my sweet girl, you have broken me
in two, in three,
in a thousand shattered pieces
blowing in the wild winds.
i would like to love the impossibility of you
shamelessly diving into the body of water
that is you.

my sweet girl,
there will be no one left out there to
doubt you.
you'll be understood by those you
respect the most,
loved completely by the world that tossed
and turned you
like a bobbing ship on the open seas.

my sweet girl,
you'll be singing up tempo songs,
dreaming broadway dreams.
you'll be happy and without liver disease.
the panic will fall off your bones,
leaking into the clear shallow streams.

why, sweet girl, must you waste such a
beautiful existence hating yourself?
why must you deny yourself the love
you truly deserve?
why worry your mother to death?
oh, sweet girl,
why must you contain yourself for those
you have never met?
oh, sweet girl, when i saw you crawl out
of your cocoon, i wept,
for the change that would only make a greater world,
was finally appearing.

when the wind whistles through,
poking, prodding,
doesn't even see
every minor infraction, even after plentiful inspection
in that it has touched me more than anyone,
has known which direction it would blow my hair
in that in no time has it made assumptions
nor presumed
only moved
about with a firm motion.
that just the other day, anger had gotten the best of me,
wishing the wind would stop reminding me of my existence
in that the bitter cold reminded me of every thought
that had been digging at the surface of my skin
and the wind did not know that i had not wanted
to be understood
in that moment.

i desired to be misunderstood,
a presence as unkempt,
as thoughtless, yet tender,
yet warm,
yet violent,
yet soft,
being able to know
the depth of someone's skin--their hair that stands on edge,
each scar and all its painful attachment,
each memory they've kept hidden,
that for some reason stay dancing on top;
and i stayed dancing
as the wind whistled
and
told me of my reasons
and didn't laugh
at a single one.

the weak have never been strong
or maybe they’ve been strong too long,
holding on
to something that makes them quiver.
being loved,
does it feel impossible when the night swallows you whole and spits you up?

has it been love this entire time,
this entire period of sulking in haziness?
there are saviors on each corner
singing pretty lies
but they’ll never save me as you had.
there’s been apprehension
since the dawn of time
but this time,
i just wanted you to be sure of something.

the weak have never been strong;
never have i been able to lift myself off the edge of the cliff.
i’m extending both arms to you
as if you’ll save me once and once again
a masterpiece strewn on ***** carpet,  
a death rattle heard from the backyard.

my lungs do not know love,
but they understand fear.
nothing is meant to be.
i turn to dust.
i hear sirens in my ear,
has it been love this entire time?
some creature that was eating away at my heart
that i had to **** in order to stay alive.

that some creature always looked suspiciously like you.

i don’t believe in who you are anymore
now that my shoes have holes the size of dimes
and the drunk is still wearing off
and coming back from time to time.
wonder if the pressure ever ceases.
wonder if your heart feels empty
on a rainy night
or when i write,
wonder if your mind keeps spinning dreams
where i’m on the fence and the dogs are in the yard
and love isn’t scary when you’ve stared down the barrel of it for so long.
you ever wonder if your heart might stop one day,
ever wonder why the shame builds walls around us
and yet we keep dancing around it with our old shoes?
i don’t wonder anymore
about your whereabouts or where your emotions sit,
cross legged and anxious.
i don’t wonder anymore about our small town
and its stipulations.
i don’t wonder about you that often
and it makes me wonder what we had that made me love every second like it was my own offspring
like it breathed me alive until i died again and again
just so you would revive me.
i don’t wonder about you,
that often, anymore,
maybe the shame ate away at my bones
and provoked me for too long.
never knew the wound would heal itself and soon it would be apt time to forget.
does one forget?
does one forget those late nights,
fever-less after a sickness?
does one forget each purpose they’ve gathered
when they were not searching?
does one forget you?
does one simply stop believing in you?
stop thinking of you?
until the dust settles and the doors slam shut
and the empty hallway is just a hallway again
and not filled with your absence?
stop waking up wishing for you?
stop dreaming of the world without bloodshed, without fear, without shame?
just suddenly forget every emotion
that rests inside the mind?
just suddenly forget you?
stop believing in the falsehood?
just stop believing in you?

maybe we are punished
by those we miss most
with dark eyes
and heavy bags that
linger on a sad face.
maybe we are hurting
by ourselves and
we think it might get better
to wish for a lover,
i don’t want a lover,
i wanted to be loved.
now that that’s over,
i can’t remember
how tender you were
how life was a story
that i would’ve
fabricated to my mother
if it hadn’t happened
like it had.
maybe we are punished
by the thoughts we hold
that we think can stay forever,
a lingering cold.
maybe we are losing
our minds just a little
every second.
the neurons are gone—
what does it take to remember?
what does it take to remember?
make it much more,
bring it all back,
i haven’t thought of you—
it’s driving me mad.
how i can forget
what means the most?
am i being punished
by you, i hope
so.

