I saw an old friend on Monday
Ran into her at the bookstore
She was my first crush
We had so many memories
We read The Fault in Our Stars together
We would often say
Okay?
Okay
Not out of love
Out of a willing that what we had
Would never end
That changed when I told her
What I really felt
We have so many good memories
Of us texting till 3 in the morning
Describing our dream life
Eating lunch together  
But all of them were blocked by
Her response
We were walking home together
We lived a block away from eachother
Hey
Yeah
I have to tell you something
She turned her head to the right
Her expression as if she knew
Her black hair dragging
Across her shoulder
Her white shirt blocked by hair
Her tan shoulder with
her blue backpack strap
Her left foot leads as I say it
I have a crush on you
My sentence trailing
A pause of complete awkwardness
Oh... I
I don’t
I’m so sorry
I like
Someone else
Then she moves away
That was three years ago
But
All this floods back
In the second I hear her voice behind me
Excuse me... Atticus?

Only a few of you remember this
Me being Chicken Little
but those of you who need a reminder, here’s the tale

Scrolling through Netflix
we crammed onto that tiny couch
Into those tiny chairs
We put on a movie we thought was just memories

We did what we all do when we watch movies with friends
We decided who was who
Talib was that fish
Dre was Chicken Little’s dad
Kiera was the goose
That left me, Chicken Little

From then on
I was Chicken Little

Here I sit
One day from the new year
Remembering all the fun we had
The tears shed
The laughter shared
The hugs given and received
The pain healed
And I wish I could do it all again

Another cute guy I want to walk up to and talk
But what do I say?
I could go over,
Fumble my thoughts around
Leaving him confused on what just happened
Or I could stay here, safe in a little bubble
Quietly kicking myself for not saying something

Do you ever feel
Like you aren’t you
Living your life
Like you are just walking
In someone else’s skin
Do you ever feel
Like you aren’t controlling
What you do in your life
Do you ever feel
Like you are watching your life
From another view
Do you ever feel
Like there’s more than you know
About yourself

Words claw at the silence of the room

When you look at someone through rose colored glasses, all the red flags just look like flags
You are everything that’s wrong with you.
See, we’re not doomed. It doesn’t matter what happened in the past or how we’re remembered. What matters is this moment.
I’m so tired of squinting
Time’s arrow neither stops nor reverses, it merely marches forwards
I have half a mind...
I see you...
A xerox of a xerox
Don’t you see, there is no other side. This is it
Life’s a *****, then you die. But sometimes life’s a *****, and you keep living

Wanna see it again?

So many mistakes
From things I did
To people I spent time with
So many mistakes
I wish that I could take back
Yet for every one of those moments,
There are some I’m glad to have had

One question was asked:
“How can I develop and open myself to my personality and not be embarrassed?”
Just be you
If people truly care about you
They won’t leave, they’ll support you
This isn’t to say that you should go and do anything you want
But as long as it’s safe and you know it’s morally and lawfully right, I say go for it

Don’t hide behind a mask
Show yourself and all your beauty!
Love yourself!

Can I ask for some advice
Who can tell me
What to do
Who can tell me
What to say
How to ask
Where to go
Why this is so
Difficult
Why this is so
Exhilarating
Whether or not
I can do this
Someone
Anyone
Tell me an answer

Well done
Here come the test results: "You are a horrible person."
That's what it says
We weren't even testing for that

Sure, apologize for calling me a Fa++ot
Doesn’t do you any good
Not gonna say
“Oh, you apologized
Guess the homophobic remark to the bi guy is forgiven”
Because your apologies are *******

You’ve called others fa+s before,
And I fought against it
But you didn’t change
What hope is there for me to wish for now?
Nothing is forgiven,
******

A year ago I sent a text
Telling of something I had written without remembering
I must’ve been blinded by insecurity and naïveté

As I wrote of the days after
Where I compared myself to characters in a tv show
I wrote of my hatred
Of my pain
Never realizing that I wasn’t writing against him
But attacking myself in turn
For falling under a spell
For allowing myself to be tricked
For looking through those ******* rose colored glasses

