in sixth grade at the
end of the year
boy transferred into the
"smart class".

he sat next to girl
in science and social studies.

later, when girl looked back on
her and boy's first meetings,
she would recall a moment that,
at the time,
seemed passable.

study skills on the first day
of sixth grade,
middle school,
girl was looking around at her
new classmates.

boy was sitting at a desk.
bracelets lined up and down his arms.
girl read them from her seat.

one of them said
'i a band with brit-related stuff for her love of the u.k.
>a skinny black one from boy because he "doesn't like green day."
(but girl sometimes wonders why he would have it if that were so)
>a legit green day one with the uno!dos!tre! logo
>deathly hallows from her friend GaHoolian girl
>KISS hello kitty cross-over
>pink that is inscribed with "flirt" even though girl isn't
>pink that is inscribed with "wipe-out" which is more fitting
>blue from the orthodontist
>string of plastic pearls from a bff
>black leather with a pentagram painted on, made by girl

boy is becoming a different person through his own
bracelets,
he doesn't wear the "i <3 boobies" anymore,
and girl recalls that day in science when another boy cut all of his
"sex-bands" off his skinny wrist,
and she smiles to herself when she also remembers
another girl coming up and offering
the broken bands to her.
"but they're boy's" is her line,
and girl and boy are both blushing.

girl likes seeing how boy has changed
through bracelets,
his now almost bare wrists pale and white,
rivery veins snaking up his arms,
veins that he has
tortured girl with many times.
he no longer has sex-bands or
"rebel" or soda can tops tied together.

just a black one
saying "bite me"
and a watch.

girl doubts anyone else has realised
he even started wearing a watch.

but girl is just a very observant
hopeless romantic,
who wears her heart on her sleeve
and shows her love through
phrases carved into rubber.

Come with me, take my hand.  
Let's go view this barren land.  
Although there are no waterfalls or trees
There is something new to be seen.
I don't want to scare you and run into the blue
But I'm spending my summer away from you.

Do not grovel into the unknown.
I simply have something new to be shown.
So I'll go one way and you another
And we can both learn what it's like without one another.

In this desert time has passed.
We're together forever but the one thing we have learned
is that the fragility of love
needs to be earned.

-Asterisks indicate the necessity to pop your cheek with your thumb.
-Answer the two questions correctly and I will give you a hug.

He fell asleep while traveling time
where a true name
becomes everything else.
So please give me a minute to explain myself
through the doorways
that I see champagne on a windowsill
walking across the room with blue
and fine china feet
saying again and again
drink me.
Until somehow
the words become a song
singing and swinging the bottle like a dinner bell for thirst.
A kind that we've settled to quench
with television
and somebody else's dream.
So don't pour my drink.
I'm trying to uncork it with my thumbs.

POP

It's flat
and I still have a tongue
so I will use it and I
I will use my thumbs to push back time
until hitler
becomes a baby.
Dr. King becomes a baby.
Until the left and the right and every dead genius in between
becomes
a baby.

Tiny feet trying not to crush the wet salad of the lawn
because it is green,
like my heart
that has learned
how to break fine china.
From experience,
let me tell you
it's a lot more tiresome than a blue dream
but he fell asleep on a boxcar crossing Germany
where mustard gas
drowns you in your own lungs
and he tries to breath between the joints in the track

the

click
...                             clack
click

as years
hurtle by.

Asking again and again,

"Who killed me?"
           &
"Who am I?",

until dinner was served without grace.
Until my head becomes stiff and bubble shaped
having been conditioned by
their
piles
&
piles
&      mounds

of
ob        cation.
fus

So we should tell all the baby hitlers,
that become children
that become us,
that a lie
is what you become
when abusing language to distort a reality.

And when you make a fist
you are handing lies out at random on a silver tongue.
But I still have one
and I still have thumbs
so sorry to burst your bubble but,

POP.

Child,
I don't mean to put

barbed wire

between us.  
I know it hurts
to have something so precious as the world
taken away.
But walls hurt worse
and through them only muffled sounds are ever heard
until your world is made of mute prisoners
that have forgotten what silver
really sounds like.

