If you dream that they are posting tirades in response to you
and hallucinate jolting awake and checking your social media-
if every fictional character they relate to is a serial killer and every argument sees them
coating their chest in fake blood
if everyone else who ever loved them jolted away like an alarm clock rang
and you think you inhabit a deeper awakening than these strangers
who sleepwalked past your lucid love
if their arguments run on unreal logic where you become
their mother, their last ex-best-friend, Meghan they went to high school with
if you chip a tooth because your jaw clenches
against the tide of nightmares about them
if they are made of rows of gnashing teeth
demanding apologies long past your bedtime, leaving you chewed-up and bleary in dawn
if their sulks and single-word replies remind you of falling and you
drift off imagining the impact-
rainbow, ruby heart, red-winged wounded blackbird,
you need to wake up.