maybe because i'd been broken hearted before
the cracks were so easily picked apart until a skeleton
was all that remained beneath my breast in a hollow shell
of rib and flesh.

maybe because your smile was a dressed up smirk
contradicting its appearance with cyncism unseen
and leaving your face with an almost trusting gleam
in your eyes.

no, i believe it was the nights
that i loved
that you hated

when the air hung between us and
peeled us from our skin

you were always too buried
to see how naked the truth could be

too in love with that smile
to even care to know its origin