Your Flannel Shirt
i'll wear your heart on my sleeve
I see you standing in the doorway, that familiar plaid pattern of cloth ensconcing your broad, tapered frame, and I think to myself that it looks so much better on you than it ever does on me.
Whenever you go, you always leave it behind. At first, I think it was an honest mistake, but now I know that you leave it here just for me, so that I can still feel you even when you’re over a thousand miles away.
Some days I want to wear it out to the mall with friends or to the library for a quick cram session before my eight AM class, places where you would be if you could, but I rarely ever do. I’m scared that if the scratchy material brushes against my skin, it’ll become more me than you, and I don’t want your colors to fade from those cotton threads.
But sometimes I wear it to bed, though the texture’s uncomfortable and I always find myself tangled up in sleeves that are too long. Your scent clings to the collar, and sometimes I’ll wake up in the middle of the night and catch a whiff of you, that combination of Axe, sweat, and weed. And other times, I’ll catch a glimmer of golden blonde underneath the streetlight’s glow, a forgotten strand dangling from the sleeve, and I’ll long to run my fingers through your hair, to feel your breath against my neck slow and steady.
Now you’re moving closer to me; the material seems to float with your gait. A thousand miles become bridged into the distance between our two bodies, and your calloused fingers trail along my sides. I tremble slightly at your touch because even though it’s all I could think about for so long, time and miles have made it feel foreign.
At that very moment, I press my face into your shoulder, inhaling the smell of you that’s become diluted in my nostrils for so long, and the force of it nearly overtakes me, but you tuck your chin into the crook of my neck, and I finally feel like I'm home.
Whenever you go, you always leave it behind. At first, I think it was an honest mistake, but now I know that you leave it here just for me, so that I can still feel you even when you’re over a thousand miles away.
Some days I want to wear it out to the mall with friends or to the library for a quick cram session before my eight AM class, places where you would be if you could, but I rarely ever do. I’m scared that if the scratchy material brushes against my skin, it’ll become more me than you, and I don’t want your colors to fade from those cotton threads.
But sometimes I wear it to bed, though the texture’s uncomfortable and I always find myself tangled up in sleeves that are too long. Your scent clings to the collar, and sometimes I’ll wake up in the middle of the night and catch a whiff of you, that combination of Axe, sweat, and weed. And other times, I’ll catch a glimmer of golden blonde underneath the streetlight’s glow, a forgotten strand dangling from the sleeve, and I’ll long to run my fingers through your hair, to feel your breath against my neck slow and steady.
Now you’re moving closer to me; the material seems to float with your gait. A thousand miles become bridged into the distance between our two bodies, and your calloused fingers trail along my sides. I tremble slightly at your touch because even though it’s all I could think about for so long, time and miles have made it feel foreign.
At that very moment, I press my face into your shoulder, inhaling the smell of you that’s become diluted in my nostrils for so long, and the force of it nearly overtakes me, but you tuck your chin into the crook of my neck, and I finally feel like I'm home.