ten cotton briefs
white, big.
they look like shame to me--
they look like something i shed.

i never let my dishes soak after i use them because
i hear a voice every time i try to
and it makes me sick

i used to think my paralysis was
lucidity
not hysteria
but now i know the difference

i wish i had big teeth,
so big,
that they'd fill my mouth and i didn't have to talk

how much of who you are is ego?
how much is self-actualization?
and how much does answering these questions
help or hurt one or the other?

January 2015
i am freshly nineteen.
a boy with black lipstick comes down unfamiliar stairs
from a mysterious Above.
i wonder if i'll ever see this place.
March 2015
same boy, no lipstick.
i kiss him at a bar
but do not yet get to see the mysterious Above.
i hope to see it soon.
April-June 2015
i wake up most mornings
in the Above place.
i sometimes wear lipstick, but usually not.
it is bright and
cold and
nowhere near the bathroom.
July-December 2015
i reluctantly walk up now
all too familiar stairs
to an Above place where
i am not wanted
or welcome
but i still need a place to put my bag, so i ignore the signs both
literal and figurative.
January 2016-**
i am welcomed with
open arms to
the Above place and
do not want to leave
but
home is a subjective term and time doe not stop for nostalgia;
i am glad no one else will get to see the Above the way i do.

i hate it when you leave me to fall asleep
on my own
but ******* if i don't love
when you crawl into bed and then
inside of me

i am half priced but
full quality.

you told me we weren't alike
because when i sit in the sun
i feel sick.

but here we are
alike and touching
my hands hold yours but
mostly yours hold mind and
i am very scared.

losing my wisdom teeth
and losing you felt similar;
i only had them (my teeth)
briefly, two months maybe,
just like you.
and when they took them (my teeth), it reminded me
of all the chemicals i put in my body
when i was too young to
understand the consequences.
and when they took you, it reminded me
of all the chemicals i put in my body
now that i'm old enough
to understand the consequences.

i spend a lot of time thinking about setting myself on fire
i used to hold hot irons to my forearms
i am no stranger to feeling cold
i often feel cold
i spend a lot of time thinking about setting myself on fire

white sheets in a strange room
dim lights, bright eyes.
i love it when you **** me, i love it when you're inside of me.

i feel like a sunburn waiting to happen
and my teeth have looked so white lately.

i let you see my body last week;
every part (or as much as i could fit in a 4 inch screen)
and my teeth have looked so white lately.

i drove to your old house today
and even though i KNEW your family
had moved out and that
you were still in Europe i looked to see if the front light was on
(it wasn't).
there were white christmas lights framing the door i used to wait at
while you ran 30 minutes late for everything and i chain smoked and
hoped i'd get to see your mom soon.
i couldn't tell if those horrible neighbors who wanted to put your dog down
still lived next door but i hope they do
and that the people who moved in to your old house
are horrible and those people have to suffer at their expense.

i am here sitting quietly doing nothing but
thinking
and i can see vividly in my head the color of your birthmark
(and i can feel myself crying)
do you remember mine?
do you remember my scars and coldsores and bruises?

you like a girl with teeth too big to fit into her mouth
(i'm glad i grew out of my buckteeth)

i love going to the dentist and always do my homework on time.
but,
i am bad at remembering to brush my teeth at night and i smoke
so they're yellow
and reading on a computer makes my eyes hurt.
but,
i somehow always get perfect marks on my homework and
my medical records
so how badly can i really be doing?

i always came over wearing silver and black
and you always wore something purple and insisted it be noticed
even if it wasn't noticeable

but i didn't care.

i used to date boys who cried wolf and kissed poorly
******* in dugouts
high holiday hook ups and lackluster dates

but i don't care.

you bruised my ***** bone
and ego
and surprisingly, my heart

but i hardly care.

or, at least, that's what i keep insisting.

when i get ****** my hair feels greasy because i broke my sobriety when you broke my heart
not that i was really sober
or somber
or helpful, even
but at least you liked to hold me.

i accidentally re-read conversations about The One Before The One Before You
and felt sick to my stomach because of the disgust in my voice
and his lack of awareness
and the fact that i didn't even know you then but i already can feel myself
saying your name though those words.

this feels so millennial, talking about you/me/him/us through a keyboard
into the internet (if the wifi ever works) where you'll probably never see
but strangers will but i just want to tell you in person that
i want you back.

they're gonna play spin the bottle tomorrow and i hope you sit next to me
or don't play
so i don't have to feel weird if it lands on you and you don't wanna kiss me even if i wanna kiss you.

