We are slowly building something beautiful, starting at the foundation. But lately, my darling, I feel like the only one who is doing all the heavy lifting. I'm a walking cliche with sore limbs from one summer of sexual harassment and bricklaying.

I was fanning myself with a flashcard of summer. The last sweat of the season; the final drops of salt licking my cheeks and rolling past my chin.

I used to live in a heartbeat city,

I swear I'd fall in love every minute on the street.
You might be walking around the corner
And our eyes might meet.
Where you been darling, darling we've been holding this moment for you.

must be the colors and the kids that keep me alive
'cause the music is boring me to death

I found an island in your arms
a country in your eyes

I wrote him a three-page letter and biked out to the beach on a hot autumn day. The air was thick and there were curious crows strutting on the rocky shore. I read that letter out loud in a small, muffled voice - though I wasn't sad. There was a lump in my throat: a pearl that I've been harvesting for the past five years. I tore up that letter into dozens of pieces, thin rectangles and squares stained with my inky-black words. I buried that letter in the sandy grit under layers of grey and crunchy seaweed. I thought about him. I thought about that letter and held a speckled rock. I threw that rock into the ocean and turned my back as the ripples were gently hushed by the incoming tide.

Yonder stands your orphan with his gun,
Crying like a fire in the sun.
Look out the saints are comin' through
And it's all over now, Baby Blue.

It's an overcast day and all i can do is touch my lips and watch strange men on park benches. Slow walkers gnawing on their lángos like cattle. Ignoring catcalls in languages i'll never hope to understand. Beautiful tall women - urban giraffes with terrible fashion - swarm these concrete slabs at 3:37. Orange-eyed pigeons scatter and strut around my feet as the city chimes fill these muddy grey skies. I've been living in a city overrun with screaming children and adolescent drug dealers. Flies land on my summer legs as the crowds disperse from the spitting shower, and now i'm one of the few outside on this muggy afternoon. Waiting for the clock to show the right time as insects land on my neck and crawl over my thighs.