for the longest time, the years after i left us
things changed: the sweets jar is always empty.
hollow. it was a curse — every candy i tried
would taste like headlights that evening

in the backseats of your run-down car
we broke into crushed sugar, condensed
at all the sweetest places—
your smile, fingertips, ecstasy, my ghost

like hourglass sand through a narrow tunnel
your nails slit open powdered flesh
the past and present remained still
until one overflowed into the other — i met you:

sculpting candy with serrated teeth, you
dragged the lollipop across my closed lips
scraping with shards of broken headlights
as our moonlit nights slowly slipped away

like this one: back of your car, tasted
timeless scars, you tell me it’s okay—
lollipop bits stuck to the back of my throat
and sticky under my tongue like sand

after every grain has passed through
the hourglass neck, will there ever be
another us? the sweet blood i crave.
searching through an hourglass; our glass

somehow my lips ended up etched in shards
pressed tightly against the side of your neck
i fed on your blood trickling into my scars
intoxicated from the sugar on your lips

slowly, i sank, like metal keys in honey
into oceans of starlight, sickly sweet
they became mists of heavy dreams
seeping into scars until we were but—

your fingertips poisonous to my skin
like headlights waiting to break.
and that was why, even after a forever
every piece of candy would remind me of:

one, a taste no artificial sweets could match
two, a story ending with broken headlights
three, the hourglass on your bedroom shelf, and
four, you;