Blessed be
for I also have ears
so give me second place
and I will throw the medal against your walls.
Ringing out,
the universe doesn't look like an ebony tub,
with knobs we can't ever see,
full of infinite shining marbles to everybody.
Your mind
is a library of language,
so free will isn't a book written in english.
And tourists,
those know nothing infants trying to travel,
belong
where
           ever they
are
                             going.

Belonging like this medal bouncing trying to sing
off your wall
and
falls

into


your world.

Where again it will ring,

we've all been runner up

and somehow
we still get annoyed when another doesn't enter our library
instead of trying harder
next time.

So,
let me say grace.
Let me set l o n g tables
with the gruel that's been given
served on b  r                     n.
                         o
                           k  
                                        e          
china,
spooned
with sterling silver.

push it down until it isn't there
blocked out
blacked out
like those years
2.5

bodies hard and sweaty in the dark
hands and tongues
reaching
searching


2.5
forget and never forgiven
but somehow you do
specks of blue
across my chest



2.5
light the night for us
betrayal
but not betrayed
for not one; but two




2.5

Did you ever wake up and realize
that somehow, over night,
everything stopped making sense?
All of a sudden, your bed feels foreign to you.
Your pillow is cold against your cheek and
your blankets aren’t as comforting
as they used to be.
You drag yourself out
from beneath the covers
and the walk to the bathroom
Feels longer than you remember.
The tile on the floor is more solid and
the little rug in front of the sink
no longer caresses your toes.
When you look up,
when you make eye contact with yourself,
you notice that your eyes
are no longer the same shade of blue.
Your hair is longer and lighter,
your shoulders sag lower,
and the wrinkles at the corners
of your eyes are more defined.
You turn the knob on the sink
but the water takes longer to warm
than it did the night before.
Washing your face,
you hope that it’s all just an illusion.
You look up again and nothing’s changed.
Your heart starts to race,
you hope that it’s just an off morning
but your mind tells you that you know better.
Slowly, you take the few steps
back to your room and
look at the person lying
in the space beside yours.
You close your eyes and
open them once more.
Nothing, you feel nothing.
The person lying in your bed
is suddenly a stranger,
and then you realize,
so is the person inside of you.

Did you ever wake up and realize
that somehow, over night,
everything stopped making sense?
All of a sudden, your bed feels foreign to you. Your pillow is cold against your cheek and
your blankets aren’t as comforting
as they used to be.
You drag yourself out
from beneath the covers
and the walk to the bathroom
Feels longer than you remember.
The tile on the floor is more solid and
the little rug in front of the sink
no longer caresses your toes.
When you look up,
when you make eye contact with yourself,
you notice that your eyes
are no longer the same shade of blue.
Your hair is longer and lighter,
your shoulders sag lower,
and the wrinkles at the corners
of your eyes are more defined.
You turn the knob on the sink
but the water takes longer to warm
than it did the night before.
Washing your face,
you hope that it’s all just an illusion.
You look up again and nothing’s changed.
Your heart starts to race,
you hope that it’s just an off morning
but your mind tells you that you know better. Slowly, you take the few steps
back to your room and
look at the person lying
in the space beside yours.
You close your eyes and
open them once more.
Nothing, you feel nothing.
The person lying in your bed
is suddenly a stranger,
and then you realize,
so is the person inside of you.

Did you ever wake up and realize
that somehow, over night,
everything stopped making sense?
All of a sudden, your bed feels foreign to you. Your pillow is cold against your cheek and
your blankets aren’t as comforting
as they used to be.
You drag yourself out
from beneath the covers
and the walk to the bathroom
Feels longer than you remember.
The tile on the floor is more solid and
the little rug in front of the sink
no longer caresses your toes.
When you look up,
when you make eye contact with yourself,
you notice that your eyes
are no longer the same shade of blue.
Your hair is longer and lighter,
your shoulders sag lower,
and the wrinkles at the corners
of your eyes are more defined.
You turn the knob on the sink
but the water takes longer to warm
than it did the night before.
Washing your face,
you hope that it’s all just an illusion.
You look up again and nothing’s changed.
Your heart starts to race,
you hope that it’s just an off morning
but your mind tells you that you know better. Slowly, you take the few steps
back to your room and
look at the person lying
in the space beside yours.
You close your eyes and
open them once more.
Nothing, you feel nothing.
The person lying in your bed
is suddenly a stranger,
and then you realize,
so is the person inside of you.