I wanted to be stronger than I was
I was ready to hate myself over my stupidity
I was missing everything that I had spent years building and in two weeks got ******* destroyed

There was no cure, no easy solution
Because I read the last line
And knew it was true
“The next time we saw each other
Everything had gone to ****”

When I say “I’m fine” what I really mean is
I didn’t get a prom
I didn’t get to experience the last half of my senior year
I didn’t get a “proper” graduation
I didn’t get to celebrate my 18th birthday with my friends and family
I got hired just for the business to shut down indefinitely due to ******* gang activity
I don’t get to say goodbye to my friends as they leave to start their lives
And I’m stuck here because I can’t afford college, but my parents make to much for financial aid
Life keeps ******* ******* on me
So when I say “I’m fine”
Just know that I’m ****** up inside
But I just don’t want to bother you
Cause I’m a man, and we aren’t supposed to feel

It’s rare
To skip a class
To talk to the teacher after
And have them apologize to you
Sure she wasn’t apologizing because I skipped
But because my relationship shattered
Because I couldn’t deal with people
Because she knew the pain I was going through
It’s rare
For a teacher who’s class you skipped
To apologize to you

Who knew that the key to drawing
Stems from the same key to poetry

He sits alone at a bar
People swirl around him
The only conversation he has is ordering another
He stands to leave
As he walks to the door the bartender asks
“Same time tomorrow?”
“Yeah Leo. Tomorrow”
His voice heavy with sadness

He drives
Faster and faster
would anyone miss me?
a singular thought passing through
Over and over as streetlights pass above
would anyone miss me?
His foot presses down
He closes his eyes
would anyone miss me?
He lets go of the wheel
As he lays motionless inside the car his journal opens
*would anyone miss me?

As if nothing happened
You walk in
Asking to play Monopoly
You’re civil
No longer giving me a look
As if you’re saying with your eyes
“I’ll **** you”
As if nothing happened
You ask me how my summer was
You make idle conversation
You make jokes you made before
Even some at his expense
As if nothing happened
We played our game
No emotion across your face
As you sit next to me
Laughing as we roll a six and a nine
A four and two tens
As if nothing happened
We sit
We laugh
We play

Ask me a question
Anything at all
I’ll answer it to the best of my ability
Go ahead
Don’t be shy

The story of me
How to tell it
How to describe those moments
Those emotions
How to break apart every conversation
Conveying the importance
The desperation
The depression
How to tell you everything
Without the words to describe it...
I’ve got a story to tell,
But only if you were here

I have a story to tell
But the words don’t sound right in my head
When I think about the story though
Scenes fly by
deep conversations take place
Exploring complex existential ideas
Figuring out who I am through my writing
But there I’m vulnerable
So I tell myself it doesn’t look right
Save myself the pain of finding out who I really am
Of sharing myself with the world
And being rejected by just one person
Because I try my hardest to be liked
Work my personality to the bone
And when people ask me why
I say because I want to be accepted. No. I want to be loved
But I never feel like I’ll get there
So I write those feelings in short little stories
But tell myself they don’t look right
And throw them away
Little parts of myself, discarded like the **** I feel like

3 quick questions
1) did you love them?
2) did you spend all your time with them?
3) did the breakup hurt?

Calculating results...

Results:
You miss them.
You want to be with them.
You are in pain.
I’m right there with you

If a picture is worth a thousand words
Why can I only think of three when I see one of you?

We’ve all been there
Where you just can’t sleep
So you toss and turn
Listening to that song stuck in your head
Mouthing the lyrics as to not wake up others

You scroll through countless apps
Often reopening the same three
Checking to see if anyone has messaged you
Even though you know they’re all asleep
So you lay there
Bored with nothing to do

So you count the bubbles in the popcorn ceiling
Imagining what you would do in situations;
A fire, meeting a celebrity, if you finally meet that special someone
Hoping that you’ll sleep soon
Until you look at the time— an hour till the alarm

No sleep tonight

Never read through old texts
Memories that linger in those digital words hurt more than they did the first time around
**** from old friends
Discussions about your now alma mater
An awkward conversation that left you on read
All that waits in those buried messages is pain