never thought i was worth it until somebody told me so
he told me never to doubt myself or feel any insecurity
and now my hands are ****** and the rope is tight around my neck
and now i wonder if i ever love again must i have to forget?
every shattered promise clinging to my sleeve
but i am freezing now, can i come home?
or at least observe you watching television
with a coffee mug and imagine it was me you never stopped dreaming of.
outside the snow is creating blankets i must wrap myself around
cause the cold is my muse and i must never let her down.
unless you want to keep me warm,
keep me safe in someone’s locket
doesn’t have to be your own
the loners never let you know
until it’s too late.
i never want to be your burden—love me for your sake.
love me so the cold does not preserve me in her arms
and leave me someone you must deal with when you inevitably shovel the driveway.
can you walk me home in time for the dinner bell to ring?
will you stay if no one’s home
or will you leave me to my own devices,
watching every human that i have ever loved disintegrate in my cold ****** hands?
i’ll wipe the prints on every item,
never leave no evidence.
i will crawl until my knees bust open and the floor is wet
from my tears that i feared would always seal my fate.
can you take me home, hand in hand, coats on shoulders, giggly negative self-talk?
but maybe make a stop
and i’ll make a home in your bed
just enough room for me to remember to forget
that this love will never ever happen again
and no amount of begging
will produce the results the same.
you must lay me in the corner,
tell me “stay where you are made,
don’t cause a scene, don’t make me regret bringing you like some kind of dead
weight.”
i will listen; that’s the best thing that i could ever do,
let me think high of myself for one minute or a few.
i won’t chew the food you give me
i just want to be forgiven
want to live without a knife lodged deep into my rib cage
i’ve learned nothings fair in love and war
there is nothing poetic about it
you’ll be left by your best friends,
your enemies will never mourn you.
and if you win there’s no virtue
to uncover
you’ve taken something in your hands that wasn’t even yours to begin with.
let me stay until i’m warm again
until their fingernails don’t puncture skin,
their violence becomes normalcy,
so i will know when to hide from the cold that slowly creeps
and calls me its daughter like i ever belonged to it
i believe you, i believe it,
just didn’t want to believe
that you’d leave
me on the porch for some yellow tv screen.
i’ll be as quiet as you want, you know i should never reveal my presence
once i do, the men deem me too much of something—something that they must rid of.
and i’ll forget the torture, long as you forget the power
instilled into your bones as far as any time must go.
i have tried in vain to get you to love me,
or at least see my skeleton
as i was made,
i’m just a body,
just something you can’t offend.
i have defended all my reasons as they lie flat on the floor,
sat in grass outside your house and waited for
the door
to open
much to my surprise,
no one loves you when you’re dying
when the love you once thought could happen
starts crumbling like a sandcastle
and wind chill makes you contemplate the reason why you keep going.
you’ve never been worthwhile
you’re just a silhouette,
of someone stronger who sleeps in comforters
and the cold is not their hollow mother.
can you walk me home at midnight
but if i ever stop trying
what’s the point in telling anyone i feel like i’m dying?
will you lift my wobbly legs, walking drunk back from the station?
i’m so sick of being cold;
i just want to go to sleep.
never thought i was worth it until someone told me so;
he must have lied through his teeth the entire time.
how could someone love me when i’m giving into weather,
when my pulse feels more like a broken clock
rather than a living thing?
how could someone love me
when every house i’ve built has no heater,
no place to lull the wind to just a sound
that can never enter?
how could someone love me,
cold and broken,
alone, with nothing left?
outside your porch beckoning for the warm light through the window
will you carry me home?
i’m sorry,
i’ll forget i ever asked you in the morning.

don’t be a stranger he said to me,
strange how i feel like a stranger
speaking my own words, telling my own stories.
strange how i feel paralyzed,
strange how my muscles don’t move out of habit,
strange how i’m lonely in my own mind.
don’t be a stranger he said to me,
even stranger that i feel grateful
for something so minuscule.
strange how once i was lost
and couldn’t comprehend being found.
even stranger how someone’s once kind words became daggers,
myself being the one to make them as such.
don’t be a stranger he said to me,
the strangest thing since i feel so weak.
every week,
a reminder that my thoughts aren’t pretty, my love not craved.
the strangest thing is i cannot carry the world,
as silly as it sounds, i know.
the strangest thing is i expect superhuman out of myself
when i expect nothing out of everyone else.
don’t be a stranger he said to me,
don’t be a passerby on the road, putting your head down as you move by.
don’t be afraid to show someone you love them,
don’t be afraid to take life by the reins and make yourself matter,
don’t be embarrassed of the love you are giving, of the kindness you are gifting,
don’t be alone when you know someone deeply cares for your calls,
don’t shove and sulk and make a mess,
don’t make yourself feel sorry for yourself,
don’t die alone,
don’t exit with silence,
don’t regret what you feel,
don’t think your life was anyone’s mistake,
don’t be a stranger.
please, i beg.

i start to mourn the life that i could’ve had, but killed
and so i sit
sabotaging the only shining starry nights in my life,
and i sing restlessly into an empty jungle,
hoping to hear a familiar call.
one sound to reassure me that i am not the only one left,
singing unknowingly into the thicket
waiting for something to whisper back
—something that has gone extinct.

