Tracing smoke with dry ice fingertips,
I hold my breath and begin to float.
The heat of a bellies past burden
steams to my head, until I begin to rise.

No where to go, except everywhere I'm late,
so I drift along a black and blue sky pretending
to be a storm. Pressing clouds into my skin
that slowly evaporate into recovery along the way.

Unconscious and shattered, I land where I've
always been. Cloaked in dew drop kisses and
pink morning yawns, I could pull the earth over
my head just to snooze into eternity.

But there's a mouth at my neck, breathing sticky
lies and humid affairs. Each whisper a grain of
sand, filling my vision with a million fragments of fog.
Blurring what ever I was and who ever I will become.

I drink shape shifting water that always refills as
*****, lubricating contorted lust and pages that
won't burn. Scraping scabs for clues and emptying
all my pockets for loose change as a compass for hope.

Slippery slumber, the hot air rises to make room for
cold confrontation and chilling truths. On every
surface you'll find manic scribbles that feel
like immortal truths
bleeding from my fingertips,
only to wake in silence with no resolution.

Just the melodic drone of recycled air from the AC.

Underneath my bed, you''ll find a box that
holds everything that I've forgotten.

You'll say it was never mine,
and I filled it with passing time.

And there's nothing I can do to change it's rapid course,
"it'll only fill you with drowning remorse."

They'll say.

But I pick and I pry, wondering
what could be inside.

Rolling in my bed, watching
life pass instead.

With eyes wide open, worried
it will always remain

Shut.

So I ask a few friends, a stranger, and you:

Do you have a box, kept hidden, but near?
Of moments long gone, but fill you with fear?

Do you stay awake, all through the night
debating whether or not you should fight?

Do you dream of broken pieces from a different time & place?
Smeared and burned with a ghost of a face?

This box, this box
in which I've forgotten
But cannot seem to forget,
will not leave
my head.

So I smash it on the ground, until I make
sure all the hinges are
completely
unbound.

It opens, quickly and quietly,
so silently
I hear it all at once:

Do you remember the day,
when someone had all the right words to say?
When you were picked up with warmth & laughter,
so you forgot what you were after?

Do you remember your very own touch,
honest, genuine, and never too much?
The slide of a hand within your own,
so tender and kind it becomes a home?

Do you remember the days you let yourself grow,
through cracks and stains painted long ago?

Underneath my bed, you'll find
a box, filled with all that
I'm
becoming.

All of the intricate
lies you tirelessly improvise,
in order to surmise
This Weight,
that you carry with you on every date.
A sensation you irrationally decide was
fate.
Because to pretend that you're okay,
may lead to the survival of one more day.

The end is near.
The end is near.
The  end is near.

Further than you ever thought.

-I scream at you for bleeding everywhere, when I myself feel like an never-ending open wound.

-Lazy, laying, and filled with disdain we sit and let time wander through the dusty halls.

-Suspended in mid-air, twirling amongst light and darkness, I wait for movement to occur.

-The smog has lifted, but we remained mentally clouded and uncertain.

-There's plenty of food, but nobody eats. We stay still until the sun sets and countless clouds of *** eagerly activate the palate. Then we feast meagerly on snacks and drink and drink and drink until tomorrow blinks into our vision. We clean until the space feels open and momentarily alive, only to wreck it through the night to create purpose for the next day.

-The fragility of the day immediately crumbles in my hands the moment I make contact.

-I'm holding my breath, hoping all the air will keep me afloat.

-Because in the end I'm just a scared girl, shooting arrows at the world trying to pinpoint my direction.

The thought of death, self inflicted or natural,
can hit you with such dedication.

Like a forest eaten by the spark of a match,
it travels to your brain.

Until it's all you can breathe or hear
and see.
Until you beg to be alive and
understand what that means.

They tell me about craft beers and climbing
the world to sip on adventure - to understand
and praise what we sip and why we sip.
Wisps of hair and crinkled eyes, I begin to
blush inside. The glint of forever gleams off
your finger and I want to bury my ideas
with you - if only we met sooner, another time,
a different world, good luck.

You sit there, swimming in man made pools
of bourbon - clutching her hand - and I pray;
bite my lip and grip my heart that you don't
drown my sunflower. That you survive and
she grows...remembers to grow...that I don't
****.

She storms in, screaming songs of thunder
and lighting the room with rage. Powerful,
I think to myself, as you slander the cursed
perceptions of your own insecurities. The
dull lamp sinks me further into the couch,
harboring lonesome anxiety. Sometimes I am scared
to speak
and say what you are avoiding hearing.
No more.

You're running towards me, my name echoing
from your lips past the stretch of concrete
between us - kissing warmth into my mind.
I want to explode into stars with you and
never part again, fix all the cracks I made.
My arms cradle your soul, for one last time,
and the disappointment of my distance slices
our cracked hands: I'm sorry I wasn't there.

He interrupts our conversation from a
foot away, through someone else. I smile,
coward. You still fear what I was to you,
even in the onset of something new. I
wonder if meeting your eyes will change
this strange silence. But I close them instead
and hum my own dance until I remember
your lurking body. Silent, silent silent, as
I scream at myself.  

Everything died, but your mornings have
just started. You all know nothing of the
bottomless gin and shards of glass I
ripped my eyes out with. Wandering down
to the steaming coffee and banter on daily
dissatisfaction - I become lava. No...dripping
blood. Slowly, so thick it travels centimeter by
millimeter tainting the surface below. Surprising
its peers, fearful for some. And you ask, hey are
ok?

Lay down honey and let's whisper sweet steam;
for tonight nothing can hurt us without our
permission.
When will it end, you ask? Never,
I think.

But instead, I'll tell you the tale of eight princess's,
who simmer and steep in the very glory of God.
They each were buried alive, asked to stay put
and decay for many many days.
But instead, one princess heard the birds, who
fly and roam with crisp cloud undertones, chasing
a horizon that will never end.
But instead, one princess decided there must be more,
then lying dead. She wanted to find lips that bloomed
each morning and change the little she could.
But instead, one princess hummed the soft melody of
a future she couldn't imagine, painting it with pieces
and people that reminded her of what warmth once was.
But instead, one princess realized she could hear all of
them deep below. Their weeping and wishing each night and
roaring anger towards a moon they could only feel.
But instead, one princess touched her body slowly and rapidly
all at once, trying to find who she was in the dark.
But instead, one princess picked at the coffin until it
filled with blood, choking and drowning her in all that
she had self inflicted.
But instead, one princess plotted to **** all the men and women
who put her there, until all she could do was forgive them.
so she counted all the stars in her mind, until the madness
beckoned her to break free.


But instead, the princess opened her eyes and realized she had
buried herself all along. And the only way out, was within.

I start, where I end
Click, press, send:
I blacked out the recovery process,
until I woke up to your name
written across my lips.
When they asked if
I believed in love, I said
eventually.

And you,
I throw stones to watch nostalgia
ripple through my mind.
Missing a concept I no longer
crave.