Behind a frame hanging on my bedroom wall
Are those letters, the ones I never sent
Folded nicely into an old Altoid tin
Packed with the rings and an old lighter
Behind that frame is a whole other life
I read those letters
Thinking of how mad I was
How much I changed
How lucky I am she forgave my harsh words
I tried on the rings and they fit just the same as they had almost exactly a year ago
*******, that was a year ago
A year ago Friday I took those rings
A year ago Friday I had my first kiss
A year ago next Saturday I had my heart broken
And words started flying from pen to paper
Behind the frame is another life
One I look back on in wonder and curiosity
Behind the frame is a box with two rings and two letters never sent
And I’m glad I didn’t

Anyone who’s had their heart broken
Especially by one
You truly loved
Knows “The Feeling”
We all know
The general ache
Your heart shattered
Everyone knows
The feeling of emotional emptiness
But
There’s a third
Everything else melts
Into the background
Color fades
Voices become monotonous blahs
The feeling from those movies
Something happens to the character
Suddenly
It’s all black
Jazz plays in the back
Signs pass too quick to read
When they’re your life
Your purpose
Your drive to get through the day
When they’re everything you have
And it’s taken away
You get “The Feeling”
Where everything becomes nothing
You are just floating
In an abyss

I never have a steady stream of inspiration
I rarely see things worth writing about anymore
But every now and then
I look at the stars and wonder
“What if..?”

I want to destroy everything from our relationship
But I can’t
There’s nothing to destroy
The only thing I have are the rings sitting behind my painting
And a series of texts from when we went to the park together
I still remember
We went to **** Creek
Named for the taste of **** in the river
I still haven’t gone back
Because I know I’ll run into the two of you
And I can’t deal with that right now
It’s been two months
I’m trying to forget you
And as tears stream down my face I wish I had something
Anything
To destroy
But I can’t, because there’s nothing to destroy

The world may be falling apart
People turning weapons on those with nothing but their voice
Thousands dying of a disease with no cure
But the cat’s letting me hold him

If you find me
Just know something
I have lost everything I love in life
I have lost family
I have lost friends
I have lost special moments that make life worth living

I don't write this to make you pity me
I write it so that you understand that I am broken
I write it so that you understand that I may seem cheerful
But underneath lies the wreckage that has been wrought

Even as I sit here I wonder
What if I had gone to prom tonight
What if I had taken that puff on Wednesday
What if the man I love realized that I am fine with three months
Because any time I can spend in his arms
Will make me feel safe
Will make me feel happy
Will make me whole again

The tears stream down my face though
The music plays in the background
The words flow out of me
All congealing into a poem of regrets
Into a poem of disappointment
Into a poem of longing
Into a poem of sadness

It says this is by another author
That much is true
The author isn't me
The author is my soul
pouring out my life
Reaching out for something
For someone
Reaching out to feel an embrace

Please...
If you find me
Make me whole again

Can anyone tell me
How to heal from a breakup faster
It’s been almost a month
I’ve tried ignoring it
I’ve tried talking about it
I’ve tried complaining
Fighting
Yelling
Nothing seems to work
Can anyone help?

Can I go back
And do it all again?
Can I go back to the first day of school
And with the knowledge I have now,
Keep my old self
I used to be the “fun *******” of the group
Making jokes about things that aren’t funny
But get laughs because they’re dumb
Now I’m just an *******
I want that time back
Stop myself from making the mistakes I’ve made
It was a fun journey, sure
But I didn’t look at where the road ended up
God...
Jesus...
Buddha...
Kali...
Flying Spaghetti Monster...
Cronus...
Saturn...
The reincarnation of L. Ron Hubbard...
One of you
Any of you
All of you
Please give me a chance to go back
And keep myself

My family heard that I’m graduating early
They sent a card, a cap, gown, and lei

The card full of love
Best wishes
And hopes that I can celebrate soon

The cap made of cardboard
With my great grandma’s Micky Mouse cap
A tassel attached
Found in the street with a copper ”2020”