the ocean swallows me.
this midnight is a still midnight,
where the birds don’t coo and the waves don’t move.

the emptiness is not the ruler of all.
the tides continue to wash over the beach.
each wash of water awakening its earthly daughter.

each blush in my cheek i was taught to be ashamed of,
every desire deserved to be stomped on, twisted at the bottom of a shoe.
each nightfall i am forced to be tamed.

a seafaring sailor, drunk on each lifeless wave,
carving through sea walls.
i once believed in magic, but i have grown up and i know

that every sickness is a truth revealed
that every doubt can drown you, child.
that every word i’ve interwoven in your story has kept you reading,

candle-lit and curious.
that every reason i once had goes out with the tides,
that every blessing has six bullets and a sharp knife.

that the sea can feel like home,
an immense calling that never ceases.
that the world alone is meant to burn

each finger, each word
that i could ever sing, speak, or whisper.
that every human is incapable of loving you.

that every human is a desert
when all i need is an ocean,
a constant, a still midnight.

i’ve been stuck
and you’re here.
your silky clothes,
your gentle understanding.
does the night seem heavy to you?
does it make you die inside?
does it make your bones shake
and your heart ache?
does the day take its toll,
leaving you an empty shell?
does it bring sadness in its arms?
does it leave hope dead in your yard?
all i’ve known is the void,
a sizable gap inside of my body,
a place no one dares to explore.
how am i stuck in a rotting bed,
in a world that’s unforgiving but won’t take the blame?
what will i do when the branches i climb collapse
and break these legs of mine?
fragile limbs.
frost bite.
what will you do
when the hole in my heart gets bigger
and i cannot hold it inside of me anymore?
if you cradle me, like the baby, the child i once was,
will i see my parents in your eyes?
will all this confusion make it even clearer
that your strength will carry me out of the deepest ditch?
my limbs are failing.
will you lift me to bed when i cannot climb the stairs?
lay me to rest, away from all the pain
and suffering in the living room
making jokes at someone else’s expense.
no one ever asks me to stay.



but you do.
you always do.

i was never what you truly wanted, i was just someone to look to.
look for me on the road
either scattered or waving hesitantly,
warm sunlight beaming down upon my shoulders.
you were what i truly wanted, i was just too scared to tell you.
deathly afraid you’ll see how much you mean to me
and then you’ll disappear into the corpse of our love.
i’m so terrified to tell you,
so sick of being unsure.
sick of being second;
all i want is to be heard.
and if you do not adore me
how will this all go?
when i love you till i’m dying quick,
how fast will you hold me?
oh, how fast you know me.
when no one quite understands,
i hear your voice and smile,
wishing you would speak to me,
i haven’t seen you in a while.
i’m always second pick
i’m sick of being pushed to the side
i miss you—i miss us.
i miss every conversation.
every contemplation of whether i’m in love with you,
every expectation you had of me,
every quiet moment where i didn’t feel like exploding.
i wonder if you know that you know me better than anyone.
i wonder if you know you’re all i think about when i’m lonely.
i wonder if you know i love you.

more? there’s nothing to give.
not with my sore pale hands
clutching every last fiber that stands
between our two shapes.
not with my bloodshot eyes
pleading for responses that eat at every surface.
not with my black dying heart
wincing at the sight of every disaster that, in vain, keeps me alive.
not with my hollow brain
the fight or flight tendencies defining the reactions i give.

you want more?
there’s nothing to give.
there never was anything
to give.

need a friend?
the doubts live inside of me like citizens
that walk slowly in courthouses ready to sue.
all their passions are out of wack,
they only know how to survive by shooting down others.
every hollow house i was led to, hand in hand,
as i trusted you to guide me.
i need a friend.
i need the fever, the fire, the rage, the shooting star, the red seething blood.
any warmth to remind myself of tenderness,
even if it is without at the core.
i need anticipatory silence, waiting your filthy hands to slap the dinner table and i rush to clean the shattered plates.
don’t hurt me,
be gentle,
don’t make me smaller.
make me smaller,
make me writhe,
make me smaller,
quieter, less of a burden.
be responsive,
make me spill.
i need a friend.
the panic has large hands that choke me,
has a large frame to push me deep
and never lift me out.
though, i will not make do with violence,
i am not silent when it comes to love that festers.
need a friend?
the breaths i take will be for you.
the day is wicked
and you are so tender,
i would like this meal to be filling,
i would like you to stay a while.

and i’m swallowing each impossible love
and letting it fill my stomach lining.
i have touched this ****** with shaky palms.
i have taken my fill,
i have loved, lost, loved, and gave birth to a body i never conceived i would.
i have been in my own company
each night with stacked dishes and undone laundry
and puffy eyes that cannot seem to shrink.
i’m swallowing each sweet nothing as if it belongs to me—as if you belong to me.
through flesh and blood, i see your insides.
they are living. your aura. the soft delicate smooth manner in which you exist.
i live to see the sunrise from your bedroom window in a nightgown,
observing whole towns awakening
as our hearts have never known another
as clearly worth living for.
we are alive and i’m swallowing each emotion
i forced myself to deny.
i breathe what i feel, i am what i want, i am wanting
and oh dear, there is nothing wrong with that.

