To The Pretty Poets of the Windy City

— for Rachel

There is a certain emotion that feels like being on the verge of tears.

It is when you sense that you are beginning to better understand someone you’ve loved for a long time, without their knowledge or help.
This feeling is something scary that inspires me: something frightening and loud.
It is a feeling that cannot be cured by listening to punk rock and no folk music for six months. It is a feeling that demands to be explored.

This poem is about three things: traveling clichés, personal stuff, and how Rex and I got married. 

August 4th, 6:11 PM—This afternoon it poured and poured. There are so many people in this city and today they all got wet.

Introducing: Rex.
Rex noticed my white dress.
Rex watched me make deviled eggs in his kitchen.
Rex remembered the short conversation we had about Virginia Woolf and was seen last week in Myopic Books, purchasing a copy of To The Lighthouse.
Rex does not want to live in the same city as me.
Rex goes by a shortened version of his middle name. Rex was allowed to choose his middle name when he was 16, and he chose "Alexander".
If Rex could see me writing in my journal in this public airport terminal, it would be love at first sight. However, the likelihood of Rex writing poetry about me is pretty low. That's just the way things are.

Some days are filled with an inexplicable feeling of dread. I fear my pen will run out of ink before I have said everything I want to say, none of my clothes fit my tits the way I want them to, and I am able to think myself into a stomachache. I always say that if my reality were made into a photograph, anxiety would be the shadows-- just something you expect to see.

August 6th, 3:55 PM—I have been emotionally empty for quite some time now... for several years, and through several love affairs.

I do not like to sleep in public places unless that public place is a library. Some people cannot bear to sit down on a plane before it has taken off. Things will change, but not everything will change. The Universe is not to be trusted, but it can be your friend.

Rex was waiting for us on his porch, and he was the one who noticed my white dress.
Rex put his hand on my back as I lay belly-down in his bed.
A physic palm reader once told Rex that in a past life he was a hero of the Renaissance. 
Rex is not sure when he'll get his next haircut.
Rex saw my white dress and requested that I marry him in it.

You look out of a plane window and see a tiny version of a city you love. The plane tips, and the city disappears behind the wing before you've finished taking in the view.