i'm flushing my heart like a dead goldfish

the cicadas were august heat wind-up toys 
i believed i only had
the distance between breaths to convince you
i was a real mourning dove & not just
a pigeon. we ate on the floor of your apartment.
creases in my knuckles got deeper and deeper.
have you ever wanted to love someone
more than you can? or else maybe love is
only ever as much as you can reach
& pull your own balloons down
from where they try to nest in the clouds.
i bought us a cottage in the wilderness.
made us clay children to animate by the fire 
if we wanted to. you drove your car
off the side of a cliff & lived. now, here i am.
i go to the pet store to buy another heart.
the worker there fishes between the already-dead ones
to find me one that looks like it has a little life.
i make all the promises to the bad of what
on the drove home. i say, "i will not love like this again."
only there i am with you & you are lighting matches.
& you are catching cicadas & filling a moon shine jar &
i am forgetting my heart on the end table.
my heart is belly up. it was dreaming 
of blue aquarium pebbles. it was hungry for a night
free of ants. without a back door. there is always
the alley way & whatever trash congregates there.
there is always the cicadas whether 
they are furious & whirling or asleep
as other people's hearts in the damp cool ground. 
tell me, i already know, am i always going to be
like this? like a forest fire on a dinner plate?
loving in fits of water. killing the little creature
& immediately getting in the car to find another?