i am a dying wish—yours to be specific.
the wish dying in your arms every time the sun makes its rotation around the Earth.

there’s no life in me; i am a carcass strewn over the highway,
crushed and mangled and torn to shreds.

what if, if after every pound i lost,
i lost more of myself?
a skinny figure who changed herself to please a piece of glass.

when you said my name, i felt like you would leave me in a cornfield unconsciously anonymous,
yet you streaked my sky.
i’m shedding tears like skin, like burdened rain
seeping from the clouds on a day the world decides to die a little.

when the night is still, my muscles tense up.
i’ve been waiting for the memory of you to remember me,
dancing shameless on the ledge,
unafraid to look childish, knowing you were the first to make the empty void cease.

wide-eyed at the ceiling, losing two strands of hair in the shower, mailing you my address, begging you to stay.
you won’t—i won’t let you.

i am a foggy backroad, you cannot see through me.
all you’d see is a figure, clutching her stomach,
pinching herself for eating two meals,
for not resisting the temptation to feed the pressing hunger.

in your mind, the quietness i exude is only when my brain is confined.
there are shapeless memories and words that float until my arms are strong enough to grab them.

what if after every pound i lost, i lost more of myself,
drifting away into an unwelcoming atmosphere, unfit for someone as bewildered as me?

what if i love you and i don’t know what to do with that
so i write on a night with no moon visible from my bedroom window
and i lie awake wondering whether you are dreaming of me or whether you love me too
or whether we are nothing
but two memories floating,
remembering the other as their favorite one?

every morning, i lose a little hope that you will love me.
there are weapons in my hands,
pointed straight at your heart.
will you love me if my temporary winter chooses to subside?
will you love me with my spring eyes and hopeful glances?

there are weapons in my arms,
pointed straight at your heart.
the night calls my name with her quiet lips,
her silent voice gliding through the busy streets,
straight into my soul.
will you love me if the distance only makes you guiltier?
will you love me as an extension of the adoration for yourself?

there are weapons in my heart,
pointed straight at your heart.
the morning kills me with her hands as i almost do to you;
unmistakably, regrettably, and embarrassed.
will you love me as i am, a summer child, with hopes as fleeting as the humidity?
will you love me if i cannot hide my fragility anymore?

i’m so ashamed to admit i’m too weak to love you.
but will you love me, without arms, without hands, without weapons aimed at mistakes, without window panes, without cold shoulders, without dying streetlights illuminating the bones of every fault, without shame, without killing me by accident, without drowning out the truth, without starving all the bad news as if it’ll just disappear, without eyes that burn through confessions, without flimsy notions, without sickness?
will you love me if the words refuse to escape from my prideful lips,
that i love you just the same?
will you love me even if the morning never comes, even if the winter keeps pushing its frosty thumb against the glass, even if the world around us keeps us knee deep in quicksand, slaves to our own habits of ‘run away’?
will you love me no matter the weapons i try to attack you with?—
i have no bullets, no sharp knives, no desire to harm you.
my inability of loving is violent in and of itself
so
every morning, i think less of who i am,
knowing i do not deserve to be loved
by you.

when the floodlights hit my body,
i hope it dazzles clearly
for i am scared i’ll disappear in a crowd
and the beam of light won’t notice me.
although i’m frantically waving my arms
𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦
with those eyes that make the moon seem small
that make the sun lose some of its glory.

and once the day will bring forth no light
and we will have to forge some ourselves.
your arms will be the anchors
holding Earth still
and i’ll lasso the sun two times around
and coax it out of the nimbostratus clouds
𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦
it whimpers.

when we walk in alleyways with no streetlights,
i hope you hold my jacket sleeve or my hand in the cold chill of the sudden change in temperature.
i pray that you’ll still watch me
so strangers walking with the darkness
don’t steal me away
and make a jail cell out of my heart
leaving the prisoners it detained pacing and awake.
i hope the streetlight shines or your heart bursts into the fire of one thousand suns
just
promise me you’ll
𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦

my father hasn’t been himself,
i’m piling clothes on each shelf
while the cold is attaching its lifeless embrace around my thighs that are too big
and a stomach too normally abnormal.
i write about living,
i try to live for writing;
always end up living for nothing.
maybe the ache seems like a home,
or a house
i just passed on the open road.
constantly familiar since a younger version of me
opened the vault
and it slipped out.
my eyes haven’t watered the flowers underneath my bed
since the summer came and went.
love came knocking at the front door;
the latch wouldn’t open up.
now every car makes it look as if it’s him behind every wheel.
i pass that house with a sore throat—
a lump in the back;
something’s unraveling inside of me.
i am neither tall nor strong,
every sadness almost takes the breath out of me
and i haven’t been like myself,
but when have i ever?

