an amber bottle full of dark secrets and broken promises
we press our chapped lips against the rim
the burn of the *** is the only fire left in my stomach
the shake of your hands is what i  feel in my bones
mommy taught me how to make a cocktail
before she taught me how to love myself
and long story short  i can make mixed drinks in my sleep
but self care is blacking out in the backyards of strangers

s.s

I hate my life and we
Are one
So do you hate my life or
Hate your own because you are me
We are they and there is not
"one or the other"
in the universe we are also
One with

Who among you to know my game
Wood leg gaggin two good lames
Old man nick’s been burnin dreams
Till I come out, settle in the seams

Purps on the news I duck my head
Home to cookin, feel good dread
I'm in my zone, the throne ceramic
My buddy Nick, he calls panic

Tells me now “come’re you wannit”
I duck flows I’m barely onnit
To pass a day a daily life
Feel fists fapping, fury fright

My "friend" nick ain’t seen him so much
**** come hither hits so blunt
I’m on the floor his sucker punch
Can’t remember my past three lunch

Cereal on the beach
Seeing now that what I preach
Over yonder my future’s bleak
Blue so ocean yet I’m so weak

Call my name again won’t do
It’s not bad I’ll make it through
I’ll see you on the other side
Where lust and beauty don’t collide

There’s a silhouette outside my eyelids and a deep, dark color that rose up out of a dream I had as a child.
There’s a forest green and a slow, methodical movement that suddenly becomes lithe and deliberate under the influence of art.
A small part of me recognized him from the visions I created as a child, but I never thought he’d come in the form of someone I love so much.
The best kind of love-
The kind that stays even when the weather is poor
And the roads are winding,
The real kind.
There’s no romance,
No flowery words,
But just like the man from my made-up narratives as a kid,
He’s sturdy
and he feels real.
I can read him and hear him and feel him even when the lights are low and life gets loud,
And he does just fine no matter what.
He survives.
Despite my desperation to escape the company of every other person,
Frantically crawling back to the solitude of my home,
I hesitate to leave his company.
Because friendship is the finest balm
For the singe of human emotion,
Moonbeams and a night breeze after the severe, summer sun.
That’s the truest kind,
The most authentic kind
Of love.
And when I dreamt man as a young girl,
I thought I’d find him under a jasmine arch,
At the end of the isle.
Instead I found him in a classroom,
And became his best friend.

My father walked me down the aisle,
But my mother held my arm.
He went with me,
But we went not towards the altar,
But towards the door.

My father walked me down the aisle,
And the ***** rang through the church,
Humming through the elaborate crown molding,
Carved by my ancestors.

He went,
Not beside me,
But before me,
And I watched,
As he was illuminated by the bright,
Overbearing,
Texas sun.

My father walked me down the aisle,
But I did not wear white.
My father walked me in silence,
And I shed tears not for a man standing at the altar,
But for the one I would never see again.

My father walked me down the aisle,
And no veil obscured my face.
All eyes were upon me, but not for my pristine beauty,
Instead for my clenched jaw and furrowed brow,
Severe and fierce to distract from my glassy eyes.

My father did not leave me at the end of our walk to sit beside my mother.
She clung to me for support and sobbed breathlessly,
Loudly,
Unavoidably,
And I carried her with one hand,
My sister the other,
And walked towards my future.
A future family,
Not one person more,
But one person less.
I walked,
One final time,
With him.

My father walked me down the aisle,
And I will never forget it.
Hundreds of eyes isolating my family from the crowd,
Slow and muffled sounds drowning in the deafening beat of my heart,
Blurred faces staring,
Black heels clacking against the cobbled path from the church,
The anguished wails of my mother,
The whimpering of my sister,
And the wooden box that glided before us,
Pulling,
A string tied to our patriarch,
The pin key of our family,
Pulled taut and then snipped with the slam of the hearse doors.

My father walked me down the aisle,
Before I had a chance to grow up.
He walked me,
Out of the church,
Away from the altar,
Never to be walked again.

“recovery”
is too romanticized,
it’s not taking a bite,
or skipping a smoke,
it’s relapse and tears,
runs for weeks or running for weeks,
thoughts constantly stirring,
never fully recovered,
never really alone,