I pressed my finger to that soft spot just behind my ear above my mastoid process
imagined putting a barrel there
that spot is the best way to ensure death if I use a gun
that’s not how I’d do it in actuality
but I can’t mimic hemlock and sleeping pills with a finger

I whispered ‘I want to live’
over and over into my pillow
as many times as it took for me to believe it

my life is
mediocrity
plainness
inadequacy
weakness
and that is hard to change

I could end it
guns
knives
poisons
ropes
but that has it's problems
so I keep living

I can't fix anything
but it is changing
slowly

is it good change?
is it worth it?
I don't know
I don't really care
it is what it is.

An ugly little girl
in an ugly little  world
Raises a fist to the sky
As the rain ignites
On the face of the last dead leaf
Burning it to a crunch
As it falls from the vine
That circles the bars
In the prison of her mind

it's being alone
it's being judged
by shallow people
who think my worth negatively correlates
with my pant size

it's knowing that isn't true
but secretly thinking I deserve this
as if somehow my outsides reflect my insides
it's being so concerned with making myself better
that I'm making myself worse

it means I have to try harder
to be better at school
to make more people laugh
because I can't rely on looks
I can't just be me
because my fat defines me

it is hard
but not as hard as poetry
not as hard as not writing
not as hard as not letting the characters out
not as hard as keeping my ideas inside my head
not as hard not trying
it is hard writing a novel
but not as hard as the alternative

Hey you, let's go on a road trip!
As long as no one gives us lip
it will be better than ice cream
more like floating in the jet stream

under the sun with the windows
down we’ll party like manic clowns
the music’ll blast, so nineties
not like elderly or grannies

but almost awesome ancient times
with cargo pants and Busta Rhymes
we’d cruise dashingly up the coast
eat lots of snacks like nuts and toast

unless you can’t, that’s sucky bro
don’t worry now, we can just go
I promise this will be awesome
like watermelon flavored gum

the wind will crackle through our hair
we will road trip without a care
we’ll drive all day or just a bit
as Nike says, lets just do it!

they are so worn out
but I can't let them go
so faded orange
dirty white
and dusty black
my socks peek through
little frayed holes
they've been with me in the best of times
but not in the worst

these are ones I got in the beginning
they ushered in the golden years
they've been bird watching
they've been mini golfing
they've been waiting to slip into
on so many mornings
after so many nights

they've listened to me sing Taylor Swift songs at the top of my lungs
in a little blue car
mobbing through this quiet little town
at a quarter to midnight
summer rain pouring down
with my best friends
with my first real friends
on those nights that are my ideal
the ideal of being a teenager
of being young
and in love

not with a person
but with a feeling

they've absorbed these feeling
absorbed the love
the stars
and the high
the high of being alive
spinning in circles
so close to the edge of adulthood
they hold me on the precipice of something new
and when I fall
they go too

colors stream round and round
rocking and pulsing and pushing
they burn the backs of my eyes

and my foot steps stutter with my heart beat
as it thumps erratically by the side of the road
the buses, cars and logging trucks
they pass me by
I care too much, fuck

but I just
I want to be the pavement beneath their wheels
such a fight
flight is too easy
and too too hard

and so it goes
my hand against the fuzzy inside
ripping up my coat pocket
tap tap scratch
tap tap scratch

beating a beat
marking a mark
a deep humming under my skin
a magnificent sinking
as I'm falling in

my thoughts collide
breaking under massive waterfalls
I can't seem to catch
all the drops of myself

any faith in God I had
it shattered when I was eleven
like the shards of glass glittering on the road
next to my puppy lying in his blood
like Grandma's tears as I held her hand
while she died so, so slowly
like the dew on the grass
that I stared at for an hour instead of going near Uncle's grave
like the ruthless eyes of the Husky
as it ripped into the torso of my one month old sheep
like every prayer that went unanswered
this God thing is a lie
I learned
it can't be trusted

any faith in people I had
it left when I was twelve
like my father
and the step father who screamed all the time
and the creepy old man who slept with my mother
the guy that tried to touch me with his greasy hands
the fool with a shovel and a gleam in his eye
standing in the doorway and swinging
crazy
people are crazy
I learned
they can't be trusted

my faith in air
that's what I have left
even if there is nothing else
I learned
I can breathe

