When I cry at 1am,

I’m one year old again

and I don’t know what to do

with my hands, so I chew on them

and hit things.

The TV sings, spills color across the room.

There’s no way something so bright

could rot my brain.

When I cry at 1am,

I’m one year old again—

and I’m lovable.

My mother kisses her existence

into my skin

so I’ll always remember.

But sometime around first grade,

her kisses turned to vapor,

slipped inside me like death.

I ran wild with sand in my shoes

and bubblegum brains.

Still didn’t know what to do with my hands.

So I chewed them.

Hit things.

Hit people.

Hit the ground

and screamed into it

(very quietly.)

When I cry at 1am,

time splits.

Suddenly it’s 10am,

and I’m ten,

weeping at my own grave.

I think I’m mourning my mother,

but she’s crying just out of sight,

mourning me instead.

Now I know what to do with my hands:

ball them into fists—

to prove I’m angry,

to show I can hurt back.

When I cry at 1am,

I’m fourteen

and in love with a boy

who should’ve died long ago.

He wraps his fingers around my wrist

like a prayer.

I name his eyes a color

that hasn’t been invented.

We write poetry

on the bathroom floor,

between cigarette ash

and rotting soap.

When I cry at 1am,

I’m telling him I love him.

He’s explaining why I don’t.

I forget what to do with my hands.

So I chew them.

Hit things.

Don’t know what I’m hitting.

Don’t know why I’m crying.

Only that it’s 1am—

and I need to sleep.