Ezhno Martin

Only Constantly

 

                        I just got married Samantha
and I'm not sure what I'm trying to prove
                               besides that I wear her like a freshly healed tattoo
a cover up that can't hide the fact
           that in the life I fucked up
                     it was supposed to be you
                                                               and me
                             on a fools errand rushing towards a fleeting forever

when I say I'm happy it worked out this way
           I'm almost entirely sure I mean it
but I still get caught up
                   thinking of what would have happened
                             had I not been the way I was
        and mostly still am
                                                  I'm insane
                                      but I'm at my most rational
                        when I wonder what would have happened
                                                     if I could have changed.
              What if the rear-view
                                   was foresight 

                       and all the ruined nights
            could have turned into surrenders
apologies searching for reconciliation
                                                rushing to the reality that I would always love you
                                    instead of running away because I couldn't handle my liquor
                        or admitting I was wrong

What if
            once and for all
I could realize
                  being right
never got me nowhere
                                                 Anyway
                                         I'm really trying to love her
                    and it's not that hard most of the time
                                         she is a better version of me
                               and we are a better version of us
                   so even when I wake up
                                        next to her
                               from dreams of holding you
         I don't hesitate
                to be happy I'm finding her instead
         and flush you from my mind
as I write poems on her back with my fingers
                            so that by the time her eyes open
                     all she sees are my fantasies

           
                      for how much better I can become
                                          the longer she loves me  
                      Sure, she knows about you
               and is acquainted with all the reasons I gave you to stay gone
                                   but I do my best to keep my worst in those stories
She seems serious about sticking around
              even if she gets sick of me at regular intervals
                                   and I keep having to find apartments on short notice
                                                      when she needs the space to miss me
                                             I can only love the people that let me
                        and she always lets me come home
most of the time it's her idea, even
                                         most of the mistakes I make I've made before
                            so when I say I'm sorry
                                                I really mean it
                            I mean it
                with panic like it's proof I don't deserve happiness
                               I mean it
                          like I hate myself and can't believe I let it happen again
I mean it
                 like I'm so sorry I'm contemplating suicide
                                    because I can't stand living making the same mistakes
over and over again
                         hurting people I need to heal me
                                                                  You can't fake that kind sorry
                                                       and she knows it
                                              she tells me she forgives me
                                  she says it all the time
                         and I need to hear it
                    I have a wife
                                    and she forgives me all the time
                              I need to be forgiven all the time
                                                   she says she forgives me
                                        and she said she'd keep loving me

            and I need to hear both of those things
constantly

National Emo Day Gets a New Sponsor

It's about time
to leave town again
Samantha
It's January 10th
and my soon to be ex wife
is sympathetic to my superstitions
so she picked your birthday to break up with me

It's not so bad

It's convenient, really
not having to create a new holiday for grieving
I can just lump you and her together
on one of the coldest days
of every infant year
as a reminder that broken promises
occupy the same space
as second-hand baby clothes
never used

It's a relief
to finally bottom out
come to rest in the wreckage
of the failure to ever get past you
or the repetition of the same fuck ups
freak outs
insecurities
and nights spent fighting over
how bad I wanted to pass out in the snow

You were never the problem
she knew all along
about my obsession
she heard the poems
with your named littered in them

She found it charming
that I had kept socks, underwear, shirt, pants, jacket
of yours
exactly enough to dress up a mannequin stand in

it was just my same old shit
getting older
with an older woman
with less time to turn back
and find a better life without me

Samantha, can you remember how many times
you found me in the dumpster behind your house
gargling a bottle of cheap warm vodka
crying uncontrollably?

Or did you lose count?

That was her life too
and she got sick of it
just a little slower than any normal person would

I'd really like it
if you told me
that I could be redeemable
if I'd just stop being like this

It's been years
and I'm convinced
that the reason I'm unlovable
goes a lot deeper
than then stupid mistakes
I could stop making

 

Ezhno Martin is a freak who makes books for freaks via EMP Books(.com), obsesses about a certain New York Basketball Team, and takes long urban hikes in the middle of the night. Ezhno has substituted god with a ghost who goes by Samantha, and the prayers for forgiveness have yet gone unanswered.