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DElizabeth Mar 3
cherry-vanilla soda instead of strawberry vanilla

i drew a heart next to my belly button in navy ink

he never asked me how my day was.

i heard the geese fly by at midnight, peculiar but lovely

the air smelled of october

october: hay, orchard, football games that ended a week or two ago, bittersweetness, and fine droplets suspended in the atmosphere

desserts taunt and temp me but i stay away for now.

easter is not on april fool's day this year

but it's still His best trick yet.

my fingertips dry and raw from flipping through so many pages

she licks my hands until they're clean

"death, he is not mean."

i rearranged my vanity, displayed my new perfume

bought myself flowers to lighten up my sanity

i couldn't see the moon tonight, is that why there's been no gravity?

no gravity for the thoughts

i wish i could say they come & go as they please but they never really go.

i'm thinking about those little white pills again.

sleeping dust: lavender, chamomile, tonka, benzoin...soft like dandelion, smooth like milk slipping down silk

the childhood bird coos and suddenly, i feel better

spring is still cold but warm.

i want to be the sun, i want to be the breeze...

i want the monarchs & swallowtails, the lawn mowers & never-ending birdsongs...

today we laughed as hard as we could, "mission impossible style"

a love letter lost, laying on the ground

anonymous but sacred.

i wish it would feel like it did all the time.

i don't know what happened.

the ambulance screams.

i lay blinking in the moon-less dark.

my thighs warm against my stomach.

but for the first time, i know the only one who can free me, is me.
DElizabeth Mar 1
my head was pounding with nothing, nothing but everything and nothing but everything all
at once, all at once the revolving door revolves again, no revolver to my head, no escape and no
soft bed, i thought my head was in the clear i thought everything had turned to nothing but is
nothing ever in the clear? i know, now i know there is no trigger to pull but the one that’s
already inside my head, inside my head the monsters wake, they taunt they pull they push they
prowl, preying on the “mind-killer”, fear, fear is what i fear, it eats it gnaws it rips it digs
a hole, a spiral hole, a hole with ridges to craft illusion that i’m burning bridges, when i am
actually building it stronger, solidified, worried, i make a frenzied dash out of the brief opening, the
opening that teases a sweet escape a sweet brain a sweet artery a sweet lung a sweet forever
that goes on forever until everything becomes nothing, there is no escape no escape from this
revolution this mind-killer this past this pattern this pool, pool of blood, pool of the same old
stab same old loud eyes same old breathlessness same old heart-race same old panic same
old irrational-rational darkness same old thought-spaghetti same old doubts same old destruction
same old replay of dagger-words same old over and over same old everything same old nothing
(sonnet structure unseen in this format)
DElizabeth Feb 27
i bite the skin hanging off of my thumb with ladybugs in my hair.

last year, my mom made a wreathe of green and pink hydrangeas that she grew on the side of the house. they're dried up now.

i promise i'll make up for all the years i was supposed to be kissing you instead of them.

my eyes glaze over with euphoria from knowing i will soon douse my whole self in childhood.

ten years ago my father's day gift to my father was moving 2,429 miles away...

the sea turned into lakes, and lost it's salt and starfish.

i sigh heavily as i weave through the cars, another seven hours ahead of myself, and hold my breath as i walk through his cloud of cigarette smoke as he says, "you just coming in?"...

california hasn't forgotten about me...it waits patiently for me knowing i would always return
|
return to it's dusty air and beige dry grass, shriveled in my palms after i picked them out from the cracked ant-infested dirt as i sat "criss-cross-applesauce".

it waits patiently...i wait impatiently...


the mountains watched over me through every black-top-scraped knee and monterey sticky-fingered ice cream cone.

the seals slept soundly on the sun-heated rock beneath the obnoxious seagulls, unbothered by the tide-splash.

SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK
|
KINGS CANYON
|
DINKY CREEK
|
YOSEMITE


the redwoods and i are related by blood, but they never believe me when i tell them. i can scream it until i am black and blue.

my hair looks like night in the evening, chocolate in the day, and becomes fire in the sun.

dopamine limbs, serotonin mind, and oxytocin heart.

i was never impressed by blue eyes until mine met yours.

eye-contact is a language in and of itself. but few are fluent.

i arrive at you fully made up and exactly how i want to be...
|
wisp and bisk rub off onto your clothes and skin as you love me whole.
|
i leave as more myself, seen raw and authentically bashful.
and to my surprise, i leave feeling more beautiful than before...

this morning i had to look up the definition of "LONELY" because i forgot what it meant.

