I spent my childhood and most of my teenage life dreaming about my first kiss - the fireworks and electricity and romance - oh god, I couldn't wait for the perfection of the first boy who touched his lips to mine.
And then I turned seventeen...
In reality, most of my kisses were stolen from me.

1. A stage kiss, with a boy who dreaded even speaking to me in theatre class.
2. A boy I barely spoke to, using me as an example to show others on how to kiss a girl, with no warning or permission, he grabbed my face in his and harshly crushed my mouth with his (This is not how you kiss a girl).
3. The first time I was ever intoxicated by alcohol and the thought of a cute boy finding me attractive. He poured me whiskey and whispered empty compliments in my ear. I woke up laying on the cold floor the next morning alone (He didn't find me attractive, he found me drunk on the idea that he was the first tongue in my mouth).
4. An awkward ride home from waffle house with a half stranger, with my best friend in the backseat because we just had to sneak out of the house, that led to a goodnight kiss that I didn't expect, nor did I desire.
5. A twenty year old soldier that I met on vacation at the beach, after having admitting to hating sand, he threw me in it and kissed me and asked me if the tiny grains were such a bad thing after all (they were). He mimicked the waves of the ocean with his tongue but this was before I knew how to swim (at least he tried to be romantic, I suppose).
6. A late adventure at the park with teenagers who were more dangerous and rebellious than I, which ended with a quick smokey kiss from a boy who was darker than the night and higher than the stars that shone above our heads.
7. A tall boy with shaggy hair who played The White Stripes songs on guitar and smelled like beer and cigarette smoke. He left me with a hangover,swollen lips, a neck full of hickeys, and a mind full of guilt as I tried to hide the splotches from my parents the day they came back from vacation.
8. A drunk game of truth-or-dare at 3 am with my best friend; the first ******* the list. Of course, one of the guys spoke for all of them when he urged us to make-out (we should have seen that one coming).
9. A younger boy who got angry at me when he realized that I wasn't drunk enough to have *** with him the first time I met him.
10. A man in a pop punk band that I met in the party vibes of Bourbon Street. He kissed me behind Momma's back (and my best friend behind mine) and slid his hands down my high-waisted shorts and I don't quite remember his stories of fame, only his name.
11. He had sweet eyes and brown curly hair and he seemed like a gentleman, but I guess the ***** changed us both.
12. The chaste and charming piano player, who I dreamt of running away with since the first time I laid eyes on him in ninth grade. That apartment bed meant more to me than it did to him. He only used me for experience (I guess the piano wasn't the only instrument he played).
13. "Can I please kiss you?" I hesitated, because I felt dizzy and drunk and disbelieving. I didn't want to forget any detail of the first kiss that actually meant something to me. I didn't think it would mean anything to you at all. But even sober, we both wanted it. So I said yes, and kissed her. And now I don't ever want to stop...

Thirteen.
The Unluckiest number.
Too many thoughtless lips and tongues and mouths and hands that touched only my body.
But you kissed my soul.
How did I get so lucky?

I've been thinking a whole lot about Gatsby.
A whole lot about the past.
About second chances.
The green light.

I should have seen it coming,
that first time on the gym floor
when you wouldn't hold my hand when I asked
and you watched as embarrassment and rejection spread across my face
or the second time after attendance recovery
when you hugged me too long and waited so long to decide whether or not you should kiss me that you just didn't make a decision
and you watched me walk to my sisters car in the back of the school's parking lot with my hands probably in my pockets my eyes on the pavement and my lip between my teeth
or the third time in my car after a day at the flea market on valentines day when we pretended to not to notice the fact that the plans we had made aligned perfectly with the calender's lovely little notice in the bottom corner of the 14th square as we sat in the dark so close and yet so far and you told me goodnight and retreated inside
or the fourth time just a few nights later when I built up the courage to slightly graze your skin with mine as we talked about life and I still wonder if that took you by surprise because I was so scared and nervous that I couldn't do it until I closed my eyes and you must've been nervous and scared too but you managed to keep it disguised
or the fifth time when I got too high to drive home so I slept over and you didn't want our bodies connected in too many places so you intentionally shifted each time I did to create empty sheeted spaces
and I snuggled close into your neck and I could feel something in you this time but you rolled over and slept until I was awaken for a favor from a past lover and I left


or the last time, a few months later,
after I told you I felt us ending and you told me there were people who could make both of us happier than we were and I cried and I held you tight and we spent some time outside admiring nature and the bugs and when it came time for me to leave all I was left with was a hug and "don't text and drive."
It took everything in me not to turn around as soon as I pulled out and ask for one last chance to kiss you
just one more, for the memory, for old times sake, for anything
but I was tired of being brave
and I was tired of making the first move
and I sure as hell wasn't going to make the last one.
So I unlocked the wooden gate, and drove on through the cooling twilight.