i am not your dog; do not pet me once, then expect my loyalty.
i am not the woman in your dreams
completing your r.e.m sleep.
i am not your dog, do not train me once, then expect me to behave.
i am not a slave
to your blaze
to the fire on your tongue.
i am love personified.
i am a pain unresolved,
but free.

i’ll once believe we have something, some kind of ember
some kind of fire that doesn’t scare itself
some kind of blaze that never escapes
that keeps growing and forming and whistles all day.
there’s some kind of weather
that makes me colder
and you, warmer.
some kind of change blowing through the summer air
some kind of new wind unheard of from here.
there’s some kind of vigor i wish i had
that you do  
and it’s so easy to get swept up in the current of you.
no matter where i swim, the tide carries me down the wet sullen stream.
i’m back in the heart of things,
something is grabbing my pant leg;
it can’t be shaken.  
i float down the river,
weaving our love into baskets to send off to the water.
i’ll once believe we have something
when you pull my shaking body out from the water,
wrap me in a towel
and place me by the fire.

near some kind of ember
floating till its death.

every morning, it’s the same monotonous routine.
i’ll die and be buried in the soil.
perhaps someone may lay a coffin in the ground
in the shape of my emptiness,
the vast surface area of loneliness.
i’ve loved in spite of every distraction
in spite of every dying emotion
in my brain.
i have walked in hands of friendships just to feel some sense of relief
but all they’ve done is empty me.
i sit on my bed every night,
nothing changes except the length of my sighs
knowing fully i’ll never escape.
i can’t tell the ones i love,
they’ll worry for me,
and they need some happiness in their lives too.
i can’t tell friends, i shove them away,
wondering why people never choose to stay.
i’m erratic and sick of my own games:
to watch on the sidelines and never take part.
so sick of the routines,
all i want to do is donate my heart
to you.
take good care of it and water it and this proves i have no clue what to do with it.
please make it a home, with a hearth
and make it happy,
i’ve tried, but i’ll never bring it peace.
no matter how long i sleep
the same emptiness stays until i am it
and it is all me.
i’m packing my bags,
i’m moving upstate,
i ache to be someone you tolerate but don’t hate.
i can’t be someone else,
i’ll always be six feet underneath as you gaze upon me
and your eyes are so alive
and i love you,
i do,
what has this come to?
my frail body lying in a bed of dirt—
i’m dead before i hit the ground.
the same day all over
can i just lay with you
until night falls softly upon your pillow
and you call me a friend,
i’m someone to defend,
worth someone to you.
i keep the room quite tidy
tidy enough so the emptiness has a satisfactory space.
but you’re in the kitchen
and i’m hugging my knees
i’m scared i’ll die lonely
empty pews in the church,
with the emptiness clinging to my fraying shirt sleeves.
what have i become?
the same monotonous cycle
defining every aspect in my life.
i’ve loved till my heart was whimpering in pain,
and i’ve recorded every sound to revisit its anguish
and i’ve served every doubt till it’s wasted in a bar.
i’ve loved every human who stopped just to tell me that i was worth existing,
even just for a second,
i’ve loved myself more for every joke you’ve ever laughed at
i’ve loved every second with you in it
and i want you to have my heart
because you can do great things with it.
i know you can
because the emptiness feels fuller when you’re around
and it sits down in a swivel chair and it listens to you
and actually smiles.
i was revived every time you’ve said my name
even by mistake,
i was less lonely some days,
just replaying the sounds till my cheeks hurt
and you’ll never know,
but just keep my heart warm.
keep it by the fire.
keep it by yourself
and
it’s certain to be safe.

is it crazy how weak i feel falling in love?
it is stronger to start to cling onto an unfamiliar season
and wade through its frozen river.
it is stronger to let a fragment of yourself stray into the bog,
approach a stranger with olive branch eyes
reaching out for a piece of your soul
you weren’t sure even existed.
is it crazy how weakness is all i think of love?
a mistake, a mishap, something to do-over.
i need stronger arms, stronger limbs.
i was so much more as a child,
playing with love in my hands; bending it whichever way i deemed fit.
there is possibility in adamant denial:
a curse for a lover disguised as apathetic.
i am stronger in love than it seems,
only weakness is simple to grab onto
allowing the tiredness to creep onto my eyelids
and the force of sleep beckons me.
loving is giving up,
loving is sinking into quicksand in shallow waters.
love is strength masquerading as weakness,
a pale creature moving in the bog.
how come i am so scared of love when that is all i am made up of?
every little embrace, every small favor, every tiny chuckle,
every good cry, every rekindling, every intermingled life in mine.
i am strong for believing in something as fragile as love,
that could crumble in my hands at any moment,
yet gently still holding it so that it may remain.

all i do is write and hope you call.
sweaty hands on shaky pens.
the dreamworld i imagine has you in it,
but i cannot touch it or it crumbles.
and what kind of sanctuary did i build for myself acting like you’ll keep reaching out till your lungs start to shrivel?
my own imposter syndrome kills me
from the inside out
and i’m sorry i never quite saw myself in the light you envisioned.
all i do is write and watch the wall.
imagine it being my friend
imagine it being unable to punch a hole in
but just as it is, my doubts come hurling;
there’s a hole in your stomach the size of my avoidance.

