You look at me the same way that I look at my favorite book.
I know every notch, every fold in every page.
I can read it over and over countless times,
yet still find some nuance, some foreshadowing, some miniscule detail that I still didn't catch the 18th read through.

It's been so long since I've felt whole that I forgot what pieces of me looked like until you held them in your hand exclaiming "You're so beautiful!" when all I've ever heard was "You're such a broken ******* mess".. and then the scared little girl in me remembered how to breathe.

when people waste my ******* time
when people don't believe that I am latin
when people say I shouldn't have cut my hair
when people use my mental illnesses as a way to push me lower and question my ******* capabilities- I can still be a mechanical engineer with PTSD, thank you very ******* much,
when people have the audacity to say anything about my parents
when people doubt me based on the things that have happened to me instead of the things I have done
when ex boyfriends call you a **** after you left them for being abusive *******, because they don't think they were an abusive *******
when that same ex blames you for every ****** thing he does after you leave him, because somehow he's no longer responsible for his own actions
when people are racist and have absolutely no reason to be- you can't have a good reason to be racist if you come from an all white town Kevin, to be fair though, there is no good reason to be racist
when I get discluded from the ethnic narrative because my skin paled out as an adult
when I say "I like your hair." to a black woman and she thinks I'm an ignorant white ***** because she won't talk to me long enough to know that I too, have curly hair and enjoy talking about it with other women
when people assume that I cannot be beautiful without my "gorgeous curls" even though those same ******* teased me for my frizzy nest of hair my entire life
when I would straighten my hair and people would ask if I was mixed with asian but then would doubt me when I said "Nope, latin."
when I say that I am queer, but get "but you have a boyfriend though?" as if a bisexual person cannot date a person of the opposite gender
when people say that I will regret my tattoos, not knowing that most of my tattoos are to cover the regret of cutting scars
when people don't understand why I am frustrated
when people say my skin is too white
having a concussion when all I want to do is dance to get all of this ****** frustration out
I could go on and on
but basically, all of my anger stems from human interactions.
but then I get called a ***** for wanting to keep to myself.
First off,
I'm just trying to be happy.

I am over this "happiness is a mindset"-"find a love that makes you forget you were ever depressed"-"medication changes your personality"-"just think happy thoughts"-"have you tried yoga?" *******.
Nowadays, everyone has self diagnosed depression- and won't shut up about it.
And now when I say "I've had manic-depression and was diagnosed with it when I was 9." what most people think I mean was "I need attention, and I have to be like everybody else."- tumblr is my life- *******.
Happiness is a mindset that I was never wired to have, and I am not in control of changing the programming from the inside. I cannot forget that I was ever depressed, when I have known depression since I took my first breath of fresh air out of the womb- as if it's woven into the very fabric of my skin- and I know my skin about as well as I know myself and I've been stuck with both my entire life- an invisible twin that I never ******* asked for. Sure, medication changes my personality-. It makes me function like a normal human being, instead of one that wants to swallow all of those pills and stop breathing- for no reason other than a lack of the same chemicals you can find in that pill that I take into my mouth and swallow every day as if it is my soul that I am swallowing, and not a chalky, white tablet. I cannot think happy thoughts when that it a language that I do not speak and no matter how I have tried to learn, I just can't seem to get the grammatical structure correct- don't even get me started about conjugating verbs because my depression prevents me from doing a ******* thing anyways. I cannot just do some ******* yoga, because all that does is make my body stronger- it cannot alter and rewire my brain to suddenly do something it's never done, and I cannot begin to tell you all of the ways my therapist and I have tried to figure out a way to wave a magical ******* wand and suddenly I'm cured, and how my therapist definitely is not a ******* fairy, and my psychiatrist is really just my potions master, how I've been on **** near every kind of pill, how those pills have kept me alive, how if I miss even one dose, suddenly I imagine how jumping off of a building is the exact way that I want to end this agony- but with no reason to jump, nothing pushing me. Except maybe the fact that having manic depression, gives me more depression- like a never ending plant that just is.. always in ******* season, and boy do I have some ******* allergies.
I cannot begin to tell you how it felt to be 9 years old when my father sat me down and asked me point blank "Honey- you look sad, all the time. Why are you sad?" and bursting into tears like a water fountain bursting a pipe and saying "Daddy, I don't know. I just am. I always am."

take the bus you say, as if it's completely safe and harmless.
and not the highest level of anxiety inducing for me
as if I've never had to reach into my purse and find something hard or pointy to grip in my hand if need be
as if I've never had to scramble to find the answer to "Where ya boyfriend at?" that would actually work and get the guy to leave me alone and stop asking that ****** question
I would take the bus to my beauty school
which meant that all before 7 am, I had to have my face beat to the Gods- as a school requirement.
make up at 7 am is like a golden cheekbone flashing signal for
"keep talking, try to pick me up, when I say I'm taken, I really mean try harder."
I had to walk through the ghetto, as a tiny, make up and fancy clothing clad woman- to get to the bus stop, get on that bus, get to the transfer spot- transfer buses, and then finally get to my destination.
When really it was keep my head down, hood up so no one sees me, get to the bus station, get on the bus, say "I have a boyfriend." at least 10 times, try to make myself small when the questioner sits next to me, breathe a sigh of relief when my transfer spot comes up, only to swallow it when I walk on the next bus, repeat and then finally get to my **** drop off point and walk as fast as I ******* can into the school.
Every ******* day.
So don't you tell me to just take the **** bus if there is another option.
I would sooner shell out cash for gas than ever have to answer "Where is your boyfriend?"
Well *****- I am my own ******* boyfriend. He's right here. He knows how to throw a punch, he can handle himself, he doesn't take **** from no one.
But he's still weaker than most guys.
And for that- my boyfriend is in my pocket, small, barely noticeable and I'll just answer- he's at work, or he's at home, or I'm meeting up with him, and hope to God that you respect the idea of a man more than you respect me.

