and now i’m
chasing lovers that other people want,
crying over my hideousness,
drowning my skin in
liquid thinner than blood,
testing my limits of pushing too far.
you see,
i saw him once across the room
and his eyes burnt holes through mine.
i know such a thing cannot be done
and cannot be mine.
i spoke to him as long as i could
when you were not looking,
i’m so selfish,
i think he steals glances my way,
but his heart is without a doubt empty
and unlike a haven,
but i cannot stop smiling when he laughs at me
and it’s a sickness that plagues me.
his shadow i try to chase
will vanish when i touch it,
and i want to love you longer
and stronger;
no lover could do such a thing as you.

on the corner, there’s a woman.
and she’s a mother to the small things,
a soldier on the battlefield of life.
she loses herself in the flames that
engulf her and
she wishes she was a real poet
who knew how to summon words.
she wishes she was chosen,
just once, but the world
she loves does not love her back
and she cannot convince it to.
someone else’s bones seem stronger,
less brittle, unkempt but beautiful.
the curls on her head move like
the waves
but the words on the page
do not speak back to her
and the candle blows out
the evening closes in
with its unbridled attachment
and she’s alone with the darkness,
making a home in its skin.

feel that one morning, i’ll forget your light,
wake up dead in a dying world
stop stomaching the night
that spins its ballerina feet
upside down on the ceiling
and with its mouth it mutters
words that i cannot speak
i’ll wake up without feeling
with tears staining the pillowcase,
lose the melody of hymns once given,
know to every ceremony i’ll be late
when the soft footsteps lull
dispersing into the dark,
i’ll forget the gentleness
that once lived inside my heart
a heart that became a wasteland
an exile for evils never committed
a world where once someone forgets you,
it cannot be remitted.
when that morning comes,
when the morning dove will mourn
something unborn that is already dying
i’ll bury my lungs in the grave you dug
i’ll destroy what we built
until i’m forever wounded in love.

you know i’ve exhausted the idea of not being your friend.
remember when we were close and little girls
who thought they would cohabit when they were older
and weren’t we a mess with our sleepovers and jokes?

you know i’ve grown tired of being bitter and ashamed.
the blame game can only keep me untamed for so long.
remember when the growing pains struck, at least i did,
and our horizons were broadening on opposite sides of town?

you know i’ve gotten sick of the want to ignore.
remember how our mothers and fathers used to speak
and they didn’t stop out of anger or disdain,
so nor should we.

you know i’ve grown out of the resentment.
remember how it used to fall to the floor until i used it as a weapon
to inflict upon you the same hurt you caused me?

you know i’ve exhausted the idea of dying on this hill.
remember when we used to run down yours
or wish to sled instead,
and how the snow was streaked with brown sticks,
as we found little trinkets left behind and kept them as our own?

you know i’ve forgiven every minor error.
remember how we said we’d know each other until we were old,
forgetting kids and just spending our time together,
how we’d never be separated by the roughs of changes?

you know i’ve tired the idea of writing poems for you that you’ll never read,
knowing i’d dedicate myself to you again in a second
but being unsure if you would ever do the same.

does it take all of me
all of me
me out of all people
to realize the nakedness? that i’m
bearing my soul for the heck
of it? for some “asylum”
built for the pleasure of others?
should i stand straight up,
laugh like i’m confident,
own the naked
parts of myself,
dance for the sake
of it, blow the horn?
live like i’m sick, live like
a parasite, going from
door to door, searching for cracks
and crevices to slip under,
sniff with the nose i forget
about all the time,
live like there’s more?

i’m alone on new year’s eve,
starved of life,
been living off of fleeing thrills.
i’ve been hungry,
lacking the flavor that lingers
on my tongue.
completely distraught,
all up in my head like i owe myself a debt.
the new year’s eve moon is absent,
but i need her;
she understands the length of my despair,
and she places hope in my palm.
nothing along the horizon,
just the vague glow of the Christmas lights from the passive neighbors.
unsure of what new year dawns,
if this one
will knock me off my feet,
waltz with me until daybreak
touches my cheek,
or leave me astray on a bustling city street
where the largest emptiness isn’t even in my own twisted heart.
and perhaps this year
will taint me,
paint me multicolored,
until my own shade of individuality cannot be seen.
fragile or elusive,
a patient lover,
a reckless ******,
a kiss that stays for longer than thought.
bigger shoes to fill,
new attitudes to convey,
new deals to follow through on,
old ones that have never been finished,
losing the fears of the past ages
that burned
down towns, left them flat.
if the new year unfolds like a film reel
with an unreliable narrator,
i’ll likely fail to look up at the moon,
lose my direction,
start believing the superstitions
with all my soul.
don’t leave me stuck on a bench
at the kitchen table,
writing instead of letting the world handle the anxieties for a while.
leave me alone on the edge of
a new platform
that makes feet sink past their comforts,
ankle deep in something i cannot control or hold with both hands or penetrate.
there may be new avenues to walk down
just to turn back around again in,
kinds of sabotage that
only i know how to bring upon the only thing control can control.
and new year,
don’t leave me alone no more,
i never wanted to be afraid,
watching the moon disappear like
all good friends do,
and have a stapled tongue
so that i cannot speak for those
who wish to
be heard
by someone,
anyone.

i’ve known war-less times
or the war didn’t leave its red mark of dried blood behind,
cleaned up the evidence nice.  
i’ve known wars that only hold weight in my mind,
imaginary bullets hitting imaginary soldiers,
the war leaves the skeleton of my body
in a ditch.
the forests are chopped down,
the memories are lost entities of ourselves.
i once knew how to love,
or the quiet meaning of it,
but all i know now
is barbed wire, machines without souls
moving on their own.
how do i find peace in the silence,
in the icy wintertime of gloom?
how can i remember the shoes of the dead,
the life they never knew?
i recall something,
that stings just like a memory,
the lost joy of a child,
the ending to the bitter tragedy.
knowing the war is too much to handle
for one simple child of peace.