip chardonnay bottle he gave you                   trying                
to discern the tasting notes of your grief
             I'm sorry                  unbearable tear down your cheek as you watch 
fingers peel my skin away
     our wounds approaching congruence


He shoots himself and you’re always 5000 miles
away         He shoots himself in the head and I’m always in the shower
slouched against the stained fiberglass of your longing
                 Once from afar I shared his hopelessness
                 but you shared his life up close


The wind drags a crumpled leaf like his limp hand down the pavement forever
The semicircles on the bathroom tile will never meet to make a whole moon
Tomorrow I’ll hold you while you’re shaking 
                                                        I’ll quit drinking         I won’t bleed

Love that we are playing with white space even if sometimes I find it distracting. In the second line for instance it's effective at conjuring a sense of anxiety or hesitancy.

Some of this language reads too poemy and pulls me out of the dream, like "the margins of his past" which is so lofty after "doodled" (great verb). Or like "instinctively overstep" is a bit of a prosaic mouthful.

When the speaker goes directly to the heart of the trouble the verse is most impactful: "He is alive in the driver's seat" (though, do we need the explanatory "like always"?)

I suggest cutting the entire Chardonnay bottle stanza, it's so maudlin and weepy in a distasteful way. "Discern" is an ugly verb. 'The tasting notes of your grief" is not a good metaphor. This action all feels forced and melodramatic. "our wounds approaching congruence"? Eeeesh. Take it back down like 6 levels. Speaker is way too ornate.

The rough and unapologetic "He shoots himself" stuff is so much more compelling. Really hits me in the heart. This was hard to read

Find a less archaic phrase than "from afar"

Just ditch the poemy stuff and let the natural voice come through more often. When it does, you are cooking