To be all the better
for you and me,
and I will try
for this.
Everything we said
to be all the better.
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 4:30 PM UTC
Child, the swing set
squeaking in the familiar way.
Father, in the familiar way,
swings me, pushes the chains, my back, my everything,
every time I was back he would whisper or coo,
animal noises, ghost haunting wafts,
the dog barking, the boos.
Swinging so strong the set jumps up from its
Georgia clay grounding,
that fear,
I will topple, or head diagonal in the stopping,
that fear.
When we moved,
the trampoline stayed.
The next house had one.
A new swing set, in front of a pond.
A croaking bullfrog-domination,
fake ducks gurgling under fake fountain.
The fear, falling in the water.
Dog once, now dead,
scampering across the thin layer
ice, the pond in winter,
me screaming me bawling, debating the worth of jumping and saving.
She crossed, me on my knees, both
alive
a prayer.
Saved.
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 3:32 PM UTC
Said the world, “Sorry, I’ve got too much feel."
So she gave me twice as much, told me to deal.
Said I, “I’m sorry, it’s just too much."
And said the world, “Well, that’s too bad, and you can blame the world," and such.
So I waited it out a little bit longer.
Said the world, as I advanced in a rage, “It’ll make you stronger."
So I waited and waited, learned to want to live still, learned to want to die.
"Oh goodness, you can do it, please, please" said the world with a sigh.
And so that’s what it’s like, being an empath of the earth.
Having in my heart, all foreign emotions pure and swirled.
And I sift them like flour,
Keep the sweet and some of the sour,
But underneath I am bitter,
Not the first in a long line of “deal with it" emotion sitters.
So it’s been years, and what I’ve learned is never desired or simply yearned,
Don’t let yourself get burned.
Peel the world, let aching fingers soothe,
find the truth,
Don’t let your thoughts and words babble out uncouth.
So you harden and you crack,
Cave your stomach, arch your back.
Find its easier to hate than love.
But world, its worth it if you try.
Jul 17, 2013
Jul 17, 2013 at 12:01 PM UTC
I’m getting bad at what I do
I’m getting words stuck behind my teeth like pills in peanut butter,
words stuck between my teeth like apple pulp.
I’m getting backlashes of food poisoning,
how my whole body became a devil entity and I swooned in and of desperate consciousness,
how walking was the hardest.
Like how acid trips give you acid slips
Like how you never wanted me,
like how I’ll stop caring eventually.
But now I’m choking on my words and there’s no excuse
And I used to write poems about self abuse
that I never gave myself.
But for now, words fumble
like I did for you.
Jul 17, 2013
Jul 17, 2013 at 11:57 AM UTC
Today feels like fire,
smells like iron,
wears its pants low, hanging, slipping off the hips,
is blood edged arount my fingernails,
is bright primary and black, each sliding up next to the other,
companion guides, wordless.
—-
The seeping of oil on paper
the jam jar quietly containing black coffee
a bag of lavender
water through a straw.
—-
Today is a drug-minded sober body,
mine,
is as-usual clawing into the skin around my fingers, by now so scarred, so thick-skinned, my fingers are so red, so often asked of, “why are your fingertips purple?" such a faint violet, such a small count of millimeters raised, such beautiful fingers I would have, they say, if only I would stop bleeding them out.
Jul 17, 2013
Jul 17, 2013 at 11:50 AM UTC
For once, there is no anger here. Hardly resentment, either
but I'll admit it did throw me for a loop.
The bar at 2 in the morning,
the grasping,
the car.
The bed 2 weeks later,
still I am in it.
You leave at the end of the month, but
this isn't a military decision,
it is only for you
to leave
for you.
And I am proud of that,
and of you.
Jul 15, 2013
Jul 15, 2013 at 9:07 PM UTC
My body, a ceramic vessel.
Yours, a bruised one, but not a fixer-upper, never. Already proud. Already
ready.
Your body a cave.
Your body a permafrost-stuck-mammoth,
all things worth exploring,
but I'll admit I am not interested in
having *** with the prehistoric, or those with tusks,
just
you.
My body, weak. Weak to heat, weak to panic, weak to restoration even.
My body a liar.
My body a liar.
My body a liar.
Scared fool, scarred easily, but bruise-lovin', achin for pain and then collapsing in it,
so masochistic, so ready to be weak.
Because the scarred know how easily to scar again.
Because my body a memory, my body a collection of organs, of dark organs, of working organs.
Because our bodies ready to scar again,
because our bodies know what it's like,
because our bodies know
it's worth it to go.
Jul 15, 2013
Jul 15, 2013 at 3:05 PM UTC
Trying to write,
only feeling past ones filter through,
wondering if anything new sits under my tongue, crawls behind my ears,
shelters.
Shelters.
Yes, I think I shelter the wounded.
I love saving people, figure this is
the only way they could love me,
as if their love for me was worth their life.
I have saved a lot,
and it flips as well.
The one, my only for a year,
she sent me to the hospital when I was threatening to burst, to sicken the knife, to split the tongue.
I'll get over it.
Split my chest, sent me reeling, sent me screaming on the floor
as a white-blind result of affairs that are proven, saved in photographic form.
They are forgiven,
and I am free.
Jun 21, 2013
Jun 21, 2013 at 4:22 PM UTC
The oatmeal spills
steaming
spills like *****
spills like ***** from the mouth
spills like snow off a roof, too
heavy
too heavy for you or me or them and especially,
my mother.
Licking mayonnaise off the fingers,
biting into raw onions,
savoring the tears,
sopping up (fake) hamburger juice and cheese off plates
with faces bought from the stars,
with forks bought from discount stores,
off plates from discount stores.
Half off for your children's clothing
something, they too, have heaved on and dirtied.
Relentless-
the way children drown in dust and swing sets and in their tears
and not for nothing
not for nothing
do they cry.
They-
the most connected, the most concentrated cells, the most complete beings,
all questions no answers all wonder no pandering lying sneaking stealing
hollerin at women out the window of a car
drinkin beer to keep away memories of a childhood not dealt with.
If it was hell, deal with it. Sit in it. Sit in it.
Hell is not for those who will sit in the flames,
it is for those who would run, run, run,
hot coals everywhere coals flames licking the body licking the sweat
how ****** how steamy how ****** the flames, how they lick, swallow, spit.
Hell isn't for those who will sit in their problems, in their broken childhoods.
Sit in it. Feel it. Take it in, breathe it out. Don't forget. Get better, don't rise up to the occasion, don't let it hurt anyone else. Take your pain and trust it.
Mar 10, 2013
Mar 10, 2013 at 9:35 PM UTC
How strange to say I hardly
remember that month at all.
The diagnosis is
muddled.
It's funny to think I've been out of the hospital for two weeks,
and in it for two months, and that I've got a
bright-squeeky-new-and-shiny
diagnosis to take home with me, or two
or three.
And the psychiatrist says these things run in fours-run in packs-run together forever (maybe)
and ticks them off his fingers
1. Panic disorder
2. Eating disorder
3. Bipolar disorder
4. ADHD
and so, four numbers in, I wonder how many it takes to rack up a final total of
(how the hell are you still alive?)
and the answer being,
(I've tried both)
(I try to live in the middle now, it barely works, I am watching my mouth following my eyes not talking not breathing breathing too slow, meds on time, eat on time eat on time, ******* eat on time)
And I am okay.
I am okay, and that is ******* beautiful.
Every day taken hour by hour, nothing left to chance
(except housing, job, food, rent, contact with the outside world)
but ya know,
baby steps.
Feb 16, 2013
Feb 16, 2013 at 10:42 PM UTC