Today I didn't wear any makeup to school for the first time in 6 months, and no one noticed, not even you
although I know you look at me a lot.

Today I decided I needed to end things with you.
Not because I don't love you, and not because I don't want to be with you
but because every day I leave Latin class and walk down a zig zagging stairway

and go to visit my friends, the school nurses, who give me tea in my Vermont Public Radio mug
whose names I don't know
and I can't tell if they know mine either because they only ever call me "sweetie" or "honey"

Or to my favorite bathroom at the cold end of the school where no one ever is by the Multipurpose Room
which is always empty and doesn't seem to have much of a purpose at all
and look at myself in the mirror and take deep breaths

and when I walk up the stairs the tall rectangles of light cast by the huge windows above the stairway have moved at least 3 feet.

I know this because I took a picture once on my way down because I liked the way there are three panels of light, and two of them slanted down the brick wall perpendicular to the window and the other fit just right on the diagonal corner section of wall that split the two

walls, that is

and that is the way it always looks when I am walking down, but by the time I go back up
my mug clasped in both hands, steaming hot,
the diagonal wall holds almost all of the lit up rectangles
and this worries me.

And today while I was trudging across the parking lot behind the bagel shop where we both work
I was happy because I didn't need to wear gloves and the locks weren’t frozen on the dumpsters and the sun was still lighting up the evening sky
peachy pale
and I realized that just one hour was enough time for the sun to set entirely, because the day before I had walked across the same parking lot in the dark

and all of this reminded me that you haven't talked to me in 24 hours and I don't know why, but I don't think it's a big deal.
What seems like sort of a big deal is that I've thought about you nonstop for almost 3 years
and it's getting warm again and I remember the first time we kissed when it was rainy in March
and I was cold and lonely afterwards
and even though you liked me you dated a different girl

and it's March again and I don't remember what it's like to go to sleep with something other than the way your hands move on my mind
or wake up thinking about something other than the way your mouth feels

and even though you kissed my neck and called me gorgeous
and even though you think i'm cute and funny

and even though you still like me
I don't want you to rule me like the sun rules the day
because time goes so fast and everything changes

and even though you make me warm like freshly steeped tea
(sometimes)
the reason I drink so much of it

is because I'm usually cold.