But this time I'm having trouble
seeing the green light at the end of the dock.
This time when someone questions me, I know the answer.
"Can't repeat the past?"
Why of course you can't.
I'm not a fool, and neither are you.

aquamarine beard, lips tinted plum
he grows beside the knowledge tree
smoking a joe while sipping some,
as he fingers dissonance and harmonies,
composing as he hums.
far beyond his peripheral debris:
unearthed charm and wisdom.
ah, if only his eyes could see
the potential of what's to come.

I forgot what it was like to be around her, i'm so used to being in the company of lighter souls.
The heaviness is starting to sink back into my bones.
The day turns to darkness, and back to dawn soon, and sleep still hasn't come because the battle between eyelids scanning screens and the inside of themselves proved to be easier than you'd think.

You made me forget that I didn't have a green thumb
You were the green thumb, you are the green thumb
and you're still around, you're still here, but not in the dark,
only when i've got the sunshine anyway, because you are the sunshine
and **** i'm not a flower when I'm alone and looking in the mirror at a single silhouette

I knew I was ****** when I started looking for my skeleton again

The truth is you hardly know these bones, you helped to hide them, heal them.

But every moment I spend with my thoughts brings them out more

They aren't necessarily bad, but I don't know who I am
I know what I want, who I want, who I want to be,
but who am I at one in the morning when I slip back into watching
dramas about people with OCD and anorexia and I find myself crying and wishing there was another skeleton for me hold on to...
one thats not mine.


****, I'm even writing again... That's a sign too.

Where do you go when you can't go home and you don't know the backroads well enough to absentmindedly navigate your way out of your mind?
Can someone show me a map with a route that has the most frequent red lights and stop signs?
What does it mean when it aches to see that every green light you approach won't turn gold?
How does it feel to loathe the silence between you and yourself?
It feels like this.
It feels like flipping an hour glass over and over but the sand is stuck to the top
Like the digital clock on the dash is always seventeen minutes faster at each tick and turn of the tiny green digits
Like the four note church bell chimes at the cemetery forever
Like the CD is scratched and keeps skipping but it only repeats the same line over and over

Home is wherever I'm with you
Home is wherever I'm with you
Home is wherever I'm with you
Home is wherever I'm with you

Like the CD is 80 minutes of the same song straight
Like everyone sings about home or going there or asking to be taken there or defining what it is to them but you still can't find where it is for you.


Like the gas tank is full but the battery is dead
Like the sharp curves of the asphalt just take you in circles and you can't find the exit to the roundabout
Like there are no curves and the road goes on forever and all you get are green lights blinding you but all you can ******* see is red

remember the poem i always said
i'd write about that light
house well here it goes
ten months later
and certainly not as romantic as id
hoped

ok ok so
i'm the lighthouse
(of course, you should've predicted that one)
oh oh and
you're the boat thats never coming home
(of course i should've predicted that one)
some days its sunny and if i squint
reeeeal hard -
hand over my brow and thumb on my temple

i can see the shore!

other days the fog is so
thick
so grey
so heavy
i cant see the hands reaching out to hold me

but frankly, i'm not sure they're even there anymore

part of me hated the kids who called me a lesbian before I knew I was one, part of me applauded them for seeing beneath the surface when I couldn’t
they turned the light on before my eyes could adjust and I turned it off just as quick before I knew it made sense

Love me when you meet me.
Love me when I tell you the time of day.
Love me when I'm uninterested.
And when you become interested,
don't forget me.
Love me when I ignore you.
Love me when I'm loving someone else.
Love me when I start to love you.
Love me when I spend three consecutive nights in your bed because I can't bear to be without you.
Love me when you see the smile you bring to my face.
Love me when I'm sad and don't want to talk to you for days.
Love me when I don't want you or your love anymore.
And then when you move on and make progress towards the direction of finally not being in love with me,
Love me.
Please.
Because even when I don't want you to love me, I want you to love me.

I forgot what shivered bones felt like
I forgot about weak indexes and knees
I forgot how I sometimes used to forget how to breathe
I forgot about the blood pumping head crunching beats
But simultaneous yawns, constant blushing, and white teeth don't erase the past in me
I find warmth in your fingers and the sun shines from your mind,
but the snowflakes and ice cycles come back sometimes

it feels like for a brief moment, we slipped into another dimension in which that was our life, a parallel world existing simultaneously as the one we are currently living here

we were those people and we are also these people which I guess means that we are so many different people living somewhere else right at this very moment

like the life I have here and the person I am here is just one beautiful version but now that I've peeked in through a window into this alternate life, it has swung open the door to a million other lives and avenues and dreams and desires

like some part of me is still there and hasn't made it back yet

like this isn't the me that's supposed to be here and the me that's there is the wrong one
maybe we are both mourning the other "right" life

like I should be sitting dizzy along the Boston harbor, a cool breeze and soft hazy light washing over me, my hands in my coat pockets and your head on my shoulder, a small smile at the corner of my lips, laughs loaded in the chamber, because everything feels so perfect that there is no way any other place in the world exists outside of that moment

and she should be sitting here, along the bay, watching the red sun set over the gulf, listening to the familiar song of the water lapping the rocks below, taking her ritual stroll of coming back into herself, and her home is quiet but not for long because she's counting down the minutes until the moment he walks in the door with open arms and an excited hello

both of these people exist but they can't together, and to accept one is to deny the other and neither feels fair or good or
right

and in that realization it is impossible to not think about all of the decisions that led to this life and not that one or any other one and how by chance, I ended up here but could have just as easily ended up anywhere else and that discovery is too big to settle into over a three hour flight and fourteen hundred miles because

somewhere I am sitting in a park in Rome, fingers sticky from eating peaches next to my best friend in the grass, and somewhere,

