From the inside out,
we waste away.
I remember the first time I coughed
up a bit of dust, perfectly dry, and said to myself,
"this must be normal."
However, I have always been
much more than normal.
More hesitant than normal.
More fearful than normal.
More of an empty vessel
floating through life than normal.
Nowadays, if you knock
gently on my chest
like a door it will respond
a low hollow sound, void of life, free of emotion.
The dust comes and goes. I feel
the marrow of my bones
drying more each day. Eventually,
I figure, they will crack and snap,
pouring out more dust
until I am weightless.
And maybe then
I can be freed. Set off to sea
like an aged piece of driftwood. Floating out
with eyes for adventure and a fate
full of rot.
Nov 23, 2018
Nov 23, 2018 at 2:33 AM UTC
What happens when every image
becomes a cliche? No one
has had an original thought in years,
what makes you think you are any different?
Sculpting language so meticulously,
like you're the first to compare to seasons.
I bet you write about writing, too. Pathetic.
Love is not a feeling, it's a force. The words
write themselves and purely use you
as a vessel. Somewhere back in time
we did a seance of sorts and now sometimes
poetry drops in like a demon, possessing
the mind which tells the hand to pick up a pen.
Demons, whatever that means to you,
do not answer demands. They play their own game,
which we are indeed a part of, though
we were never invited to play.
Nov 17, 2018
Nov 17, 2018 at 10:26 PM UTC
The door only slams
on windy days, and
in a similar fashion,
these days I just snap.
I am a manifestation
of all that I fear--
it is what made me
and thus it is all that
I am. How does
a heavy door transcend
the force of the wind?
How does it transcend
the forces that be,
who decided
it was a door?
Nov 17, 2018
Nov 17, 2018 at 10:19 PM UTC
Something about the comfort of autumn—
in California our leaves go straight from green
to gone, if they choose to change at all.
The sun stays bright but the air starts to bite,
and the Santa Anas blow through to dry up
our last drops of livelihood. Most seem to like it—
the streets littered with death and ready to restart—
but the rough winds always hollow me out,
echo a haunting song off the tunnelled walls
of my bones. It’s about this time I empty out,
and fill instead with cotton mouth. My lips chap
and crack, but I smile silently, and I wait.
Nov 12, 2018
Nov 12, 2018 at 10:57 PM UTC
Do you fear me yet, sweet one?
I manifest my horror as tender touches
and soothing pet names. They say something
about killing them with kindness,
but love ends lives so much more smoothly.
Each scratch of a fingernail adds to your unease.
Every "darling" called from the backroom
causes you to cringe. But you won't say a word,
will you? Because this is a fate you chose.
You like my cold arms wrapped--
so boa constrictor tight--
around you that there is no room
for another set. Each time you leave
you are tortured by the thought of me,
laid out in the darkness awaiting your return.
Like an unforgiving dog. But it is you
who cries when we are apart, soothed
only by my talons, which hold you tightly,
but are careful not to cut too deep.
Nov 11, 2018
Nov 11, 2018 at 7:49 PM UTC
Sweetheart, don't be fooled
by my thick veils of lovely
language, this curtain behind which
I can easily disappear. I sing
a song which invites both
fact and fiction to the dance floor
to perform a number they didn't
know they knew. My tongue
wraps their love with a cherry stem--
still tied in a bow--though
they both long for more
than the other
will allow.
Nov 11, 2018
Nov 11, 2018 at 7:36 PM UTC
Darling, darling--
I still creep beneath you
I yearn for your reach.
Lit between the floorboards,
I watch you dance in panels--
watch you undress under strobe light--
watch you sleep in shades of dark.
Sometimes, I crawl out
through the vents, to come sit
on your nightstand.
And we breath in synchronicity.
The air grows hot between us
and sometimes, I can't help myself
but reach out for the covers
to uncover, but instead
I crawl back down
and sprawl my legs
and disappear again
back into the walls.
Nov 11, 2018
Nov 11, 2018 at 7:29 PM UTC
Like the seed I swallowed when I was small,
from my depths a tree now grows. As first
I didn't feel it all, and then it felt like
n o t h i n g at all, and now as its branches
tickle up my throat I wonder if I'll die
before they're reaching out like arms
from my (normally) empty mouth, poking
wooden fingers through my broken teeth, or
if instead it will finally give me something to say.
...and what could I say?
Jul 17, 2018
Jul 17, 2018 at 1:20 AM UTC
Falling apart isn't easy to do,
on the bathroom floor in a puddle
of tears and sweat. Remembering
a time when things seemed simple, a
time before someone smashed
through the car window of the minimum
wage worker, living in her car, at six a.m.
and took the tokens of her life
away, to be under loved.
The unraveling was gradual:
Graduating from school and watching
her own brain start to melt away,
dripping out here and there,
on the couch, the bed, the floor,
all over the apartment but rarely
outside. Splattered on the walls
rather than scratching a way out. It's fine,
the mind just makes a mess of things.
Jul 17, 2018
Jul 17, 2018 at 1:08 AM UTC
My soft skin opens,
draws you in, earns your trust, and
then swallows you up.
Jul 8, 2018
Jul 8, 2018 at 7:57 PM UTC