In the day I am too big
but in the night I am too small
I lay in bed with my feet near the ceiling
air currents wisp around my ankles
and the world envelopes me
darkness surrounds me
Words overwhelm me
I think
I think
I think and can't stop
about everything and nothing
It is all too much
I wish I could just sleep

from a young age I was
manipulating them
making them mine
playing them over and over
letting them use me
but really I was using them
then tossing them out
to move on to the next

more and more and more
ripping them off the page
tearing apart the ignorant ones
making passionate sense to them
and spitting them back out
fingers digging in like quotation marks
burning them into parts of speech
adjectives, nouns, verbs
taking advantage of them all
I'm an equal opportunist

I only had one
for my childhood
at least the parts that mattered
the laughter
the tears
the fun and the fear
rolling in the grass
swinging in the trees
growing up
wild and free

he taught me to swim
and pulled out my teeth
made me sandwiches
and helped me shear fleece

he let me be little
while he could not be
he was my protector
from everything

from the yelling
from the fists
he took branches to his body
and a shovel to the face

I wish I could have been braver
taken away some of his pain
I wish I could reciprocate
for all that he’s given me
and more
for I have
the best brother in the world

all was calm this morning
and now it's not
it changed faster than tachyons
how can it be?

how did that blue sky
breathing life into the little white flowers
the ones that tell me it is spring
the ones that seemed to smile as I passed them
how did that turn into this?

this torrential down pour
these ferocious winds
the sideways rain hits me like bullets
or at least paint balls
turning exposed skin red on the run
the wet trash is hurling down the street
faster than the rushing creek
the creek that serves as my driveway

how did the sounds of the birds chirping
turn into thunder crashing louder than the ocean
thunder shaking my house
we're in the Yahtzee cup of the God's dinner party
shaking around
no clue how we will fall

I hate the weather.

the utter exhaustion at the end of a book
after not being about to put it down all afternoon
those 5 hours spent out of my world
feeling another person
feeling so much more than I have ever felt as me
my mind so darkened from this overwhelming feeling
the feeling that my life has just ended
or that part of it has
that part that was so much greater than reality

memories like bullets
are firing at me from a gun
the fists fly from my mouth
as it's all turning south
my life is crashing into the sea
because there's no you and me
I'm vacuumed packed
shrink wrapped out of air
lost and alone
sinking like uranium
radiating all these manic fish
floating in this deep blue foam
screaming that it's okay
but I'm a tidal wave
trying to tear down their dawn  
and this whole world is watching
me feeling so far from so close
I can't have come this far
just to sink into earth

The sun
The rain
The ocean
The clouds

Ferocity
Passion
Love
Thought

those beautiful things
they hurt the most

they burn, dehydrate, and blind us
they flood the land, and drown our people
they carry diseases, spread blights, batter our shores
they electrify us with their crashing waves

they kill, murder, and maim
they cripple, mutilate, and rape
they break, batter, and wound
they incapacitate, wrong, and hurt us
our mind, our bodies, our souls

they are malicious
they are pain
they are life

eternity
life
death
limbo
all the circles of heaven and hell
all the worms crawling in
all the worms crawling out

some go through life without a doubt
delusional, insane, the best kind of crazy

some of us
we feel
and we think
we never really know

what is wrong?
what is right?
should we even care?
what matters?

in this moment
in infinite moments
Love

matters
shine is what loves
hurt is what loves
forever is love

embrace forever
forever shall be
your enchanting misery

tangled up in flannel and dreams
dreams that fade into mmm bop
and the realization that it is tim
time to turn off the alarm
almost back asleep when pirates seep into my consciousness
snooze button
rolling over
head banging
against the wall that is
I know
I've gotta get up
I can't get down

pirates once more
out I roll
banging my knees on the bed frame
bumbling to the dresser
grabbing the 4 essential items of clothing
heading towards the shower
if they don't look good right now
well I don't care right now
because it is the morning

other girls say they want to be tall
they don't really
they want to be 5'8" or 5'9"
so that they can be skinnier or a better basketball player
or just so they can reach the top shelf
it doesn't work that way
because that isn't actually very tall
and even if you are that tall
or taller than that
your dreams won't come true
because when you are slightly above 6'0"
you can still be fat
like me
you can still be bad at basketball
like me
and even though you can reach the top shelf
you'll get hit in the head with tree branches more often
like me
but I can pick from the top of the bush
and I can change a light bulb without a ladder
and I can hold onto the ceiling while trying to do yoga
it has it's ups of course
but the downs hit harder
because it's farther to the ground