I am dancing on a frozen lake in Bar Harbor with rosy cheeks and bright eyes, and somewhere

I am back home, wandering the streets of the french quarter after a few glasses of red wine and a soft saxophone fills the silence in the distance and my parents are only an hour away and somewhere,

I am riding a bike through the cemetery as spring brings pink blossoms to the trees in Tallahassee and I never left

and I never met any of you

and these are the people that I always have been, always will be, never was, and never will be again

I have never been held quite like that
like that day in the ocean
you held me how the ocean held me
how it let me float clung to my skin molded around us
the hold the ocean has holds up

you kept saying the waves had hands every time they crashed into us
white foam clouding the way my legs wrapped around your waist when we went too far for my toes to touch
you held me and I felt light
my heart was weightless and my head was heavy dropping back over and over again
laughing up at the sky
looking into your eyes
the setting sun glistening off your skin and turning your brown eyes golden
the way I know these days are
golden

we pressed our whole bodies on the sand right next to the water and let the waves wash up over us and laughed each time we had to resign farther and farther up the shore because they were up to our ears
we pressed our whole bodies on the floor of the tub, my back against your chest against the white ceramic and your head falling back to rest against the blue tile your brown eyes closed chin up towards the ceiling
I felt so held when we pressed our bodies flat against white fitted sheets hands on each other’s cheeks your thumbs rubbing my hair out of my face staring at each other in silence still the waves crashing over us my comforter clouding the way my legs draped over your waist
wish I could hold onto those moments forever the way you held me that day in the ocean

hand on your shoulders
dark curls get caught in my fingers
eye contact used to make me nervous
in the dark it makes me smile
want to pluck the strings of your soul
find out what you’re made of
what you sound like
in the darkness
swaying to the voices
swirling in the ballroom
singing me to sleep

never forget who watered the soil your roots were planted in
or the rays that helped you grow emerald leaves and slanted limbs
and when it rains don't be afraid cause that's how flowers bloom
i promise not to runaway from the dark side of the moon
cause you were my sunset in disguise
all the gray clouds and tangerine skies
the introspective orb so bright
that even the blind wolf cries
you were all the songs I grew up on that thunder sang to me
and if I ever find myself gnawing and barking up at the wrong tree
I'll howl my loudest and wait for help to stand on my own two feet

I'm trapped in a relationship with a man who doesn't love me

I can't remember the last time I was called beautiful or intelligent or felt as if he found me endearing

Im watching the moon and the waves are crashing into the sand and I want to swim as far as I can

I want to show him how far out I'd swim to show him I'd drown for the love I gave to him

But he's not here
He's upstairs in the hotel room
But he's probably not even there.

Why is it so easy to find reasons to hate yourself but so impossible to find those that make you love yourself?
I look back on all of the mistakes I’ve made and decisions I should not have chosen and I feel like those parts of me dictate the kind of person I am today, regardless of how much I’ve changed.
It’s not so easy conjuring memories of all of the nice things I’ve done for others and for myself or all of the redeeming qualities that I know I have but refuse to remember.
I can never be sorry enough
I am so sorry
I wish I could take it all back
And be better
Better

My whole life I’ve been striving for better

• (1) pencil
• (1) laptop charger
• (1) small t-shirt
• (∞) dust bunnies
• (2) socks that did not make a matching pair
• (2) lighters, one with an eyeball and the other abstract colors that you said if the Bic lighter company had asked me to design a lighter it would look something like
• (1) fallen rose petal and
• (1) pair of pants with my
• (1) pair of underwear still tangled in them from the way you took them off.

Rip out my ribs with your teeth and then heal the wound with your lips because your kisses reseal the opening that vulnerability unzips.
I'll light my biggest fears on fire and lay them at your feet and watch you put out the flames only to sweep up the ashes and pour them down my smoke filled throat. And I'll gaze for hours in a trance as the blazing dance and scarlet hues mesmerize me until I'm warm inside and numb in a daze of blues.
It seems I'm only capable of flattering those flowing fingers that bend my bones rather than ridiculing the way they crush my decayed carcass.

I panic at the thought of you wanting someone else.
I tremble at the words you've written for her.