i hide without the possibility of seek,
without the capability of you finding me
in the deep deep woods of my heart.

we are echoes to each other’s empty corridors.
you bounce off the walls and the noise is gone before i speak.
but if i just speak up, will you hear my throat scratch,
will you wait till the next little creak?
if i chose to find my way out of the hallway,
will you just be standing staring at a wall?
or will you come and find me
collecting my screams
and committing them to memory
so that the echoes are just reminders of
what you’re truly searching for?

all i do is write and hope you call.
hope you sit and remember the nights
and contemplate diving headfirst into what terrifies you.
hope you use reveries to daydream about me,
hope you patch up the holes you’ve received.

hope the indecision doesn’t haunt me
doesn’t echo in my corridor
doesn’t call with your voice in the darkness.
hope i never mistake it for your tender care,
hope i never come running at it with bared teeth and teardrops,
wishing it dead.
hope i never become the bitter villain that forgets how to love
and both hands become weapons
pointed and primed
waiting for someone’s weakness to define their demise.

all i do is write and hope you call
and lose my mind thinking of you giving your all
to someone who won’t reciprocate it,
someone who’s still hoping you’ll search for them
even though they do not wish to be found.

before i go to college, i want to live. i was living in a moment of time, paused to wait along for me. i want to hang out with friends and stay out until early morning and sleep the whole day and meet up again and again. i want to climb the monkey bars and slide and swing on swings and run till my head aches. i want to dive headfirst into a pool, not worrying about how deep the bottom is. i hate to be alone, but it’s all i know. it’s all fear. i live by fear. i let it spoon feed me only soft foods and i can only swallow when it lets me. i let it live pacing in my stomach, letting its claws dig at my intestines. i let it tell me what to do and what not to do even if i don’t want to. even if i want to run away from the suffocating arms of liars who say they care about me. i will remain at their heels, wining like a lost puppy, waiting for my owner to lift me up and pet me and reassure me. i don’t wish to be alone, but sometimes the ache is so immense the only thing i can do is slam the door. shut everyone out. i can only injure myself if i am alone. i do not wish to hurt anyone. i want to dab at pulsing wounds. i want to wash hair in a sink and wrap the towel around a cold body. i want to tuck someone in. i want to love, i have so much love to give. so much love to foster inside of me. i have so much life to live, but i’m stuck walking back and forth in a vicious nightmare. i want to be in your dreams, a warm hand to hold, a fire that’ll warm the bones that you hide away. i will not judge, i will only stroke your hair and love you. i have so much love to give, i don’t want to be alone anymore. i want to spend my entire sweltering summer days lying on picnic blankets and staring at the clouds saying ‘this one looks like a heart, this one looks like singapore, this one looks like a train, this one looks like you.’ i want to live and cry and sing with friends on an open road with the windows down and laughter ringing in my ears. i want my abs to burn and i want to dance in flower fields unafraid to be alone. i was not made to be alone. i was made to be a friend, a lover, a trier, a doer, an example of what wondrous things can do. i was made to belong, even if i try to deny myself of it. i was made to love and live and be happy just as much as the next person. i was made to be myself. i was made to be the person i am now and i should not deny myself the entirety. i was made to exist, to live and love and live and love until i’m dead and gone. i deserve to be loved, i deserve the feeling of belonging, i deserve to live.

by the time i get to college, i want to be able to love you and live.
selflessly, beautifully, and endlessly.

what did it give to learn and unlearn and learn it again just to unlearn it on purpose?
what did it give to make friends strangers to make strangers friends and then turn them inside out again?
what did it give to live within a dying house without ever exposing yourself to the outside world?
what did it give to push and punch and **** the love inside you just for simply existing?
what did it give to jail the one person who gave you wings and labeled silly old you a friend?
what did it give to dig only one hole in the backyard when you knew there would be too many bodies to hide and bury?
what did it give to sing and sing and giggle and smile when it was all for nothing?
what did it give to kick the benevolent for just being there
to hold your sore arms
and hold you till the damage almost disappeared?
it lingers still without a halo hanging like a poster over the bed.
what did it give to end up being alone in the end?
what did it give to end up exactly like you had always planned?

your existence is a knife in the back;
i can’t complain,
i let you in with your murderous crime-plotting hands.
i stayed put and watched the blood drip
down each leg.
i didn’t try to plug the wounds.
i wanted you to hold me till my breath stopped and the time slowed to a lull,
till i laid limp in your arms,
still and hushed.
i wanted to be touched undecidedly
not knowing where to place the mess you left behind.
i wanted to haunt the memories in the front of your mind,
swiftly slithering about,
till all you knew was what you had done,
but it was passion
and yet i love you still.