(a week later) this morning i remember what being lonely feels like.

medical supplies is becoming my unfortunate attributed aesthetic, i fear.

i have never been particularly athletic but i would swim across all fifty seas for you if you needed me.

walking with purpose but mindlessly, all others only blurs i didn't bother to distinguish, daydreaming of your black shirt scrunched into my fist-

i notice she was asking me a question ! begged to know what smelled of indulgence and unidentified nostalgia...
|
: vanilla, salted caramel, saigon cinnamon, heavy cream, sandalwood, orgeat, ice cream shop.
|
she told me it fits me perfectly...sweet but subtle...niche but noticed.

eleven minutes left and feeling very corporate as i look out the third-floor window. neighboring building's & office windows.

the sky was cobalt but my skin was pale.

and you don't say much in reciprocal anymore...are you tired, my love?...

i cried when you told me you loved me.

much-anticipated days of strawberry milk mustaches, laughing until our stomachs ache, and sun-slapped cheeks.

eye watery, pigeon-toed in ***** shoes on the pale checkered floor. she's a summer baby.

i tell him i have known him for four years now, in asl from across the market (in my head, over and over and over again)

i only half listen as she tells a story of a woman who was obsessed with saffron-colored fabric. the other woman argued that the thread wasn't saffron, but red. in which she then stood corrected as the other explained how the water turns orange when the thread was dipped into it.

i miss her and her purple hair. i only pay her a visit when my bangs poke my eyes every morning before i curl them.

a box of chapbooks sat upon his desk touching a ripped manila envelope full of printing press letters.
|
"S"

between debates about jam v. jelly and strawberry v. grape jam/jelly, we dance as friends and friends only this time..

i recall, last summer tasted of cookies too-sweet, but this time it'll be just right.

our star beams & casts shadows onto your sheets. your eyes ablaze and your hair afire. i won't kiss you gently when you look that beautiful.

they told me they'd teach me how to swim, then left me drowning in their pretentiousness.

you held me down but i was set free . . .
|
you're more gentle than i thought you were.
|
it actually hurts thinking of you kissing someone else.

"she used to wear that shirt a lot." my mother told me. she deserved a life full of joy.

BRUISE COUNT: 15

BRUISE ORIGINS: WORK, WORK, WORK, WORK, WORK, WORK, WORK, WORK, WORK, SLEEPING, SLEEPING, ??, ??, ??, ??

_ _ _ _    _ _ _ _ COUNT: 5

_ _ _ _    _ _ _ _ COUNT ORIGINS: LOVE

they don't know the valley the way i do. but i hope they will.

i take up as much space as i possibly can to feel more comfortable.
i only end up feeling more vulnerable. retreat or proceed

tears of fear when eyes should be closed.

i watch her weeping with poor statues of woeful beautiful women
with nameless faces and bare ******* not-quite covered by chiseled cloth. modesty.

my cheeks are flushed as glitter mixes with salty tears, making my skin itchy, raw, bare...

i lean over the vintage sink, peering deeply into the mirror in a dimly lit bathroom of someone i only met once before...

when i was younger i always thought that it was impossible to die in a church. i thought that being inside of it made us
INVINSIBLE . . .

when i was younger, i never really thought about how
birthday cakes don't only have to be "birthday cake" flavored
|
meyer lemon-raspberry, chocolate-cinnamon, quadruple-chocolate, key lime-blueberry-strawberry, carrot, german chocolate, red velvet !

the cars in the review mirror made a total eclipse.

you are the softest color i have ever touched.
and...
you still know me better than most, even if you don't know my favorite ice cream flavor.

logopoeia of ellipses.

i will know the touch of the rays, the slimy backs of 𓆏 after the rain,
and the sting from stepping on chipped shells in the wading water . . . . .
DElizabeth Feb 27
sweet churns sour.

stable now shakes.

sun into somber.

night seeps into day until they become one.

curtains drawn.

sunless skin.

sleepless eyes.

increased to 20mg.

little white tablet, taken once daily.

CAUTION

world in swirls.

lay down lay down . . .

can't stay awake...

don't want to be awake...

it hurts . . .

stomach befriends the throat

befriends the mind, befriends the mouth.

i want to collapse...

it takes getting through hell to be happy.

and the worst part is, i'm not sure if it's worth it.
DElizabeth Feb 27
the sun
kissed me
as the
night's knife,
unsympathetic, honed, & deafeningly-silent,
took me...
took me
to the headstone
like ebenezer
on christmas eve...
i knew what
i was getting myself
into
but i dove in
anyway. . .
DElizabeth Feb 27
pale collarbones
gentle and subtle
the hint of fabric softener
flawlessly woven into his black t-shirt
the way his fingers twitch
and his breathing deepens
with a heavy head
when he's sleeping
makes my heart-rhythm quicken
and lip-corners rise
to the sun
to the stars my arms reach
to meet my real self
my real happiness
my real place
my real soul
my real morning
and ⋆.ೃ࿔*:・
a tumbleweed crosses our path
i had mistaken it for a skunk
but i always think of you
as the moon grows
frightening and blood-orange
the tides rise
like the chocolate and shrimp
in my tummy
with the butterflies
he put there
he stays
he leaves
but he still stays
right where i want him
right where i left him
right where we left
we left the past
but we still talk about it
but it doesn't matter now
now
now i want the sun
i want the stars
i want the salt in the sea
i want all the desserts
i want all the bites
i want all the skies
i want all the bugs
all the breeze
not the breeze
(it makes me angry)
all the redwood trees
and all the leaves
before they fall
so i won't fall
unless it's into him
into him is what i see
and what i see is
light
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