December 31st, 2016
Sometime around 10:40pm
On a balcony in the closest thing to a mansion I've ever been in
The weather was the worst weather for a New Years Eve party I'd ever seen and yet, there we both were, on that balcony overlooking a dark and foggy field under electric blue lights shining upon red solo cups.
I first noticed your sweater, where a hypothetical pocket would be, a little girl in a yellow dress holding a purple umbrella, standing in the rain. Salt?
Salt.
I then noticed how you looked European, only to find out you're from Florida, but living in New York. I didn't get that information from you, your cousin filled me on who you were.
At some point, I was in conversation with some friends sitting under the blue lights, with a small plastic pastel pink cup filled with chardonnay, and as you walked past me, you quickly tapped the tip of your beer bottle on the rim of my cup, a tiny toast, without even looking at me, and you just kept walking to wherever you were walking to on the balcony. I'm not sure what about that exact clink intrigued me, but I looked down and smiled at my cup in thought for a few moments. I ended up observing your mannerisms for the rest of night.
You had a cigarette tucked behind your ear, a sinister but pristine set of white teeth behind pink lips. The bags under your eyes complimented the blue in a way that when I looked into them I could see the nights spent awake, probably at a skate park, or some ***** New York alley, smoking *** with girls with septum rings and stiletto nails.
I moved closer to the table to see who was winning the game, like I always do when I don't feel like engaging in small talk with old acquaintances. You mocked me for my black and mild and asked to have a hit. You offered to share your behind-the-ear cigarette with me and I accepted, and lit it with my flannel pocket lighter.
We passed it back and forth while you tossed a ping pong ball back and forth across the table.
At 11:40, I left without saying goodbye to run towards my midnight kiss, and made it just in time. I'm not sure if you got a midnight kiss.
I hope you did, under the fireworks. But something about you makes me feel like you didn't deserve one. You looked like trouble. But I don't know anything about you except that you said you were twenty one which I'm almost sure was a lie, off about five years, give or take.
Our meeting was brief and both pleasant and bizarre.
The fact that we met in Louisiana was a lucky happenstance.
I'm not sure if I'd even say lucky. Our chance meeting has had no true effect on me, except perhaps, maybe next time I pull out the salt from the top shelf of my pantry, I'll think of you and smile in that weird sinister way you do.

January 3rd, 2017
9:05 pm**
I was closing the coffee shop after a long downtempo day. I had almost everything done when my boss texted saying he had some things to do, and that he'd be there soon. He told me he brought a friend, named Elif (which I later secretly googled in the office to learn the origin of) that he would like me to meet. "You'll like her."
And I think I have just laid eyes on possibly the most beautiful girl I've ever seen.
I shielded my irritated pink eye behind my hair, along with rosy cheeks at the sight of her.
There she stood, tanned skin, long brown hair with blonde tips, a soft smile, softer brown eyes, natural thick eyebrows, a septum ring, green socks over stockings with flats, a mustard yellow cardigan, her own handmade crystal beaded bracelets up her arm.
God, where did he find this girl?

He made us lattes, and we talked about my tattoo that she inquired about, but she'd never heard of Shel Silverstein and I was afraid to make a fool of myself and say something dumb so I kept the explanation short and sweet.
She held a peppermint mocha latte with whipped cream up to her lips and inhaled with a soft smile, and I wish I could've captured that moment forever, it was so sweet and heartwarming, to look at her small figure like her core was gravitating up into the cup, her shoulders right below her ears, her fingers wrapped around the red paper mug.
As he pulled a shot of espresso for me, steaming whole milk even though I mentioned I'd rather almond milk ("it's better for latte art"; showoff) he mocked me for always showing up late, but she thanked me because the way things worked out, he was able to leave early to spend more time with her because of my mistake, and I claimed it was what the universe wanted to happen, and she laughed. And that felt nice, to hear how she laughed.
She was so soft, but also genuinely easy to talk to, and thrilled to talk to me, and she was just so cool. so so cool.
She leaves tomorrow morning to return home to Georgia, not Turkey, like I thought, which we both agreed would have been sad.
I wish I did not get introduced to her the night before she leaves, but I am glad that he knows me well enough to know that I would greatly enjoy her presence, even if only for a short while.

I will add that he had little love marks on his throat, I'm sure which were from her, and that makes me very very happy to know that he has found someone that I think is almost as interesting and dynamic as he is.

I hope to see her again. She said she'd make me a crystal bracelet and gave me her email.
Maybe one day I could email her and maybe if I ever happened to end up in Georgia, or her, back here, we could have a cup of coffee together and I could read her The Light in The Attic.

what I haven't been trying to say is that I love you but, but... BUT
but I see my parents in us and a life as an addict out of love just doesn't appeal to me after having to live it for as long as I have lived it and i don't ever want to relive that or the anger that arose when the high was gone and couldn't get got or the feeling of inferiority to the inspiration from inhalations or the rust on the prison cell steel or the carpet petting your cheek or the sound of three girls finally wearing big girl ******* and their daddies Guns N Roses and Van Halen and Eagles tees and yellow bangs and dark curls and strawberry blonde strands down to their knees wondering why mommy won't wake up on the living room sofa or what caused the ****** noses of the "pill ****** down the street" I don't want dangerous dealers, the downers or the rush or the teen riding to dallas alone on a bus
these are things I've seen and don't care to re-see
so what i'm trying to say is i love you but i see my parents in us

