Mornings Together

I’m tired of the nights together;
I want the intimacy of watching the rising sun with you

Shapelessness of Love

I am a logical person
I think in polygons and geometry
But you come around and the shapes fall apart
Into meaningless squiggles on a page.
There is nothing more beautiful than the shapelessness of love.

Across Time Zones

My love for you is stronger than my lack of understanding regarding time zones

Dancing at Midnight

Sitting with you is like dancing at midnight;
Quiet, serene, calming, and my favorite thing to do

Eternity

When I think of eternity
Your name comes to mind

If I had to choose whether
To give myself up or get rid of you,
I would be nothing more than a sigh on the breeze

If I had to choose between heatstroke
And losing you,
I’d be on the first plane to the Sahara

If I had to choose between you
And an eternity of life,
My dear, I would choose you

Every single time

First Date

We promised a beach trip to each other
I count down the days, hours, and minutes
Til my release into your arms.

Devotional

These poems are my devotional to you
They’re my way of keeping myself honest
My affirmation that I am yours for however
Long you wish me to stay

We Consume What We Adore

We consume what we adore…
Maybe that is why I am so hungry for snippets of you

Never Look Away

If I could, I would get lost in your eyes
And never look away

Dreamscape

Without you, my dreamscapes are barren and cold.
With you, they are indescribably beautiful and joyous

Your Eyes, In Every Life

I would know your eyes in every life
In every incarnation, I would find you

Keeping Warm

The impatience for the beginning of us
Keeps me warm on cold winter nights

Perhaps it's finally time to let you go
but, god,
it hurts so much to cut you out.

She said that she forgave him

She lied to save him from himself

because the truth was that she couldn't forgive him.

Not after what he'd put her through.

I lie to friends
And family.
I say that I’m okay.
I lie to myself
Saying that I don’t need help.
I lie to you
Saying that I don’t want you as something more.

Is it living?

Or is it just dying slowly?

Children aren't meant to know firsthand of the wars that are fought.
They are not meant to smell of
blood and ash and helplessness.
They aren't meant to be ferocious as feral wolves,
snarling and snapping at anyone that dares to get too close.
They are not meant to have bullets for words,
and knives for hands.
They are not meant to taste of loneliness,
much less of fear and gunmetal.
Children aren't meant to dream of loss
and failure
and sheets of blood that rain down
and paint the buildings
a macabre crimson.
Children aren't meant to become soldiers that fight the wars of their elders.

My mother always ends a phone conversation with ‘I love you.’

And she says that it is because you never know
When someone will be taken from you,
and I think that is true.

But her “I love you’s” have different levels;
One said in exasperation to my brothers
when they’re being particularly much

One said quietly to my sisters
as they drift slowly into their dreamscapes
and as she’s closing their door

One said matter-of-factly to me
when I am having a conversation with her.

It always takes me by surprise, and I know that it shouldn’t, but it does because the last level of her “I love you” is reserved for my father.

It is said, almost as an afterthought at the end of their phone conversations, said with frustration and almost resigned to her lot in life.

“— love you.”

The spot for the “I” is a glaring void of things left unsaid

It has given me a new greatest fear that I will grow so complacent in my relationship, in my life, that I too will end phone conversations with “—love you.”

Perhaps in loving you,

I have finally set myself free.

I'm mirror-like sometimes
reflecting back the faces that I see,
all of the faces and emotions around me

I'm mirror-like sometimes
shattering into fractals,
my own emotions ever-so-fragile

I'm mirror-like sometimes
I show you what you want to see,
cursed forever to agree

I'm mirror-like sometimes
vapid and forgettable,
not inspiring, but rather regrettable

In all of my twenty years of life,
I have been many things.

A daughter
A sister
A friend
A lover

But now, I am no longer my father’s little girl.