i am a skeleton.
you gave me your all
and all i could hand back
was a piece of my femur.
the love inside of you
makes my love seem small
i’m so ashamed
of my silence.
i walk backwards down a stairway
seeing
the walls i put up
too big too tall
for you to cross.
i need to love
but i’m too flimsy
my bones
are weak.
the love inside of you
taught me about the love inside of me
and it doesn’t have a home
since i left you a ghost
in a house by the highway.
we live a few miles from each others smiles,
dive in the pool at nighttime
the lights are so bright.
i swim with the bugs and we hold each other.
how hard is it for me
to show you what i see?
i lied for my pride—
he said we were beautiful.
the love inside of you is growing stronger
the love inside of me is begging for forever
but i have no skin
nothing to hold onto.
i killed myself briskly
if you had a word in
i wouldn’t have stopped breathing.
it’s car trips and teenage years
i want us to roam free
two kids with our bones and our aches and our loves
we can’t express
i deny till i’m upset
that you want someone else in your pool
in your house
in car rides at midnight
instead of my feet that can’t reach the pedal right.
i make things a joke and you laugh
and i know that the other girl won’t
make you lean back as you laugh,
though i don’t know this for sure.
the love inside of you is trying to call on the love inside of me
but i soiled it all.
i’m blue and i’m scared we may never be anything
except two kids with shotguns pointed at each other
though you are the bluffer
and i just don’t know how to fake anything.

did this love make you weak, cower and plead?
or did it bring you depth and reason?
i’ve been adored by few
with stolen egos and smart lies
i don’t mean to compromise your beliefs
but can you see me and you start to dive into an ocean of your deepest fears?
do you see us moving without our eyes with just our souls and do you think we were made to question every feeling we feel?
shouldn’t we just dive head first into an ocean of our deepest devotions and leave our doubts astray on the sandy beach?
when the wave had swallowed me, i had forgotten your touch
now every fingerprint looks and feels like yours.
i compromised my heart for i feared i would have to stomp the ember out before it even separated from the fire’s edge.
should we dive with no reservations, no hesitations, no preconceived notions?
we are tidal surges, we are tsunamis
afraid to unleash our full potentials
and what a shame to deny our natures so defiantly.

what a bed to inhabit in
when the illness strikes the body
there’s no caring mother to nurse the health back.
what a bed i set up
a sunken-in *****
a ***** to sink in until the seasoned chill sickens the soul.
there’s a body next to me, but he lays still, rarely speaks a word
and when he does,
the answer does not find him.
i lay in wonder all night long until the moonlight dwindles
and the sun starts singing its choruses.
the body beside me, he listens,
until my swimming legs cast him aside,
the noise drowns out in this swimming pool cage.
every sorrow that has laid claim on my terrain
every dagger pointed and aimed at my skull
is digging itself into the mattress.
i just sit and wallow
on the sinking bed
and the boredom teems until the man beside me
starts sweating.
i have to throw the sheets off and sob and carry on until the morning comes.
again and again

every ache in my soul is a power outage
the lights are out
the electricity fizzing
the power lines lay on my house
the walls cave in
the fridge is rotten
the humidity lingers
the sink doesn’t run
the internet is spinning
my head is spinning
my brain is spinning
every room too hot to enter
too inhospitable
every little sigh is a sweat bead
dripping and falling
crashing and burning
i keep on turning
the fan on
but it won’t work
my head is spinning
my brain is spinning
my mind is spinning
spiraling into madness
every sentence you spoke is a weapon
the heat is sizzling
the telephone poles are screeching
and i cannot put the power back on
i don’t have the power to do such a thing
i don’t have the power to do such a thing
i don’t have the power to do anything
to do anything
to do anything
show me once, how to do anything
how to do anything
how to be anything
how to be anything
how to be anyone
how to be anyone
how to turn back on
can this turn back on?

i could’ve lived in your irises
now, instead,
all my regrets waltz with their arms tangled
on a whim.
i’m too red in the face to reach out for yours
to dance till the morning sun shines
we’d then have to hide
from the brightness
the lights on our faces.
i’m too ashamed to love you without the dark veil of nighttime that swallows me whole
and i occasionally let it convince me of how this will go.
i’m too embarrassed to love without borders,
even after your friend called us something to consider
and i consider
until i start lying
and pulling on my collar to avoid the subject:
i love you and i do not regret that.
i’ve locked myself up in a castle of my fears
trying to adore you through dungeons and tears
though i can’t seem to tell you
you’re all i want here
besides the night chill in autumn
when you touched me softly
with words, “i am worth it,” and
“i’m so deserving.”
let’s dance till our teeth fall out
rot on the floor
and bury our bodies
to create something more
a whole garden, a lilac, a whispering willow tree,
anything to solidify us into eternity.
i’m so scared i’ll forget the steps to our favorite dances
and accidentally step on your brand new shoes
maybe you’d scream and holler
at me the pure bother
or maybe you’d take them off
and say you never needed them in the first place.
pathetic, i’m scouting for little spaces to hide
i’m so wary of you in this light
but we’ll sing all the songs
the way they were made
and i’ve constructed a million classic cliches
for you to involve yourself in.
the music becomes us, we become the music.
i’m sorry i had to disappear for a moment;
had to get some fresh air, the corridors were buzzing,
i see fireflies, they remind me of you
how they never care who
is watching or witnessing
their perfect glory
even when they are caught in a jar or a hand
they fly away because they don’t understand.

