Neighborhood streets in Arizona,
dead of fall. Everything looks dead.
Hardly colorful, pretty, exciting.
Just dead.
The nights never were too cold, though,
so we still wandered the roads.
Messy hair. Bare feet. Dead of night. Dead of fall.
Nowhere really, to go.
Knowing not to expect snow,
rather things… still dead?
still sleeping. Lying in wait, for a change.
The bi-monthly occurrence of rain,
bringing that smell, so much stronger there,
than anywhere else I’ve been.
And my best friend and I,
with our bare feet, messy hair and grins,
would go out and dance in the rain.
People called us crazy, weird,
hypothermia in the making.
But we danced.
Life was hard, so we turned to rain,
she was losing a sister to a terrible man.
I was visiting home, back
from an unwelcoming land.
It was difficult. So we turned to rain.
In the dead of dead fall,
and we danced.

Anytime you really, truly want to just walk away,
Not glancing back or up or sideways or
Down, come to me.

We can hop in the car. get a bike. hell,
Even just walk. sounds good enough for me.
‘Course, we can’t just walk away. we’d lose-
Lose what semblance of a normal life we have now,
Lose the majority of the people making up that life.

But we’d get out of this place, this place
Eating away at our souls, our very beings.

Forget those people. forget this life. take my hand, let’s just
Run until the desert finally kills us. but maybe, we can escape.
Escape what we already know, already despise-
Escape into something better.

It’s been months since I’ve written.
Now, with a shaking hand and bruised ribs,
an unforgiving mind and a whirlwind of words unwritten,
I’ll put my thoughts back on paper. Where they come from.
I want to write, I told a coworker. When I’m older.
But it’s been months since I’ve been able-
to afraid to think and too thoughtless to write,
pushing through life like a Halloween corn maze, constantly lost, yet never knowing
How or Why or Where or When.
But I feel I can- hope I can,
know I will.
So, though it’s been months since
a single word came out,
I’m taking my brain and spilling it out-
out for the world to see?

Broken crayons still color the same.
I mean- isn't that really the aim?
Finish coloring the big picture-
our life picture.
We're all crayons,
or markers, paint perhaps.
Everyone's a little bent,
cracked. Snapped,
in some way shape form.
It's really kinda the norm
nowadays.
But in a box full of crayons-
when they are used, when they live-
they snap. They crack.
They break.
But they still work, just the same.
It may be a bit tougher for them-  
but they're tougher from it.
We're tougher from it.
We're all broken crayons
filling in our own life line.
But broken crayons still color fine.

Do you ever wake up, wistful
for a dream?
Knowing you left an entire world-
a better world-
behind, moments before,
as you woke?
What that world was, exactly, escapes your mind.
But it was yours.
And you want it back-
....

Isn’t this life hard?
Sometimes I wish we had a pause button, to just
stop everything for a moment,
take a breath for a while.
Not forever, but for a while.
Sometimes I wish we were closer, that we talked
like we used to. Sometimes I wish
you and I could go back to a few months ago,
back to last summer, when things were better,
before they went back to worse.
Sometimes I wish you hadn’t called quits,
before calling me first.
Sometimes I wish you would come find me,
hold me like you did before.
I wish you didn’t leave.
-why don’t you come back-
I wish you would come and keep me.

She had a hippie happy heart,
and a giant gypsy soul.
She cared too much about too much,
and she wandered without a goal.
 
She had a lofty lover’s heart,
and was barely not breaking at the bones.
She loved too much, far too much,
but the cracks it caused were never shown.

She had a shattered spirit and a smile,
and a charlatan shine in her eyes.
She was real- too real, for this world,
and oftentimes, it was just too hard to get by.
 
She had weeping wings on her back.
And tracks of tears under her skin.
She tried. She tried. She tried, too much.
And it hurt. So she cut off her wings.
 
She’d had a future of flying in her vision,
but the tendrils in her touch tied her down.
So she gave up her hopes and her ambitions.
And she stayed- where she was stuck- on the ground.

Invisibility isn’t a super power.
It’s a state of being.
It’s being asked if you’re new,
halfway through the school year.
Its sitting by yourself
on the ground, in the hall
during lunch.
Watching group, after group, walk by,
not even noticing you there.
It’s seeing everything,
being everywhere,
but not being seen.
Not truly being there.
No, invisibility isn’t a super power.