My father doesn’t talk to me anymore;
He says that I don’t look him in the eyes,
And he is right, but not for the reason he believes

I am afraid to look him in the eyes
Because I don’t want to see myself reflected in them,
Proof of my failure to separate myself from him,
Proof that I am him and always will be him

I do not want to become my father,
Stuck in a marriage with no love left
Or love that is there
Only because it is supposed to be

I do not want to become my father,
Constantly on the verge of tiredness,
And whether that tiredness is directed at
His family or his life, I shall never know

Because I do not want to become my father
All sharp words and angry edges,
Keeping everyone around him on their toes,
Keeping my head on a swivel to not upset him

I do not want to be my father.
I do not want to make my children feel
as though they will never measure up to
Impossible standards, set way too high

I do not want to be my father,
Telling my daughter that she’s eating too much
And not looking at me enough,
Guilt-tripping her into half-hearted apologies,
Said with tears trembling in her eyes

I do not want to be my father.
I do not want my children to be frightened of me,
Dreading the thought of my arrival home
Waiting in fear of my reaction to something they’ve done

I do not want to be my father.
My home will be a gentle home,
Peaceful and quiet,
With no rage-filled shouting matches

I do not want to be my father,
Wondering where he went wrong with his daughter,
That she would stand in front of him, angry tears on her cheeks,
Screaming at him that she wishes that she were dead

I do not want to be my father.
Struggling to catch up with the times,
Grudgingly supportive of the daughter that is different,
The daughter that loves men and women,
But only because he has to be

I do not want to be my father
But I wish that sometimes,
I could be his little girl again,
Back when everything was ok
And it still felt like he loved me

I do not want to be my father,
But sometimes,
It feels as though
I will never be anything more

And I guess we were never anything more than star-crossed kids
that never truly learned how to love.

You ****** me over one too many times...

I still care, but

I'm done waiting for something that's not gonna happen.

Icarus laughed as he fell;
The golden ichor streaming
From his nose, his mouth,
His spun tresses behind him
Fluttering as angel wings do.

Icarus screamed as he plummeted
to the earth; melted wax
scalding his shoulders where
his wings once were; broken
feathers fluttering in his firey wake.

Apollo mourned as Icarus fell,
not a sound issued from his
doomed lips. His wings, torn
and broken and burned, danced
behind him, more lively than
Icarus would ever be.

Our love looks like reverence
As I raise my hands in surrender,
Waiting for the holy fire to wash me clean

Our love looks like reverence
And your name falls from my lips,
A desperate plea for your touch

Our love looks like reverence
And I am on my knees in front of you
Worshipping your body as it deserves to be

Lately I’ve felt as though every little sound and feeling and smell and sight is grating at my nerves and chipping away at my sanity.

My clothes feel constricting and too loose and scratchy and smooth and not right

My ears are full of constant ticking and ringing and noise

My skin wraps my frame too tightly and I want to rip it apart and off of me but then I’d be cold and miserable

It’s all too much and everything is loud and jarring and I feel frenzied and too stuck and not stuck enough and all I want to do is jump in front of a van because then everything would
Just
Be
Quiet.
Blessed and sought-after and evasively, quiet.

Perhaps someday we could've worked.

And maybe

That day was not today.

That's human nature.
Isn't it?
To act like we're
the gods of yore,
those lustful, flawed gods from before?
We play with the feelings of others,
never realizing that we impact them more than it seems.

I bet you thought that this was about Valentine's Day...
but instead, it's about reality:
how we bleed for those we love,
how we bleed for our friends
our family
our acquaintances.
But then, Valentine's Day comes along,
masquerading as a solution,
a promise for things getting better,
but instead,
we wind up dead or worse,
our wrists painted red and
we're crying in the corner
just wishing we were
dead.

I’ve seen myself in love poems from broken boys. I’ve seen myself in the raging ocean, the gusting wind, the blazing heat.

I’ve seen myself in small wildflowers forcing their way through cement, small spots of beauty and tenderness in this broken world.

I’ve seen myself through the cracked mirror in the bathroom and the shattered glances shot at me across rooms.

I found myself in your arms, in the love that you give unconditionally, in the tears in your eyes when you look at me.

I found myself in you.

