every night you've
been stopping by my
room and asking if i want
to walk the dog with you.

and i
say no

because i know
what you want

and i am not
giving it to you.

the truth is not
pulled out of me
and lies are just
another thing to try.

the sun hasn't
even gone down yet
and i'm already
just a failure

(i should say
still)

THIS IS NOT
UP FOR
DISCUSSION
I HAVE BURNED
OUR BRIDGES AND
NOW IT'S YOUR
JOB TO SILENTLY
WATCH THEM SMOKE

you're not helping
my mental disarray
because you are
unaware of its existence.

she's out
in the living room
again
ranting and raving
at him about
all her problems

(they say men
marry girls just
like their mothers and
i'm beginning to see it
something about that
obnoxious extroversion)

yes
i just called
extroverts
obnoxious
or maybe i just
called you obnoxious
because you are
a textbook extrovert

(they say girls
grow up to
be just like
their mothers
so i'm sure that
i'm obnoxious too)

now you're back
i can see you and
the dog walking up
the driveway
and now it's time
to trim my thoughts
at the seams and the
corners where they start
unraveling and you start
tugging at the threads

snip snip
stop it.

you've tried
to pinpoint
the exact time
and place in
life that i
went wrong

(not wrong
i should say
changed
depressed)

and so far you've
come up with a
whole bunch of
different situations
you believe
contributed

and i've come up
with a whole bunch
of questions
as to why i can't just
be wrong in
peace
instead of wrong in
pieces.

have you ever
taken your hair
out of a towel and found
it completely dry?

me
neither.

the odd part is
i don't hate life
i only hate who
it's made me out to be

how when i'm simmering
in a soupy soapy bath of
eucalyptus and hot water
i can see my body so clearly

see everything i despise
so clearly

(on second thought
it's only the things i
love about myself that
never come into focus.)

i can't stand how when
i'm sad the tiniest things
feel like malicious jabs
to my stomach

i could feel it
the panic attack
waiting for me
lurking behind
my heavy eyelids
scratchy jeans
mustard sleeves
funeral apron
polyethylene
under my skin.

(i'm sorry if you think
i'm not listening
because chances are
that i'm not
it's not anything
personal
it's just that i live so
completely in my own
head that i occasionally
forget what's going on)

last night before
i fell asleep i gave
the thoughts in my head
names and personalities
let them speak in their
own original voices.

(of course in the
morning i'd
forgotten the details
but they're still up there)

i keep seeing people
who i don't want to talk to
a sick side effect of
leaving the house

if there's anything i'm not
it's bulletproof in an apron
right in the head
or relaxed in a bath.

i had a houseful
of old friends
milling around
a lakeside town

their summer was
my half of a winter
and they spoke things
that i believed in
but had absolutely
no reason to say.

they were
alive to me
more alive
than anything else.

i don't know where
they went
trapped somewhere
inside a screen
buried alive under
my own problems

are they still
sleeping
in a graveyard?

or is she in jail
and is he seeing
someone else?

they were my
friends
just pieces of
fiction

and i'm hoping
that somewhere
inside me he's still
strumming a
ukulele and she's
standing on the side
of a waterfall and
looking down
i hope they're
alive and well

(knowing them
he's probably
sad but fine and
she's probably
just as crazy as
when i left her.)

but i don't know
i can't promise anything

i lost them
and i lost who
i was when i was
with them.

take me back
a year
take me
ridgeside

i can only promise
one thing

that i haven't
forgotten you.

they say that
if you imagine
something
vividly enough
so many times
you'll begin
to believe
it really happened

(example
a. blood)

but believing
something
without it ever
having happened
doesn't give you any
extra lessons learned

(example
b. blood)

and you've seen things
in your mind's eye
enough times
to know

(a steak knife to
the throat or a
pile of pills
down the hatch)

that you haven't
learned anything
except how to
lie awake for half
the night while your
brain plays tricks on you

(a noose in
the woods
an overflowing
bathtub in red)

it starts hurting
physically
after awhile
a tightness in
the chest that
just won't go
an ache behind
your eyes
a twist
in your stomach

(the yellow line
a pair of headlights
in the middle
of the night)

it keeps you up
just imagining
mental pictures on
the screen of your
eyes that you
can't shut off

(a railroad bridge
the scene of some
prior and future
disappointment)

flashes around the
bathroom mirror at
four in the morning
on a saturday night
when you can't
breathe

(example
c. blood)

worst of all
you're afraid.

i've had a
good day

remembered
to water my
plants
drank two cups
of coffee
didn't feel the
irrepressible need to
scream at my family
drowned in a
stranger's spaghetti

(okay so maybe
i could have lived
without the whole
swimming through pasta
it starts to wrap around
and choke you after awhile)

found out that
apparently i'm
the nicest person
at work because
i'm the only one who
doesn't want to
throw karen out
the picture window

(i mean i do
i just don't admit it
because that
would be mean.)

i kept looking up
to the bells on the door
remembering yesterday
when i saw the face
of one of the dearest
ladies i've ever known

(i don't know if
she saw me)

and then for some
reason she turned
directly around and
rushed down the
front steps and
didn't come back in

maybe it wasn't her
maybe an emergency
but the question's
eating at me.

slipping back and forth
here and there
into the mindset that maybe
i owe it to them

(i don't want to go
anywhere on monday
nights but i don't
want to tell you that)

then hitting myself
in the head because
what have i been
saying so long?

i don't owe
anybody anything.

i've had a
good day
or a day
that wasn't bad

(just tied my
spine into knots
and i tried the
downward dog
but the dog
knocked me down)

so i'm not sure
why the veins in
my arms are aching
and the muscles
in my elbows
compressing

as if
even

like i'm not
brutally aware
that my wrists are
not currently
available for
extended slitting

so i don't
know why
they're so
upset

then again
i don't
know why
i'm so
upset
either

i mean
i've had
a good day
******.

You
                     either
                   grow or
                 depreciate.

Be lonely.

Be,
Lonely,

Sit with your thoughts,
Your fears,
If only,
To be lonely,
Meant to be alone,
I wouldn't feel the need,
To sit here as the days grow old,
I can feel so lonely,
I'm a crowded room,
Of broken dreams,
And hopelessness,
Anxiety,
Makes me,
Lonely.

But why?
Do i feel this way,
Because I neglect to let people in,
To touch my heart,
And make me feel less
ALONE
My friend at a distance,
Pushed out of sight,
Because my heart full of pain,
Couldn't win the fight,
A dull roar,
Of whispering demons,
A silence,
That crushes my very being,
If only I could quit being,

Lonely