Your eyes can say one thousand words.
A picture
of the galaxies,
framed by your long lashes
which have the strength to latch onto me

Your eyes can say one thousand words
But you have not yet given me
the map
the legend
the dictionary
or the puzzle's key.

I’m not going to use 5,000 similes in this poem.
Why?
Because your bones do not tickle my throat like constellations,
Instead you abused me.
And I’m not going to make abuse into a pretty aesthetic poem.
I’m going to speak it how it is.

People assume abuse is pretty because people write about it in pretty terms.
But no, abuse is scary and messy.
It’s the forgetting your birthday and how you were born.
It’s the significant other hitting your thighs because you’re “too fat”.
It’s not getting coffee in the morning because “you’re a big girl” and can sweat out the hangover
-you didn’t ask for- off in a few hours.
And most importantly, you can’t forget how much of a **** you’d look like if you shaved your head, so you don’t.
Abuse isn’t “wrap me in your arms and put me in a choke hold so i can feel what it felt like to be mom”  
ABUSE IS NOT AESTHETIC
ABUSE IS NOT AESTHETIC
ABUSE IS NOT AESTHETIC

I can’t say it enough. I can’t phrase it different ways. I can’t say “hey dude look, abuse ain’t cool
man” BECAUSE YOU NEED TO KNOW IT AS IT IS. AT FACE VALUE.

I dreamt that gravity
was just a conspiracy
to sell us shoes
but we never questioned it
just stood, penniless on blistered feet
gazing at the stars

Rage, riot-
wage war against the mind-cage

I dreamt I was an infant
who never learned
that my outstretched hands
were mine, were 'I,'
they tried to bathe me but
I swirled down the drain
and became the sea

Wail, weep-
sell your soul to the keeper of the mind-cage

I awoke with this migraine
shook my head and
heard the shackles clink
reached up and felt
this fissure in my skull
pried it open, watched my mind sigh
and expand to fill this space

Grow quiet, shake hands-
have a cup of tea with the mind-cage

Now I am creation
took the roof off my house
I waft into the open sky
opened my heart
clowns from a clown car
the sorrows walked out

Embrace, make peace-
just be with the mind-cage

Weightless, I meet my old desires
fluffy little wishes floating in the breeze
but there is nothing lacking now
I hold the mind-cage in my arms
we float as it screams
and blames, and fades

Slither, creep-
escape through the open bars

Come home to this joy

i can’t write about what it feels like
to run my fingers through your hair
or feel your hands on my skin
(no matter how much i want to)
i can’t speak to the softness of your lips
or what it sounds like
when you whisper my name
(no matter how much i want to)
i don’t know what the skin on your hips
feels like after you’ve showered
or what it’s like to wake up
to your breath on my shoulder
(no matter how much i want to)
i can’t write about the feeling
of our skin
soft and rough
holding hands
(oh god, i want to)
i can’t write about you
in anything other than the abstract
no
matter
how
much
i
want
to