Does it have to be this way?
Why did you go through with it?
You said you were leaving,
But I never really believed you.
Why would I believe you
When you said that you were done with me?
Because who believes those words?

Who believes
That the one they love will leave?
Who believes that the one they love will leave
In flurries of frenzied apologies,
In the slam of a door,
At the merest whisper of dissent in the ranks?

But, look at me now,
You two-faced, lying, cheating little boy.
Watch me rise from the ashes,
A phoenix reborn out of the pain you caused me,
A seedling out of the flames of your fire.

That’s how we were described:
Fire; unhealthy; too much, too fast.
And maybe we were, but God,
We were golden while we lasted.

But the gold sheen always fades.
The beautiful days must come to an end.
As do all the nights that we used to spend wrapped in the other’s sweet scent.

Because honey, we were never meant
To last forever, I guess.

Nothing ever really is.

Why can't I be someone's forever?

"Why can't you be normal?"

"Why can't you feel emotions like every other human being?"

"Why do you have to be so sensitive?"

"Why did you say that?"

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"Why can't you just. Be. Normal?"

We stretch out our hands,
Waiting for salvation.

We watch the dripping sands
Of the hourglass with poignant resignation.

Our society demands
Of us to disregard those in isolation.

But the isolation is the only thing that understands
That this life is really nothing but eternal damnation.

I see you
In the light, in my reflection,
In the clouds.
I see you in the clouds
and where dreams go to die

The mirrors and I start to shatter
I never believed that I was worth it
Nothing else seems to matter


The colors around me blur
I blink back more tears than I’d like to admit
The mirrors and I start to shatter

My hidden scars seem to quiver
All your words bruise me when they hit
Nothing else seems to matter

My shoulders start to shiver
You consider me a hypocrite
The mirrors and I start to shatter

My words trip over each other and slur
I wish sometimes, that I could just quit
Nothing else seems to matter

The ugly thoughts begin to stir
Everything seems to be starlit
The mirrors and I start to shatter
Nothing else seems to matter

Two plus two is four

One plus one equals two

And perhaps it's also true

That love is equal to me plus you.

Countdowns have always seemed bittersweet to me..
The steady ticking away of time
The trickle of sand through the hourglass.
The fading of connections not curated.

I’ve always been morbidly aware of my own doomsday clock,
Slowly beating, decreasing, releasing my
Seconds into the atmosphere around me,
As I wait, sometimes impatiently, for it to hit zero.

Some days, I hope for my hourglass to run dry,
And while I know that that isn’t a healthy mindset,
Some days it is all that I can do to not hurry it along.

Not to take that revolver in my dad’s lockbox,
Not to take those pills in the medicine cabinet,
Not to take that rope and the one wobbly stool
that has sat at our bar for the past five years…

Just beckoning me.
Just wanting me to take that final step
into sweet, sweet oblivion.
But.

If I do take that final step..
Who would be there to pick up the pieces for them?
To clean up the mess that this disgusting body left behind?

Who would be there to finish my paintings,
To sing my unsung list that is ever-expanding,
To write these words that have seemed so forced these past months?

Who would be there for them, when I could not be?
Someone, I am sure, but I have been told that I am irreplaceable,
And while I may not believe that,
I am scared of leaving a mess behind
That my mother cannot bring herself to clean up.

I am scared of leaving behind a mess that would irrevocably break my father,
A mess that would torment my brothers,
A mess that my sisters would never even remember.

And maybe..
Maybe I am scared of the call of oblivion..
Or scared of the unknowingness of it all, rather.

Or perhaps I am tired of thinking
of myself as a mess to be cleaned up,
Nothing more, and nothing less.

And maybe
That is all I need
To survive one more day.

When is it all right to let go?
The waves of despair are so
Strong, they force me under the
Water of my own heavy tears.
Why does no one hear my desperate
Cries for help to survive this
****** up life?

