And we never stop being girls at heart.
Even at 80, in the nursing home bathroom mirror,
I will probably stop
and stare, at the parchment-faced woman,
with wrinkled cheeks and drooping eyes,
and wonder where the acne faced girl,
with bright round eyes,
has hidden herself away.
I will smile at the young, handsome, CNA
as he passes in the hall, wondering
what he would think of me at 18.

I believe
when it all boils down to it
the majority of us
would rather have nothing
with someone
than everything
with no one.

I can see your shadow coming closer in the dark
Growing like a tumor while I slowly fall apart
Nothing like a moment to remind you that you're weak
Grazing on the bits of truth you never fought to keep
Yet somewhere underneath the skin of what you have become
There exist the rudiments of silences to drum
But how do you identify a peace you cannot see
And put your trust in every part invisible to me
I am not the one who claimed your body as my own
So I will sit here ripping all the stitches we have sewn
And as the holes expose themselves the light begins to dance
Gradually consuming, letting go of what I can't

There came a night when everything I never knew I kept
Escaped my skin, a whisper's breath - you held me and I wept
And somewhere in the time it took for me to settle down
The simple act of being calm seemed all the harder now
From then a salty kind of rain would daily burn my skin
And multiply the passageways through which I'd let you in
I needed them to flood enough for me to let you out
Create the kind of waterfall that made a single route
And as you'd drift away from me, return the strength I lack
Return to me a state of mind I want to set on track
Within the absence you'd supply I'd shed my weary gaze
And take another step toward the frame for which I'm made

They say red roses symbolize love,
and that every rose has it thorns
But has it ever occurred to you
that red roses -
despite their beauty -
Can hurt you?

An empty carcass,
beaten to death.
Left for dead,
in the concrete streets.

Cracked and all dried up,
it follows the breeze,
like autumn leaves,
dead and yet dancing.

The ground will open someday,
swallow you whole.
The sky is black as coal,
your soul will wither.

Like the carcass, you will die,
rise from your sleep,
deep underground,
but for now you suffer sin.

Your childish lies have nothing of a true meaning
because you never saw what truly went on inside my mind.
The cogs were turning, but the wheels got stuck in the muck
that you had left behind when you decided that it was time to bid me adieu.
That child inside me broke
Like the Bay Lake dam that came crashing and tumbling down,
the waters swirling into the ever after.
Leaving me behind, alone, with the lonely company of the silt and the sand.
And then, I wept.