I can't remember the last time I frantically searched for a sharp object in my sentimental clutter, or the time that I drove out into the middle of nowhere, searching for trees that I knew would end everything.
I remember the feeling, of madness and chaos and desperation,
but sometimes it feels like a feeling I never really felt;
only read or heard about.
But I do remember it.
And sometimes, in moments of desperation and chaos and madness, I have the urge to drive back to those secluded woods, just to make sure there are no crosses with floral wreaths dug into the dirt.
But I don't.
I drive to the familiar home I've made my niche, decorated with sticky noted "I love you's" and laundry on leather sofas, with extravagant floral wreaths hung on the brightly lit porch instead, and I find comfort in the fact that this is the place where I can finally rest my head.
So do things get better?
Well, yes and no.
Yes, I still drink alcohol,
but these days I sip it rather than shoot it,
and some days I'll take a few short drags of the cigarette I've been smoking on for the last few weeks,
but I don't chain-smoke them like I used to,


and these days, I always wear my seatbelt and get back "I love you too."

the way her eyes hypnotize and magnetize me, pulling me into otherworldly realms every time they meet mine and how intrigued I am to untwist the knots in her mind because no one ever bothered to listen to her beauty unwind or the story behind her necklace shaped like a tree or her affinity for abandoned houses and the treasures in the rubble she'd find

the way she looks at me and smirks and utters something sweet and then realizes she's a flirt so she looks at the road and tries to hide her cheeks blushing like roses and the sentimental sunset spots we found and the hours we spend staring at the stars and wandering around

the way he dreams of pink seashells in grayscale underwater libraries and how he inhales and leans his head back on the seat with his eyes closed as he takes in the indian summer and how he always wears autumn wear and rolls up his sleeves and how it makes me think just how ******* handsome a man can be

the way she comforts me with her optimism and laughs every time like its the last time she may ever get a chance to, how she lives life like she's never gonna dance to another persons beat and she sweeps her own self off her feet and carries me simultaneously

the way her hair flows in the wind out of the passenger side window like flames flicking, like fire burning, like youth glowing, like not knowing anything yet somehow knowing all the right things to say

the way he gets passionate about music and the shriek he does when he gets excited about something FOR ONCE IN HIS LIFE and his charm and wit that could persuade any girl to drop to her knees and feel weak and the way he goes weeks without washing his hair and wears the same hat every single time we meet

the way he giggles at every word one and thing and how his eyes squint shut when he smiles and how he dances with me to Led Zeppelin in Waffle House at 3 am and how he carries his backpack everywhere he goes and how easy it is to carry on a conversation and how his vibes just flow into mine and how he justifies his disobedience with the excuse that he is always down for an adventure and how happy he always seems to be in my passenger seat

THE WAY HE ASKS FOR THE LAST HAIR TIE ON MY WRIST TO TIE HIS HAIR INTO A BUN AND THE FRECKLES ON HIS CHEEKS AND THE WAY HIS HAZEL EYES BURN INTO MINE BENEATH WEIGHTED LIDS AND THE WAY HE SPEAKS WITH HEAVY HANDS IN MORE WAYS THAN IMAGINABLE AND THE WAY HE HUGS ME TIGHT AND EVEN THOUGH HE'S GROWN TALLER SINCE I FIRST WRAPPED MY ARMS AROUND HIS TORSO MY HEAD STILL FITS PERFECTLY ON HIS CHEST AND THE WAY HE GENTLY SLIDES HIS FINGERS ACROSS MY SKIN WHEN I'M TUCKED INTO HIS SHEETS AND THE WORDS HE WRITES AND THE WAY HE READS AND HOW HE REMEMBERS TO CHECK ON THE PIZZA ROLLS IN THE OVEN AND HOW HE SLIPS INTO THIS FUNNY UNKNOWN ACCENT AND HE TAPS ON MY FOREHEAD AND I KNOW IT'S A SIGN OF AFFECTION AND HOW HE CAN'T FOCUS ON ONE SUBJECT WHEN HE TAKES LSD OR ECSTASY AND HIS FIXATION WITH WORLD WAR II AND HOW HE SOMEHOW BREAKS HIS PHONE MORE THAN I DO AND HOW YOUR KEYBOARD SEEMS TO BE STUCK IN CAPS LOCK AND HOW YOU PUT YOUR ARM AROUND MY WAIST WHILE YOU TEACH ME HOW TO PLAY YOUR FAVORITE VIDEO GAMES AND HOW YOU MAKE ME FEEL WANTED WHEN YOU CAN'T KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF OF ME AND HOW YOU ALWAYS COMMENT ON YOUR BREATH AFTER YOU SMOKE LIKE I'VE NEVER KISSED KUSH BEFORE AND HOW MUCH YOU LOVE THE BEACH AND THE CLOUDS AND THE WAY YOU TALK ABOUT PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPERIMENTS AND MONKEYS BEING DRENCHED WITH WATER AND HOW YOU'RE ALWAYS "BOUT WHATEVER" AND HOW YOU GET JEALOUS WHEN I SPEND TIME WITH OTHERS AND HOW SCATTERBRAINED YOU ARE AND HOW YOU'RE ALWAYS IN YOUR HEAD AND HOW TERRIBLE YOU ARE AT COMMUNICATION BUT YOU MANAGE TO PUT IT ALL ON PAPER AND TO BE HONEST I'D TAKE YOUR SILENCE OVER ANOTHER'S DULL MINDED NOISE ANY DAY