I feel so ******* weird like
buy a pack of cigarettes weird like
I ate too much pizza and cake weird like
when was the last time I thought about my ex weird like
how soon is too soon to be in love weird like
got a job at a fast food chain restaurant that I can't even eat at weird like
I have to figure out how to pay the rent and electric bill before next week weird like
I'm gonna chain smoke because my new fast food job says I can't and I have to get it out of my system weird.

my shoes are disintegrating beneath my feet
but i keep walking towards you.

5 days of bruises are built up and browning
on my notably translucent skin; i wear low-cut shirts to show them off.
there's no sorrow in my voice when i talk about your
astral body running astray across my rotting bones; i finally feel small.
601 days lost to bicycle handles and bloating bellies full of fear and sometimes cake; i don't remember before.
before, i'd get picked up and ****** up, an ultimatum in an altima; i thought it wouldn't end.
at 8 am i talked about the boy whose knowledge was so vast it overwhelmed him and took him across highways, barefoot, and out of my life; i forgive but only in abstract.

i dont think about hold your hand
only
holding your hair back when you *****.

im always around
always down
yellow teeth and brown eyes
(surprise)

there are boys with hair that makes me nuts
lusting to touch
and i don't know what it is about
copper or
orange or
tangerine,
clemintine, even
rust
that makes me cringe because my body is empty
and lifeless unless
it's covered with soft patches of old skin cells and
must.

i woke up with bedhead/left with bedhead/didn't get head
but i guess that's besides the point.
you told me to clean up
and i said okay
because i clean up so
*******
nicely
but still not nicely enough for you to take me out.

SEXT
can i see ur body
SEXT
you can see my body
SEXT
make me ***
SEXT
not tonight
SEXT
can i see ur body

i keep swallowing my words like they're the last meal i'll ever eat,
and i can't help but notice that i smell like soap and pheromones
that only you would find pleasent.
bitter and blunt.
sweet and sour;
when was the last time you thought about me?

The middle of November. That’s how I like to remember you. I think of you as the middle of November: Cold, with red hair like falling leafs and blue eyes like the sky looks when my eyes water from the wind and my small hands would go numb. Something changed. You were no longer the November mornings I’d spend high as a kite contemplating where I’d be three years from then, hopeful and star struck. You were June. Too warm. You were the June afternoons I’d spend going from high to low, my arms burning in the beating sun waiting for a small, black pickup truck that never would come. You were gazebos with peeled back mesh walls, letting bugs crawl across my bare skin until I thought I’d have to peel that back, too. You were cigarette butts put out in old cans of Diet Coke, mason jars full of expired whipped cream, fireplaces with no purpose.

i just want to write

i can count the people i kissed on my hands last night
but i can't count on myself to fix this
or you to fix me.

i should've stayed.

i am grateful for waterproof mascara;
and that i didn't let myself be stopped by the cold weather when i
decided to leave.
i am grateful that i have begun to forget your
teeth and started dreaming about
new grins.

with you again.
but, when i left you,
i felt everything (and nothing) all at once
and now i
can't
       stop
             touching you
whenever i get the chance and kissing you passionately (something i forgot about) and crying at the thought of you touching other girls.
i never thought i'd feel in love with you again
but i do
and i am
and i can't believe it's over.

our friendship was built on
broadripple and chicken wire
            stained clothing and bruised legs,
and i'm so sorry for that girl
who ruined your innocence
and for how i stood by because mine was already gone
and for how sometimes i raised my voice
and couldn't contain my sighs.

i'm sorry that things weren't always good or great or even okay
and that sometimes getting out of bed was hard
and that 
sometimes
                   nothing felt right.