I greet 2 am tumultuously
my leg aches with pain
while my soul aches to dance
to be free
without constraint
without restraint
just wild
I have class at 9am
but I don't even want to sleep
I just want to dance
all I've ever wanted was to dance.

a dress
a skirt
pink lipstick
that never felt quite like me
baggy pants
baseball cap
dirt and roughhousing
that wasn't quite me either
I was ugly
or at least everyone told me I was
I was too masculine acting
sometimes feminine features
my chest was too flat to be a real girl
my walk was too swagger infused
my fashion style, too--- not enough cleavage if you know what I mean
apparently a shirt and a pair of pants suddenly made me unattractive to both sexes
both sexes
both
I felt like both
makeup and a baseball cap
flat chest, and a flower skirt
skateboards and hair products galore
looking back,
I was always fluid.
the gender waters in which I was drowing
I was only drowning in because I can swim in both currents
fluid
fluid
fluid
****
Living
Under
Imposed
Doctrines

I would like to sucker punch the ******* that decided to tell everyone that dead bodies look like they are sleeping.
12 year old me thought I was prepared to see my mother and father just taking a nap.
I was so ******* wrong.
I'm pretty sure that it's instinct to know when somebody isn't breathing, that they're not sleeping.
I'm pretty sure the machine flat-lining was the grand signal that someone I love no longer existed.
I'm pretty ******* sure that if they looked like they were sleeping- I wouldn't have stopped talking for 2 months because I was traumatized as hell.
They don't tell you that bodies in the morgue don't look like they did when they were alive.
Paler, skinnier without all the organs filling their designated spaces within the crevices in which my father's soul used to live
They shaved my dad's goatee off.
That was all I could think about because I couldn't bear to look at anything but his face.
12 year old me couldn't get over the fact that it didn't look like my dad at all.
I thought,
well at least when mom died in the hospital, she looked like mom.
She was still warm when I held her tight and kissed her cheek for the last time.
My mom.
My dad.
12 year old me stared at that goatee-less face
comparing my parent's dead bodies
and had the ask myself the question
Who will take care of me now
And who the **** said dead bodies look like they're sleeping
I've seen sleeping bodies
they are a lot less haunting than what I saw
even a decade later I can close my mind and see them so clearly, yet I can't even remember what the hell their voices sounded like
so ******* person
you. are. a ******* liar.

I press play
and let the music completely transform me
I am no longer just attached to the sounds through a chord
I am a dancer, fluid and powerful
I see intricate choreography that my body can no longer replicate
pause
my leg throbs from the nerves
the temperature rapidly changing
as it has done for over a year
the expulsion of molten earth- Vesuveus
mingles and transforms
the frozen winter of Russia, where no army can win
my leg throbs
play
I try to memorize the world I am taken to
I practice ways to explain what I see
maybe I can't translate this world
but somebody else can.

I awake,
knowing that it happened again
another dream
another world that I can't live in
one where you exist
one where your heart never stopped
I beg you to let me stay
but then my eyes open
and I am alone
with only the night
and the fading memory of a dream

I do not need paper
I do not need a God
to call you mine forever.
The road is unsteady
but still you grab my hand
fall, you will not let me
Uncertainty is my forte
but blindly I follow
through all the night and day.

How dare you utter love
but tell me I am not yours
you say "in the future"
as if our love is an open door
I hear your words, but I don't know why
our love right now to you has no worth
you say these words but all I see is lies
Dear liar, I will not wait for your truth
I will not wait for you to decide it's my turn
so go on, go and love her
and when she breaks your heart just like the last one
you will think of me
you will wish I was not done
how you used me like a band aid
only there for your hurt
I'll be my own **** band aid
and soothe my own breaking heart
you do not deserve me
not now, not when you say when
not even from the start
and definitely, not at the end

I open my eyes,
forgetting the nightmare
my body remembers
the ground greets me like a hug I don't want
all at once I remember
time stops
my world stopped existing when you did

"Te amo."
I hang up the phone
I brush my teeth and pull the blankets up to my shoulder
I release my heavy lids and fall asleep

She wakes me up
It is still dark out
the moon is awake
the world seems different

She tells me mom is fine
but doesn't tell me if you're okay
I already know
My heart explodes
my ribs detach from their cage and struggle to break through the skin
my arms wrap around myself, trying to keep it all contained
my fingers pressing tightly
the skin bruises and burns
peeling away and exposing my bones
you are gone
while I am here,
my body is just fine
but yours is broken
but soul set free
why must you go where I cannot follow you

I want to write
I want to make the words come out,
like a bulimic purge
of all the things that are killing me inside.
I purge,
the stench of death filling my nostrils and lungs,
suffocating me in my own memories,
visions of my past will flood my mind and take control,
like some disorder that I cannot contain
to sitting on the bathroom floor
crying, screaming with vocal chords that won't make a sound
crying not over my body,
but the images of the bodies
that lay cold, and silent
my mom and dad

I hate mirrors
not because I don't think I'm pretty
but because when I look
I see more than me looking back
I see all the times
I have ever looked in a mirror
tears streaming down my face
begging myself to keep going
telling myself everyone was wrong
trying to convince myself
that there was something worth staying for.