Sometimes I’d rather be invisible
than be ****** in the spotlight.
No one expects the world,
when you’re living in your own.
So sometimes I’d rather be invisible,
then be noticed. Known.

I’m not going to take a razor,
and slide it down my own arm.
I won’t go grab a knife, or scissors, or a flame,
and cause myself physical harm.
I won’t be falling with a noose around my neck,
begging for it to take my last breath.
Nor swallowing a bunch of pills, in hopes.
No, I won’t be causing my own death.

But if I saw a car, coming right at me,
while I still had a chance to get away,
I can’t say, with certain certainty,
“Oh, I’ll step out of its way.”
And if an older, stronger, bigger man,
was stopping me on the street,
knife at my throat, gun at my head,
I don’t know if I’d have it in me to scream.

I write poetry to escape,
though I’ve got a smile as I do.
No one knows the kind of thoughts I’ve had,
no ones ever honestly asked me “how are you.”
I feel like I’ve been begging for help,
sending out pleas, screaming inside.
But no one has the vaguest idea I’m in pain-
there’s just too much that I hide.

But hey. I’m not going to take a razor,
or a flame or a noose or some pills.
You don’t need to worry about me,
It’s not going to be me who gets me killed.

her breath caught,
her tongue tied.
why does she always feel
like she has to hide?
sometimes it's hard-
keeping it all inside.

Look- I haven’t had much experience, only seventeen years, but
I’ve found that some days are better than others, and quite
Frankly, it depends on how I view everything- my life is
Either a bucking bull ride, or an adventure. It’s up to me to decide.

She acted like diamond, and
shattered like glass.
Some odd mix of beautiful,
and terrifying.
I loved her like that.

I swear,
you are some kind of mystery,
locked in a box.
And for some reason,
you’ve handed me the key.
Yet I don’t know how locks work.

do you have moments, where you can’t imagine a future?
you’re lying there, staring at the
same walls
same ceilings
same words
with nothing but the same feelings-
empty and pale,
like there’s no reason to go on,
when you can’t even do enough to fail.
the future is coming, but you don’t want to be in it,
can’t imagine yourself in it.
where you just want to stop.
everything.
and just sit there for a while.
maybe not death, as that’s too permanent,
but something close to it.
when you can feel the rope around your neck,
the razor on your wrist,
the way the pills taste.
you can imagine it, and you aren’t sure if it’s what you want,
or just the feelings you imagine it will give you

The third stair from the bottom always creaked.
I always forgot,
So I’d always get caught.
The bi-annual outburst of my rebel-ness always resulted in tears.
And blue hair.

I bought darker lipstick from Walmart, back when
we lived in a small town.
I’ve worn it, but
never outside of my bedroom.
Never worn any lipstick, outside of my room.
Mom would freak if she knew I had it,
just like when my shorts didn’t cover my knees.
There’s a reason I wear leggings so often.

I can’t wait to get out of this place-
Hot, crowded, cacti.
I’ve said it before,
and I’m making plans, but everyone says
“you’ll be back in two years.”
I don’t want to. But I’m scared I will.

My sister claims I’m going to get married right out of high school.
Considering the .5 dates I’ve gone on, I’m doubtful.
And to who? who knows. She’s expecting a guy.
I’m not so sure- of any of her predictions.

It’s been an off day.
Not an “I’m ready to die” day,
more of a “who am I
why am I here
where am I going
what am I”
type day.
I don’t know what I want to do with myself.
People tell me to get up.
Go do something.
That my bedroom walls are ******* the life out of me.
I believe it, too, but today’s a day
where I don’t want to be in my walls, but
don’t know how to get out.

She had no idea where she was,
nor where she was going.
The buildings surrounded her like giants,
their threats hiding the sky.
They scared her.
But she still walked on.
She didn’t have a map-
there wasn’t one.
but the street performer on the corner three blocks back,
told her to head down Aimm’s Street.
She didn’t have anywhere else to go,
so she did.
Night came sooner than it should’ve.
She was certain her bones had turned on her,
jolting her apart from the inside out.
But she kept walking.
The two men, sitting together on the red bench,
told her to turn left,
in two blocks.
She did.
She still had no destination,
but she walked on.

It’s scary what a smile can hide.
Especially when someone’s dying inside.
They super glue on a grin,
and even when its thin-
No one sees what they’re trying to hide.