It’s to fall,
With your heart on your sleeve
It’s to fly,
Your hair ruffled by the breeze
It’s to call,
And have faith and believe
It’s to trust,
That they will let you breathe.
It’s to choke,
As the tears stream down your cheeks
It’s to tear,
As your heart is slowly squeezed
It’s to leave,
Although you’re ripping at the seams
It’s to die,
Although your lungs still seem to breathe.
It’s to cry,
Even though you assure that you’re fine
It’s to jump,
Even if you’re still healing
It’s to smile,
While you’re trying to forget
It’s to fall,
With your heart on your sleeve.

Ephemeral (adj). Lasting for a very short time.

Ephemeral (adj). His love for me; my love for myself.

Ephemeral (adj). The summers of my mind.

Ephemeral (adj). The amount of time I had with him.

Oblivion (n). The state of being unaware of what is happening around you.

Oblivion (n). The state that I live in.

Oblivion (n). The state that I entered when with him.

Oblivion (n). When I can't seem to get out of my head.

Written word used to be an
extension of my mind; my
       thoughts imprinted onto paper
   in neatly formed sentences.

but now                              
they are jagged
uneven.                    
         tired.
                      torn.
malformed.                    ­            
                               incomprehensible.

I can't seem to put the words
together into sentences that  
have meaning.                      

The razor edge of my words
cut me, bleed my body dry
until there's nothing left    
but dust.

“This isn’t working.”
What a funny way to say that you’re leaving
A phrase that is arguably too simple for the mess it leaves behind

“It isn’t your fault.”
A cliche if I’ve ever heard one,
And trust me, I’ve heard many over the years

“I wasn’t ready.”
A funny thing to say
When you know at the beginning of anything
Whether you’re ready for it or not

And… “I don’t have time.”
And that’s what it all comes down to,
Isn’t it?

You didn’t have time to deal with me
Didn’t have time to communicate
Didn’t have time to put in the work

You didn’t want to MAKE time
Because I guess you never really
Cared about me in the first place

Darling, we thought we were golden.
Honey we thought that we had it made.
But my dear, what they don't tell you,
is that the tongue is the sharpest blade.

Darling, we thought we were free,
free from the failures of others our age.
You called us love, my dear,
but if it were love...
If it were love then maybe- just maybe-
I'd want to still be here.

Darling, you called us perfect,
but the walls only hold so much back.
Love, you called me your light in the dark,
but I was eventually covered in black.

Sometimes I feel like I'm useless
like I'm dying
like I'm
            
              f
                    a
          ­              l
                          l
                     ­       i
                            n
                          ­   g
                                                               ­            down into an endless abyss that is housed in my mind.
But it's fine because I don't show that I'm falling apart;
I look like I am fine.
The truth is, however, I'm crying behind my laughter,
dying behind my smile.
I'm slowly fading,
disintegrating,
blowing away in the harsh winds
that whistle throughout
my empty mind.

It's so hard,
to be the perfect daughter
to be the cause of their laughter
to be the sun in an endless black sky.
It's so hard,
to be a good example
to always be the shoulder to cry on
when all that you want to do
is just ******* die.

We hoist our masks,
Struggling to keep our smiles.
We hold our own hands,
Wanting the affection that proves someone actually cares.
We struggle to live
We struggle to love
We struggle to laugh at ourselves.
We love to fake being fine,
But we don’t really love it,
We do it out of necessity.
We speak, but our words are muffled
by the lies that we tell that make up our mask
That seems to hold up under society’s scrutiny.

And perhaps it's because you're gone

that I'm made of stronger stuff

than I was before.

I am not a good person to fall in love with.
I will imprint my lips onto yours until they're the only thing you can taste.
I will trace indelible shapes onto your skin and laugh when you try to wash them off.
They will never come off.
I will take you to parks and waterfalls and bookshops,
and I will make sure that you cannot go anywhere without thoughts of me running endlessly through your head.
I will love you so completely that anyone else's will seem dim by comparison.

I think I am scared to love.
I’m not used to being the vulnerable one;
The one that stays;
the one that is brave.

I do not know how to love.
I don’t know how to let my walls down
To let my fears out
To put my heart on my sleeve.

I want to love.
God, I want to love,
but my hair smells of war
and running and running.