dear college

i was scared to write
this poem because i know
already that it's too big for me

dear college i have
gotten smaller

dear college what will
you remember about me?

dear 7:14 am alarm clock
dear move-in

dear rear view mirrors
painted on the front
door of my parent's house

dear august humidity
how you came back around
to remind me of the 
oceans worth of water evaporating
from my body while i wasn't looking

dear rivers i have filled

dear fountain & my wet bare feet

dear freshman hall & 
biology notes in the corridors  

dear blue hair 
dear burned pop-corn
& butter on the back
of my knuckles

dear first-year roommate
you asked me in july about color 
coordinating the room

dear mini fridges
& nirvana poster 

dear thrift-store lamp
& white light on wooden desks

dear sun coming
in the window of Wilkinson 314 
on the last day while
i continued the process
of emptying a body

dear JD Salinger
who lived up the hall
did you ever sit under
the oak tree in hunsberger woods?

did you look at the fields 
rolling away 

the children lost in them

dear catcher in the rye 
i've come back to you
like a key ring

dear bobby fong
the bag pipes from your funeral 
woke me up that saturday

dear boy who i called 
on the phone before 
8am spanish
who kissed me in the back seat
of his silver honda
glare of the ball field lights
in the window 

i forget who recently
i would have given everything
for you

dear intro to creative
writing we wrote our hearts

dear Sappho we were lovers
meeting at the wrong time

dear snows i have walked through

dear bus stop in pottstown

dear RA who covered
the bathroom mirrors for
the day-- it was me who 
tore off the paper to put on
eye liner

dear rose on the windowsill

dear bracelet you gave me 

dear boy we had wednesdays
dear boy i still think
of you almost every time i 
hear a bird call

dear professor i keep the comments
you left on my first poem
dear professor i'm re-drafting my body
dear professor i never said thank you
dear professor in ten years will
you remember my paper about 
our lady of guadalope?
or my poem about my father & kurt vonnegut?

dear books piling up in my closet

dear rocky horror supplies
in the basement

dear lost left socks

dear measuring cups
i keep telling myself i will
out grow you

dear OCD my third roommate

dear roommate i'm sure
i woke up some mornings 

dear roommate read me
that poem you wrote about irish rain

dear roommate i'll
miss our lamp light

dear friend will you turn
the oven on for me?

dear friend your poetry shakes
the cherry blossoms from
the trees in olin plaza

dear friend the ceiling wears
your fret board

dear friend we made it
dear friend our skin eats 
scars like watermelon rinds

dear friend we're comets
coming back around 

dear friday night
in the park pavilion

dear adirondack chairs 

dear lost claddagh ring

dear pink sun dress
whose body are you blooming for?

dear boy our bodies left shadows
like finger prints on 
my bedroom wall

dear room at the bottom
of the library
you have been my bones

dear quiet hours
dear stairwell phone call

dear girlhood
i loved your red lipstick
kiss my bathroom mirror 
while you go

dear Olin 3 
i take the stairs

dear movie nights
dear halloween makeup 
dear drag shows

dear lit soc
we could never read enough poetry

dear GSA you gave 
my blood vocabulary

dear person i believe there
is something good about being a man
because of you

dear college was i enough?

dear college

dear blood 
dear hair shaved to the scalp

dear walk to dairy queen 
on the first weekend
& the picture we took
of us all crammed into the booth

dear red spoons 

dear college 
dear seasons 
passing through you
like the minute
hand on a watch face

dear college do you
feel us leave?

dear college are you 
all tuition & stone?

dear muscles & flesh
dear graduations 

dear chapel i have
always regretted not going back 

dear god 
the last time
i believed in you without doubts
was in the mouth of reverend rice
on a snowy april morning
when he told me after service 
that him & god 
would always be there to
come back to 
no matter who i loved &
who i became

as long as i am  person of love

dear college 
have i loved enough?

dear all of you

you deserve crocuses 
& poetry without rhyme

dear english majors
there's only so much 
you can close read 

dear college
dear endings come
in waves

& almost always without
god or warning