AND GOD I LOVE THE LITTLE THINGS ABOUT SO MANY PEOPLE
BUT I LOVE EVERY ******* THING ABOUT YOU AND NO ONE COULD EVER MAKE ME LOVE THE WAY MY HEART ACHES THE WAY IT DOES FOR YOU

Strings of wisdom flow through my fingertips
like front-porch-swing storytelling.
The stars are visible through the window tops
as moon eyes stare up at their sisters.

The truth is,
I could listen to you ramble for hours in the backseat of that car.
I listened to you ramble for hours,
just to hear every thought and pun and "but like"
that escaped your once clenched teeth and locked lips,
and after prying open your brain, my jaw was left ajar
in awe of the reality that a shy girl with seafoam eyes
could ever open mine that wide
in such a short amount of time.

The truth is,
I want to dig my hands into your thoughts and pull up roots from the dirt and find that I've got a green thumb.
I want to climb the tallest mountain in Tennessee and have your smile welcome and invite me into your home.
I want to watch your children grow older and want themselves as a mother like their mother did when she wasn't much older.
I want to hear every flirtatious remark dangling from that bracelet of yours clink together as you lift your chai latte from the counter.
I want to question what the time of day is
and wait for your mind to create a clever counter-clockwise comeback that throws mine for a loop and sends me spiraling back down to earth
on the dials of the sun and the mills of the wind.
I want to stop and read every spray-painted sentence on each step of the stairs leading to the perfect amalgamation of essays and creative journals, and analyze the way your cursive gets lazy and then cleans itself up while maintaining an enlightened tone.
I want to venture into abandoned shacks in the middle of the night that are hardly recognizable two seasons later just to find out that it's the wrong house and the open windows mean someone may be home.
I want to see the scribbled out "sandwhich" corrected in red ink.
I want to drink your words and refill and recycle the bottle.
I want to blend the blacks and whites on the palette and create a shiny sensitizing zinc.
I want to be the one who genuinely understands the way you think.

The truth is,
I have this irrevocable desire to listen to music that no one else has ever heard in a pair of headphones until I find a harmony,
and then let it play on the radio for those of us with complexity
to sing to as we stare down the road of an alligator bayou
and become hypnotized by the beat.

"Does this happen often?"
"Yeah, it has been lately. She's probably just on drugs again."
"You think she's on drugs?"
"I mean, just pills, but yeah, probably."
"I thought pills made you chill."
"Not when you don't have them."

How are there people who know her, who aren't in love with her?

Surely, they must be.

And I am nothing but a mess of curls and bones, and she is quirks and laughter and soft lips and everything light in the world.

Why did she choose my hands to caress her?
Why did she choose my breath to align with hers in the night?
Why does she dim herself
with darkness?

When I was a kid, and all of my friends were kids, and all of us kids lived down the same street that I still live on as a not kid that none of my kid friends still live on as not kids, there was a day in the summer, or the spring....
my not kid brain has a hard time conjuring up my kid thoughts, I just remember walking outside and it was so hot
And we fetched our bikes from the shed and walked them to the blacktop only to find the greatest gift nature could bring us: a thousand tiny caterpillars crawling on the road. We couldn't ride our bikes in the street or we would squish them so we dropped them where we stood and did the only thing we knew we should: ran inside and asked mama for the ziplock bags and collected as many as we could. We thought we were saving them from any cars that might need to go down our dead end road. We didn't know what to do with them so we kept them in the bag and left them in my kid friends parents living room, sealed tight so nothing could get to them.
The next morning we went to check on them and the bag was empty.

Looking back now, I realize we probably deprived them of oxygen, starved them of nutrients and space, and probably separated them from their families.

I feel bad about that, but that's not the point. The reason I am recalling this memory and putting it into words is because I've had an epiphany.
They were robbed a chrysalis, they never flew away as beautiful butterflies.
They slept overnight in a bag with many others, waiting to puddle and flutter before they chewed their way through plastic or they died.

What we did as kids to those caterpillars, it's how I love..
Sometimes I find caterpillars in the pits of people's stomachs and my intrigue is spiked like a child's with wonder, but I always pluck the caterpillars before they get too far..

