Suddenly it feels like everything will be alright
As long as I get to see you today
And I know that sounds crazy
But then I'll just clam insanity

If my world came crashing down
I'd still be safe right here
As long as you were holding me
Your soul you see, keeps me from harm

Having you near, makes me see
How beautiful life can truly be
You over ride my shadowing tendency's
And finally make it " okay" to be me

In my soul nothing else matters anymore
Besides the moment I see you though the door
And though my eyes the world has actually changed

You see with you in my life all things have rearranged
You make me want to be a better me
And I thank the stars nightly .......for you.

Last night it was terribly cold
But I lingered outside anyhow.
Walking home at 1 am, again,
I took the long way
Stopped by every spot that I could feel you in.
The streetlights still spilled light on the ground in rivers and puddles
And it was still gold
But much sharper- frozen.
It was dead silent everywhere.
I was alone, with my gloves and my scarf and my breath leaving little ghosts of your name hanging in the air
So cold it felt like it had an electrical charge.
I put on that song, and I let myself pretend you were beside me.
My fingers were stiff
And my cheeks were almost numb
But I walked slow to that song
That reminds me of you.
Wistfully I found the spot where we'd paused near the shops
And the one in the parking lot
And the construction site where we took photographs on that spectacularly warm December night.
You know
It's all closed up now.
There are walls where you stood before
And leaned close to me and made me shiver.
I shivered, remembering,
And pulled my scarf closer.
I felt lost. Even with the music in my ears,
I felt the silence of the whole world pressing in on me.
So quiet and still that to breathe or take a step was to shatter it like the gunfire cracking of ice.
I tilted my head back and searched the black sky
And while I'd been wandering the clouds had parted for a moment
And there it was, one star, bright and perfect.
And all of a sudden a smile snuck onto my lips like a surprise
Demure as a sigh, and then bold as a shout
And I was grinning, all alone in the middle of the darkened street.
Suddenly I was just so full of joy and awe that a laugh crept up my throat
And I had to hold it back to keep from splintering the black-ice night sky into little crystal shards at my feet.

I don't know how long I walked,
Slow,
Treasuring the moment,
Closing my eyes against the wind
And so that I could better remember your face.
And if some of my love slid down my cheeks
I didn't feel it happen
Only noticed a blurred halo around that lovely far-away star I kept glancing up at.
And I learned something about myself.
I learned that I carry my home around with me.
That if I really need it, it's there, in my heart.
If I really, really love you
I can remember you so completely that I laugh for joy.

What I'm saying to you might sound like "Please stay, I will die without you."
Sometimes it sounds that way to me, too.
Sometimes I peek into the caves of my mind
And my footsteps echo it back to me like rain.
But that
Is not what I'm saying.
What I'm saying is that I know I will have such joy in my life.
I know in my bones that I am not going to waste this chance I've got
To feel things.
I am certain that my life will be not just happy,
But spectacular.
I will never be safe, I will never be bored, I will never give up, I will never
Settle.
What I'm saying to you is that
I want you in that.
I want you to be the reason.
For a while,
Or forever.
Your choice,
Your freedom.
What I'm saying is much more than "I will die without you."
No,
I will be exquisitely alive with or without you.
I'm no fool, I know that.

What I'm saying is,
I'd rather it be with you.

Lean close to me
Brush your fingers along my knee
And
I will whisper in your ear
With my hot breath
All the things I know you'll say someday.
I say
Run
I say
This is no joke
I say
I will be too much for you
I say
You will want me
Gone.
And you lean close to me
Brush your fingers along my knee
And say don't be silly, tell me I'm wrong
But I say
Wait
I say
Give it some time
Someday you will say "You don't see it."
And I will say "No, I saw it first."
I say
Believe me or you will be in far too deep
And you say
You're special
And I say
*You're doomed.

I think when god punches you in the stomach, he's waiting to see
If you'll grovel on the floor
Or straighten back up and say, "I will make something beautiful of this, just to spite you."
But then again,
We have never been on good terms, he and I.

"You are an artist. This is what great art comes from. Maybe you're meant to suffer to create something beyond beautiful for the world."
I don't want that!
I want to be happy.
I'd give up everything that makes me special
And talented
And beautiful
Just to be happy,
Because the only reason I need
Any of it
Is to survive how sad and angry I am.
I am an artist because I don't want to **** myself.
I could have been a lawyer
Or a scientist.
I could have been anything I wanted
But I can't
Because I have to spend every moment I can
Just surviving.
And of course I love it-
It's my life raft.
Nobody wants to drown.
But would I even like any of this
If it wasn't the only thing I could do to continue living?
I don't know.
I don't
Want this.
When I get up onstage and I sing and people say
"Wow, look at the emotion she can put into it."
When I act and people marvel that I'm so raw,
When I write a poem and everyone says,
"Oh, publish it, it's so lovely!"
When I paint a picture and people say,
"I wish I had the talent to make something that beautiful."
I don't have the heart to tell them
That they are watching me fight for my life
And envying it as if it's
A gift.
I'm an artist.
I'm a prisoner.
Art is NOT my calling.
It is my answer.
The only answer I can find.

You
Are not my crutch.
You've named yourself
But you've got it all wrong.
Even when I crawled through life
I never even took a hand up.
I've never leaned on
Anyone
And I never intend to.
I have no crutch.
I am no *******.
I am simply
Something you have never seen before
And may never see again.
(It takes a certain madness to walk
This tightrope.)
I have no crutch. I have no support.
But
I have my knowledge
That when I fall I will not hit the ground.
That if I am to tumble from love and life
I may be bruised
But I will not be
Broken.
I have someone waiting to catch me.
And you
Are not her, either.
Darling, you are what I want.
You are who
I want.
But you are not my constant.
You do not rise in the east
And set in the west
And I do not expect
That you coax every living thing that grows
Up from under the soil
And give it life.
I cannot count on you
To keep me warm when I am shivering
And that
Is okay
And that
Was never the point.
You are like the stars-
Never in quite the same place,
Bright and guiding some nights,
Shrouded in misty clouds on others,
And that
Is why I love you so.
Elusive and divine,
You shape the night into a glittering sheet of velvet but you
Are not the sun
And I do not want you to be.
I've got someone
I know will always come back and light my life up.
I've got
My safety net of sunbeams.
I am reaching for the stars,
And I want them to set my heart aflame
And print constellations of white light
Along my tender skin
But
Make no mistake
I neither want
Nor expect them
To make the grass grow
Steady beneath my feet.