Something I’ve caught myself asking
Especially when I tell someone
“I don’t care anymore”
But where is he now?
Is he still planning on being a prison guard?
Is he still with that girl he met when he got there?
Does he were wish he had stayed here?
Over 2000 miles apart
And months since we spoke
But it would be nice
Just to hear his voice

It took me 16 years
To get one to agree to go out with me
When will the next one arrive?
When will I get to hold someone’s hand
Feel someone’s lips upon mine
Hold them close to me
Experience everything with someone new
Someone better
Someone who doesn’t tear groups apart
Someone who actually makes me safe
Someone who cares about me
Someone who won’t break up with me over Snapchat
Who will it be?
How long will it take?

Geek
Nerd
Me
I am whoever you want me to be

I want to write a book
Make me into a story
Sprinkle in some laughter
Some happiness
Take out the hate that became last spring
But how do I write the truth
Without being able to admit my pain to myself
I am human, sure
But I’m more
I need to know
Who am I?

I’m a tangle of words
A mess of quotes
Lyrics
Jokes
Sarcasm
All written together into a script
Into the shape of a person
Whenever I speak
A piece of me comes off
Never to be seen again

She is my friend
She is the one who said that
She is not interested in my love
She is independent
She is wonderful
She is beautiful
She is kind
She is witty
She is smart
She is my Pam Beasly
She is my Rachel Greene
She is my Gilmore Girl
She is the one that I wait for
She is perfect
She is my forbidden fruit
She is Awesome
She is Nice
She is Neat
She is Amazingly smart
She is a goddess of perfection

To all adults who feel they can ignore kids:
Why?
Why do you feel you can ignore us?
Especially when we’re old enough to know
**** isn’t perfect
We know things
We have opinions
Yet we get ignored
And let me tell you, it’s ******* annoying
So why do we get ignored?
And before you say
“It’s because we have life experience”
I understand that’s important
But we just want to be listened to
If you think we’re wrong, debate us
Change our minds
Give us that experience
Just don’t ignore us

Why do people go to find love?
Do they really feel that it’s worth the breakup
To be feeling like **** for days — sometimes weeks
Just for a short time of happiness?

Why do we torture ourselves so?
We listen to our sad music
Making us depressed
Leading to overeating and intoxicants
Intoxicated we think of when we were happy in our ex’s arms
Even if you’re happier in your new relationship than you were with them
Your ex leads you to guilt
Where you feel like calling them
Just to say hello, and hear their voice again
But if you do that
You know it will only end in tears
Yet you pick up the phone instead
And call the number you swore you would never touch
But there you are
The phone ringing
Until they pick up, call you a ******* *******
And hang up
So you call the next one as a new song plays in the background

Why is it always the boys who are dumb as ****
Why are they the popular ones?
The ones who are smart are always alone
Left to wonder why
Yet the dull ones, the ones without a brain
are swarmed with people
Why are they always chosen first
Why am I the outcast?

We hate those different from us
But why?
Because our parents did?
If that was the case then there would be no love
Nothing but hate
Because we were meant to be different
We weren’t meant to fit in
We were meant to question
We were meant to accept
People who hate gay People because the bible says
The bible also says “thou shalt love thy neighbor as thy love thyself”
Do you want to be hated?
I didn’t think so
So open your eyes
Question beliefs
Hell, question me
You don’t know **** about me
You have no reason to trust me
But just do me a favor
Stop hating people because of what the look like or who they love

Why me
The universe decided me
I want to know why
Why can’t I be happy
Be in love
Be me
Why?

Smoke is thick in the air
You can’t see to the end of the block
But I still go to work

I stand in the yellowed, dulled sunlight
Trying to to breathe too deeply
Lest the ash fill my lungs
But I still go to work

I miss my connection and walk
Through the empty streets
Passed the old neighborhood
My eyes and throat burning
But I still go to work

Six hours I stand by a window in a hot room
Wishing I could smell anything but fire
Checking over and over
Anxiously reloading the alerts
“Am I evacuated now?”
But I still finish my shift

I’m only a few dozen miles from flames
In a state that’s being razed
City by city
Town by town
We’re disappearing
Returning to ashen shells where homes once stood
But still I finished my shift

The restaurant dead
Air painful to breath
Homes shuttered
Bags packed
Fingers crossed
Prayers muttering from atheist lips
“May our loved ones houses stand through disasters, amen”
And I head home

Everyday I hope I don’t have to leave
Everyday I doubt that everything will be fine
Every single ******* day I pray to the gods that you believe in, even if I’m not sure they’re there

I wish they knew the way I looked at them
I wish they felt the same
I wish it could happen
But I know better
Than to waste my wishes

I am now stuck here
Inside my home
With nothing to do but think
And all my thoughts have grown dark

I need to say something
But it can’t be said
Words fail to describe... me
And so I sit in pain
Knowing I’ll never be seen
Warts and all

All I want to do is sit and write
Ignore all the other **** in the world
I have a story waiting to be told
But no time to tell it

Yet another dream about him and I

A few months ago was the first
Where in class we planned an art heist
Leading us to some “alone time”

Last night I had another
Just as vivid as the first
I could smell the wood of the pencils
Be blinded by the classroom projector
Hear the footsteps of the approaching teacher
Feel the cold plastic of the chairs on my skin

Here I am
Wondering why I dream of him
When we’ve grown so far apart

Those three words were all Grampa said to him
As the classic car glided down the road
Grampa looked over at his 5 year old boy
And motioned for him to sit on his lap
“Spirit’s what you need in this world kid
Otherwise you’ll crumble faster than a paper in the rain”
The kid took the wheel, driving faster and faster

Eleven years later
Grampa gave him a box
“Take good care of her
And remember, keep your spirit”
That night Grampa welcomed the icy grip of death

On his gravestone were the words
Spirit’s all you need to survive, keep it safe
Resting on top were photos
The car driving down the same road
The boy behind the wheel growing into a man

Eleven years later
The man drove to the cemetery
Tears streaming down his face
“She left me, Grampa
And I know I only need spirit
But I need you more
I need you to tell me that it okay
That I don’t need her
I need you to tell me what to do”
He sat there crying over his Grampa’s grave

He drove home
To the house in the middle of nowhere
The house his Grampa built
Sitting empty save a few boxes
He climbed the wooden ladder to his treehouse
He sat with a picture of his kind faced Grampa
Tears streaking his cheeks
He walks over to the chest he kept his toys in when he was a boy
Digging out old cars
Army men
And yo-yos
Till he reached the bottom
His toys surrounding him he noticed something
The chest had a fake board in the bottom

He pulled it up to find a note etched into it
I won’t always be there for you
But know this
It will all be fine in the end
Keep your spirit, for that is all you need
I love you
He climbed out
Got in the classic car
And drove
Hoping someday it would all work out