Maybe I'm a secret sleepwalker and I unconciously let them go.
I sure hope so.

cmon
tell me how you really feel
tell me you don't think of me like you used to
tell me you finally see how people get sick of me
tell me you're tired of resting your arm beneath my neck
tell me you're tired of being tired together
tell me again how happy someone else could make you
tell me you hate my ****** rhythm and shaky voice
tell me all of my paintings look like ****
tell me I don't mean **** to you
tell me my words mean nothing anymore
tell me my words mean nothing
please tell me I mean nothing

Things are changing for me, although the seasons this year seemed to not have.
The city of New Orleans will soon have my heart wandering in her streets, and I'll be miles away trying to determine where they lead.
My mistakes are catching up with me and I'll be forced to face the consequences I once always seemed to retread from.
I'm unsure of which the way the wind is blowing, I could never use my thumb to tell,
but I hope it's in the uplifting direction,
dancing in women's skirts, playing leap frog with the leaves, rolling through the sails of some small ship floating out at sea, humming in the giant chimes of city park's oak tree.

I just hope that when you leave, you take the wind inside my soul and carry it into spring.

I find I have so much to say and never the composure to say it.
You should know what you do hurts.
But I'll let you use me because it creates the illusion that I'm wanted.

I'm always accused of some sort of voodoo or magic,
that I possess the ability to make people become
irrevocably infatuated and attached to my presence.

But I think it is those surrounding me that are the ones who are compelling and captivating and mesmerizing and I can't keep up.
I'm burning in thoughts surrounding the idea that I may be intriguing
but I'm never entertaining.

I feel as though I am a sideshow attraction in a ring of circus performers.
The bearded lady and the trapeze swingers;
the human dartboard and the fire dancing singers;
intrigue versus talent and disappointment versus awe.
I'll draw them in for a second,
a quick glimpse of what and who I really am is all
and they tilt their head in confusion and pity and dissatisfaction
when a giant teddy bear down the brightly lit and vividly colored lane catches their eye and they stroll away with wide excited eyes at popcorn and corn dogs and dogmatic persuaders with yellow balloons and the promise of a prize.
The only part I feel I can compare is the feeling that my brain is a contortionist, it twists and folds into itself until it's hardly recognizable.
I am made up of loose joints and a personality that is flexible enough to love any and every one and perhaps that is what is so lovable about me.
However, I'll never be the ring leader. I'll leave that up to the man coaching the nice lady in red parading around on the elephant's back.

I was a coward my whole life.
Maybe I'll make up for it with bravery in ending it.

im not saying i need you but
my headaches get worse when you're not around and the creases in my chapped lips taste slightly bloodier than the cracks of my knuckles and my nails are rugged and angled from my crooked teeth gnawing at the chipped cerulean paint
and i know i always say cerulean wrong because i was never taught how to
and i know i'm clingy and i might love wrong but please forgive me

i was never taught how to

And I just kept thinking, and repeating to myself,
"God we think we're all invincible.
God, we think we're invincible.
God we think we're invincible."
And if there really were a god, he surely would have made us so.

The infatuation begins, one thousand five hundred seventy three miles away from my folded futon mattress on an unfinished floor in a sideways run down house with a gravel driveway and a wonky mailbox, across from a little green-grassed pasture with yellow flowers and "dead end" street signs lining the ditches.

Twenty three hours.
That's not that long when you really think about it.
Twenty three hours.
It's pretty far when you really think about it.

It's only the sand in my hourglass trickling down
over and over
and over and over and over.

(I was going to write the word "over" twenty three times,
but then I thought it might get a little annoying...
**** it; I'm going to do it anyway).

and over and over and over
and over and over and over
and over and over and over
and over and over and over
and over and over and over
and over and over and just
one more time.  

You probably haven't closed your eyes or slept even a grain of that sand. I wonder how many flipped figures found you wondering about me.
It's only the tap of a drumstick to an ongoing metronome left running overnight after the musicians were done with the fun of humming.
You probably daydreamed of me singing lullabies in snow covered trees while your professor went on about 3/4 and music theory.

How many paradiddles until we can finally dance to the beat?

An even better question:
How many more clever titled playlists,
how many more empty sheets,
can I accept before I accept that I could fall right on my feet?
How many grains of sand?
How many metronome beats?

sleep comes most easily with draped limbs like closed curtains
with no room for sunlight to leak through
it is dark here, yes, but the sun has burnt out all the while
I was dreaming of no longer being a demanding lover

self-deprecating thoughts have not plagued me for some time now
but i feel them creeping up on me like spiders in the night
like crying in front of you for the first time in ages and not being able to stop
like really crying, the tears burning as they rolled down my cheeks
and I couldn't tell you why and you just looked at me puzzled
like the realization that I didn't want you on top of me and you slowly retreating
and i couldn't tell you why and i just looked at you puzzled

I don't deserve you or your kindness or your kisses
You don't deserve my sharp passive aggressive remarks or reminders
You deserve a second of breath and I don't deserve the seconds you give to me

I think I fell in love with someone who I should not have fallen in love with.

