The best poems are all about
loss and pain and suffering.
It feels more natural to write a poem
about a long lost memory,
Or a love that never worked.

Poets aren't allowed to be happy.
They’d run out of material to write about.

The words
content and happy
in the same sentence as the word
I'm,
feels like your tongue
never sitting right in your mouth,
like teeth getting in the way
when making out
like an itchy throat,
not going away even after coughing a fit.

The phrases
You are and my boyfriend
can't be a real sentence
like how
unicorns and fairytales
don't exist.
They just feel like
two jigsaw pieces
from different parts of the puzzle
forced to sit beside each other.

The word love
just doesn’t resonate
with the beat of my heart.
Maybe because
my heart stopped beating
a long time ago
and my brain had to carry the workload
so I think twice as much as I should
synonyms?
I overthink.

I may be the only poet
who doesn’t want to be happy;
a ******* clinging to heartbreak,
and loss and pain and suffering.
because it’s easier to let heartbreak
wrap myself in its familiar arms
than to experience an adventure
with happiness wrapped in mine.

He’s probably not everything I’ve ever wanted
Pompous and overbold, he shines too bright,
Like he’s some star that refuses to die,
An insignificant blinking wanting to conquer the universe.
It hurts to watch him,
a fragile twinkle who’s so desperate to encompass his
Struggles, to survive, to not fall apart to his weaknesses.
He believes “talent is something you make bloom”
Obsessive, compulsive, the only things he makes bloom are
The tired lavenders under his eyes
and angry blues on his knees, the colors fading and reappearing
Remind me of when days turn into nights, nights into days.
Reckless and confident, he makes me want to punch him
He’s a train wreck happening, a shooting star hurling through space,
When I find him, he’ll be in pieces, and I’ll have to hold him together
He’s a constant motion, an existence that weighs like the whole world when he leans his forehead onto mine, and I tremble in his arms because I can’t stop him
He hides his daily torture through high-pitched whines and flashy smiles,
As if he’s the center of the universe, when all he is
is matter being absorbed into a black hole.
Pretentious and annoying and troublesome and stupid and dumb and
more than enough
I gravitate to him, he keeps me afloat
When I stare into his eyes
I see galaxies
When I hold his hands
Supernovas form
When he wraps me in his chest of insecurities,
I feel the planets align
When he kisses me,
I know a stellar collision has happened.
If that isn’t enough proof,
My heart, in all its stardust, a living form of space,
Pulses and radiates, in sync with the universe’s heartbeat,
A steady affirmation that yes,
He’s not everything I want
But he’s everything I need

There are men
with loud voices

I've been taught
to fear since birth.

If the intermittence
of skin flashing between
two articles of clothing is
where seduction occurs

then where is the
****** gaping cloth
of a yell?

Is it in the cavernous tongueless space
of parted lips: in some silent inky
strident echoing taste
or
in the tightness of vocal
chords pulled taut, the strain of
raised forehead and neck veins?

There's a weight in
my chest like a weight
in his bed, heavy and
unsatisfied and
thinly veiled.

I think somehow
the look on my face
must be a pleasing design:

a familiar retraceable
state: a reminder that
I don't mind him,

I know my place:
in a small, quiet space,
in his arms when its late,
on the drip of the spit on the tip of
his tongue: a flash of flesh over pale teeth:
a site of intermittence: in a hesitation

a fearful hesitation

Blindsided,
like being struck
by lighting from behind.

Or a car that decided
to ignore the stop sign.

I went through the windshield.
Wrong place, wrong time.

And now here,
I remain. Broken
before I even knew
what hit me..

I could have seen it coming,
but sometimes, we choose to be blind.

So how can this make anything easier
Under country night sky’s brightly lit
Digital fire burns through the skin
And all that’s left is hollow bones, empty soul
Found a way to casually converse this illusion
Hoping for a place to make it through the night
Dance away, fall into a rustic hurricane
Never able to proceed, much obliged company
Shell of ourselves as I ache for this bar room fix
Its easy when the clouds have broken from the wind
These meager minds keep sleep a luxury
How do we move through these chemical days?
Keep a promise, keep the shadows at bay
Wash the courtyard, clean the masquerade
As these trucks pull up for blue collar hands
Those drinks need pouring, those heads need care
Shell of ourselves as I ache for this bar room fix
Its easy when the clouds have broken from the wind
Its easy when the distance between settles in
And when the dreary mornings speak uncertainty
Ready fuels and coffee made to play
All for not, the sun still shines away
Speculation masks an exchange for another day

I've seen the way
Your eyes glaze
                  twinge
                  sparkle
      ov­er her presence
And I become
invisible

All I want
      is to be her