and i'm so glad whenever you smile

i have a habit of
forming habits of
doing the same thing
until i feel safe

you are made of lines;
straight, or curved
sometimes
                even
parabolic.

you told me i had forgotten my own mannerisms
that i didn't tilt my head when
i told you how to make me ***, didn't
interrupt my own thoughts
or roll my eyes when
i said that you weren't even close
(but maybe you just forgot
to notice
the new ones.)

i'm
losing inches from my spine;
losing space inside my mind.

in june i thought about your hair every day
because your reds were like the sun and felt warm even indoors.
in july i thought about your pulse
because your shirts were thin and i thought i could see your heart beating whenever i walked by.
in august i only thought about you every day
because it hurt too badly not to and thinking hurt less than a sunburn.
in september i stopped thinking about you
because you stopped thinking about me, and i found silence in familiar arms.
october didn't matter.
november was the same.
but
december i thought about your back every day
because your skin is like snow and your reds felt like the sun.

i crawled on my knees into a
new year
like evolution in
reverse.

it hurts to know that my Temple is of another faith than you care for
and it hurts to know that my Temple
                                                  might be burned to the ground
                                                  by your zealot hands
but this fear
and pain
and sometimes rain
can only last so long.

the wrong body sometimes touches me in my sleep
in toothless dreams and
quiet scenes.

i have to talk
      constantly
or i'll forget the sound of my voice and
lose myself inside
this vast vessel of bodies
in which i live (that is so
                                                              ­   filled with viruses
                                                         ­     there's no room for my thoughts)
and if i can forget the sound of my voice
how could you not?

i can feel the stress in your thighs the
voluptuous curves of memories pressed
tightly against my
hips and the petite ***** of
consciousness on my thumb, anemic
thoughts in my mind say no but
i'll always say yes.

i sometimes think i'm in love with the
bird-boy
who pecks holes in my wrists and puts pegs
through the fence (to keep me close by)
but bird-boy is
so young and
so sweet with
clear eyes and  
no clue that i think i may
be
a wren.

im so tired of the forgotten
and the dead
and the way your shoulders turn away
like mountains,
     falling boulders

I am a long way from home
(and the distance only grows as my skin gets thicker) until these bleeding fingers and
cracked teeth
start to feel just like
segments of destructive dreams.

your face is something like
rotting wood full of bodies of people i knew
(rough to the touch and cold inside)
and there's nothing 'magic' in the air of graveyards
or the morgue
or the funeral home (even though some people
feel that there is) but there is
blood and make up and
prosthetic chins  
that  make your dead grandfather (rest in peace) look twenty-eight
even though he was eighty-two.
please don't tell me that your spirit feels trapped
and your body feels wrong (even though i'd listen and nod) because
i already know what it feels like to be trapped  every morning (and sometimes at midnight) and waking up with my eyes shut and my
mouth sealed like a coma patient who didn't tattoo
NO CODE
on her chest soon enough and can hear her family whispering about what kind of
coffin and
what size dress she wears so that she looks pretty for
the reaper.

i like to feel broken i think
sometimes
  i like the way you broke me.

she told me once that she worshiped the
forest of her body and the garden she had grown (like spring
                                          all over her outsides).
she said she loved skin the same way i  loved
marlboro blacks and sweetwater blue (obviously and
                                         uncontrollably).
she screamed compliments at me in
soft words with rough meaning (like ****** knuckles against
                                        freshly cut grass).  
she assured me that it was okay to wake up
in cold sweats with heavy limbs (unmovable and brittle,
                                         buried under sheets).

but i knew better.

i miss you when you were
******* beautiful
with black eyes and thick eyelashes;
i miss you when you were
a mountain man with long brown hair.
i miss you when you were
untouchable and desired
with a broken nose and broken teeth;
i miss you when you were
a sentient being with stories to tell.

i can't always remember
if the sun sets in
the west or east
but it's okay;
i want to be remembered for thinking
the sun had a choice.

they poke and ****
destroy your pride
pickpocket your perception
throw you aside
(they are plotting your demise.)