* the kind of boy who rolls blunts from torn out pages
  of Revelation that once belonged in his father's bible
* the kind of boy who writes his secrets and insecurities
  on cigarettes and then smokes them, leaving only ashes
* the kind of boy who is thirsty for liquid love rather
  than the intangible feeling of intimate emotions
* the kind of boy who waits at the railroad track for
  rushing trains that will never come to take him home
* the kind of boy who firmly believes that destruction
  is a form of creation and if this is the case, he is an artist
* the kind of boy who finds solace and euphoria in dystopia
* the kind of boy who is likely to break my heart in
  hope of healing the broken fragments of his own

and maybe I'm the kind of girl who will let him.

when you bump me in the kitchen I want to cry at your touch
and I don't even know what I want when you look me in the eyes
I watch your back as you walk past me, tears welling while you grab another beer
I wish I could make you laugh but frankly I hate the sound of it now, knowing I only hear it booming from rooms I'm not in
I sit in the dark rooms of this unfamiliar home waiting for you to turn the light on, open the blinds, to sit next to me.
Maybe just us this time,
maybe just my words filling your time.
Is it wrong to crave hands, any hands, any eyes, wanting to be on mine?

Screams from her throat came first
Water from my eyes second
Water from the washer third
Arms around my figure fourth
Shakes and trembling hands fifth
A half present brain
A half organized book shelf
A full hearted ******* the floor
Asking to be heard over the pounding
With the wrong words, wounding.
An unplugged record player
A childish knock on the door
A desperate "please, go play"
A desperate "please, don't go"
A desperate "please, stay"
A shaking hand
A shaking pack of tic tacs
A fight not unlike the others
A car door
An empty hearted ******* the floor

Sometimes I wish that you had chosen her.
Or I suppose, really, that she had chosen you.
So that you'd be with her, the girl that, in hindsight,
now that I'm thinking about it, probably would be really good for you.
Maybe she would take care of you, do everything for you, and not mind or complain the way I sometimes do that bothers you. I'm sorry I do that, I don't mean to make you feel like a burden, it's just heavy sometimes to carry the weight of another and I'm strong but my endurance isn't impeccable.
Maybe she would stay quiet and inside her head, the way you do, so you could both go about your day talking about how ****** the world is but never how ****** you feel, the way I try to do but sometimes can't.
Maybe she'd be okay with being passive, maybe none of her friends would tell her to be more confrontational, maybe you'd consider her courage when she tried to be regardless.
Maybe she wouldn't accuse you of anything because she had every reason to trust you and the world around her. 
Maybe you could trust her enough to let her in your head for a second. 
Maybe she'd do anything for you, like I try to do, and maybe you just might fight to do the same, not so much like you try to do with me.

I feel it building up in me
brick by maddened brick
I felt it breaking down in me
break by bothered break

Slow it down
Soften it up
Let vines grow and make their way through the cracks in the walls and shatter the confinements around you
Let the vines sprout violet soft velvet petaled petunias
Stop and find them
Stop and smell them
Stop and touch them
Stop and study them
Stop and learn how they got that way
Stop and get that way

Feel it growing inside of you
seed by watered seed

tonight's one of those nights where I'd like to sit on a rooftop and smoke cigarettes and speak poetically with strangers

except I never do because I'm afraid of climbing onto roofs because you never know if you might fall through
and don't worry I don't actually talk to strangers either,
each new pair of eyes like snakes when you roll the dice...
and of course I don't smoke cigarettes, I stopped when my niece found out and it crushed her innocent little view of me in her world,

but it just seems like the thing to do in times like those, don't it?

He called me his little orchid, and I pictured him admiring me, all of my colors and twists, my petals and my stem, exclaiming "look at this one! look how beautiful it is! look at the inside, do you see how amazing that is?" and I smiled and swooned and swayed like the little orchids would in the wind and I blushed so hard you'd think I lost my chlorophyll, or that summer was coming to an end, and I wanted to sing like an orchestra of brass and wood winds because the thought of you thinking of me and still seeing me as precious as a flower after all these winters we've seen makes my heart beat and plucks my strings.
I want you to know that you're still sun, my air, my water, and the soil that my roots are planted in. Even in the winter, I only think of the times you shone brightest and eagerly wait for you to smile again.
I know it feels like winter for you right now, but it's spring baby, and I'm growing!
I'm not a bean stalk, I can't take you to the top, but I'm your little orchid, and hopefully,
you'll look over at the one on your window sill and smile knowing that some part of me is growing right there next to you, breathing and taking in everything you're giving me.

So when you're bored, water me, and talk to me, and it might help you breathe a little lighter too.

From one flower to another, I love you.

I look back at those words and wonder if they meant anything, and convince myself they weren't ever written for me anyway.
It's not very hard to do that anyway because of the words later spoken that overshadow and contradict the previous ones.
I have always been in denial, despite the opinions of others, that they were ever there for me.
But after accepting that it's a possibilty, I wonder even more so how you could say such lovely things, then turn around and **** me.

I hope you can write that sweetly again one day and mean it.