The gown so old
My grandma doesn’t remember who’s it is
With a lei —a family tradition— ready to be worn

I let the dog out into the yard
And for the first time in years
He runs
My feet bare as I run down the street
Sidewalk cutting into my feet
With every step
The faster I run
The further he gets
Finally I grab him
And as soon as it started
The chase is over

I hear it’s necessary to move on
But it’s tough to close all my feelings
When I get reminded of you
Like the rings I took from your nightstand
Small, plastic, don’t fit my fingers
But they’re from our first kiss
My first kiss
They sat there on my desk
Silently asking why
Why did we break up?
You said that we rushed into things
You said that you mixed feelings
Of attraction and friendship
That you holding me in your arms
Kissing me
Telling me that you care for me
That it all felt wrong
You didn’t even say this to my face
I read it on a screen
In between a snap from Alice
Saying that she’s bored
And a snap from Alexia
Asking me to help patch your friendship
Which you broke off when we started us
And started back when we ended
Meaning that you were straying from her
Because you had feelings for her
And kept them from me
To keep me from being jealous

I found out on Snapchat
I started crying now that I’m writing this
The first time I’ve shed a tear since
Because I couldn’t get closure
From a snap
You could have at least called me
Let me hear your voice
Ask you why this was happening
I could’ve asked to keep our friendship
I could have cried these tears
Rather than bawl now
Sitting on my phone
On a chair in my room while Dark Souls plays in my computer monitor
Crying now because I couldn’t before

My parents didn’t know about us
I can’t talk to them about it now
Especially when I start to choke when I see you
I could have had closure
From talking to you rather than
Writing another ******* poem
This isn’t even helping
I can’t call you though
Without seeming desperate
Without seeming like I need you in my life
For this I hate you
But the hate isn’t giving me the closure I need

So bitter
So wonderful
Every morning you wake me
Every morning you call out
You horrible
Wonderful habit

I lived with my sister for a while
She goes to college
I played video games while she was working
She worked a lot
I met her many roommates- they’re very nice
She has four roommates
I didn’t go to bed until late night
She doesn’t sleep much
I was living at college for a while
My sister invited me

Could it be that I got my wish
That he won’t text me anymore?
Maybe he finally realized
I’m done

I feel like there’s
A new her
I feel that feeling but
I’m so dead that
She would have to say
“Hey, you”
I would say
“Hey her”
She would have to tell me
She loves me
I would have to
Believe
Heal
Move on
I can do that
Right?

We always took small things for granted
The smile of a stranger walking by
The wave of a friend from across the hall
The small talk with the cashier
It was these nothings
That made our day whole
And now we are without them
Wondering when we’ll get more

Welcome to the Day of Silence
A peek into our life
A life where we can’t speak the truth
About something as simple as ourselves
About who we truly are
Try it
Stay silent all day
Think about how hard it is
Welcome to our lives

We sat and cried tears
Both happy and sad
In the mourning of the one we held dear

In the silence of the night I sit and meditate
Let my mind wander through distant thoughts
Explore the chaos of my own mind

Between the whirring of the fan’s blades
I could only think one though
To a poem dark and twisted

“You’re flying now
You see things much more clear than the ground
It’s all okay
Or it would be
Were you not now halfway down”

My mind shuts off
“Erase this from my thoughts” I whisper
But there it stayed, louder, quicker
Until it’s all I could hear

Do you ever wish for death’s sweet embrace?
To feel nothing
To stop the pain
But isn’t it ironic
The only way to freedom
Is the thing you’re desperately trying to escape?

I wanted to be more
I told her how I feel
I thought she’d be happy
I thought she felt the same
Then I see
She says
You’re my best friend
Nothing else
My heart withered
The light of love
Slowly seeped out
Color left me
Pain replaced love
Darkness entered me
Nothing else matters
Those four words
Killed me

All the fake smiles
Can’t hide how I feel
All the fake smiles
Can’t make me feel better
All the fake smiles
Make me miss when I smiled for real

“Why are you alive”
“You don’t deserve this”
“They would be better off without you”
“Leave and don’t come back”
“Push everyone away”