let’s watch these bugs till the morning comes
and the light might creep up, slowly descending on our smiling faces.
i won’t forget,
i’ll never regret you
even when the morning reveals our intentions;
i always meant to tell you anyway.

i’m not a lover,
i’m a mover.
a pusher,
a puller,
a secret keeper.
a violent hurricane
that leaves palm trees overturned
and businesses distraught.
an afterthought,
a delicate reminder of joy
for only a moment.
a hazy daydreamer,
a ‘try my best.’
a solo traveler,
who braves the windy waves alone.
though the water tumbles over
ships and i feel like surrendering.

i am a lover,
i just don’t understand the patterns of skin touching,
of how to awaken the lullabies buried inside of me.
i don’t understand how to stop the madness
from escaping my palms
and dripping onto your back.
i wipe the ink from your body.
it stains my fingertips.
i am a lover,
i just don’t understand how to love you,
to surrender to the thought that maybe i cannot control everything in my wake
and that is not a curse.
i am a lover who was raised in flames,
but i can be tame.

good thing it’s not tomorrow till tomorrow. so i will sit on the edge of an eclipse, chasing moonlight specks from the balcony. i look up and it’s always you. there is always a someone i seem to feel the need to chase in the stars instead of just sitting incapsulated and quiet. letting the wind whistle between my cheeks, allowing my hair to flow and move in whatever way it deems worthwhile. so many things have convinced me i was not worthwhile, that i was more a currency than human being. i let the weak tell me i was weak, i let the strong arms go for a more lonely route. i let myself be defined by the amount of words that slip my tongue, i let my name be uttered remorselessly from lips that only wished the worst in me. silence allows thought, empathy, love. i am silent and content. sometimes it feels almost too easy to remain at peace with every single attack and blow i receive, but next time i will be more ferocious. i will growl and fuss and scream for my sake. i will take your words and aim them at you with fiery eyes. seemingly a coward, i am just so brazenly tired of feeling not enough. for speaking, for lack there of, for being the one who stares at stars instead of laughing at unfunny things and associating loudness with eagerness and loudness for being simpler to love. i am a silent shooting star, begging to be watched by passersby’s too busy staring at their screens to see.

by the time i’ve woken up,
with my wooly socks pressed underneath blankets,
you’re already gone.
i don’t believe in myself
when the people i love leave cause they can’t contend with my
dagger defenses
and my ugly weapons.
i wish so, i wasn’t so dangerous with the ones
who give me a warm bed to sleep on
a warm mug of tea,
soft little socks so my feet don’t freeze
and they call me the things i want to hear
but not because i forced it out of their mouths,
but because they really want to.

and by the time you leave, i’ve already understood why you had to exit the house,
pack all your belongings into your flimsy *******,
and escape from the scene.
i’ve already made sense of your decision and the vicious cycle i let you tumble through;
it’s not fair.
the way i keep you a distance you wish was much closer,
or how i convince myself that this could conclude with no closure.
your lungs cannot bear my unhealthy air.
the room is all dusty,
filled corners with my despair.
i’m laying here still,
as still as one can when they’re losing their mind.

and by the time i’ve woken up, you’re already gone without a trace
and i will not chase you;
i can’t.
i’ll lay here in waist deep shame.

killer, i have your blood on my hands
and a pool around me.
no intentions of losing you today
but still i let the gray of sadness
devour me
until it convinces me there’s no one else.
and you were something of a stand-up guy
and i’m a woman who sits down quiet
and makes problems out of her tender relationships.
killer, i have nothing to say to you
after everything. i wished i used you instead
then you could hate me
and bruise my heart
instead of me bruising yours.
i have all these dreams where it goes right
and the ringtone reaches your little line
and the laughter flows like honey from the earth.
killer, i am such a danger to your vibrant fuse, your dance moves.
we are glowing stars blind to each other’s light.
i lie down in a pool of your blood,
ashamed that i had to take the knife
and force an ending upon you.
killer, how did i ever expect to be loved if i
i didn’t even welcome such a thing in?

a friend to me is like a bullet,
a little sting entering my body.
a friend to me is a swarm of flies,
an unmanageable mess.
a friend to me is someone broken and ruined on the inside.
i love elusively and leave a forest fire in my trail.
you try to call the firefighters to calm my erratic flames,
but you cannot stop me from sabotaging.
you cannot stop me from being alone.
but i love you with every inch of my soul,
hurting when i see your letters slowly disappear from the mailbox.
the fire is violent and you are not fireproof;
though sometimes i dream you are.
i dream i swallow my worries and hurl them in a suitcase down a cliffside.
i dream i don’t burn down the house we built,
instead i reconstruct it when it starts to shake.
you cannot love me from a distance—
i completely understand,
that you wouldn’t char your fingers;
you wouldn’t have any left to touch me with,
sweetly and so compassionately.  
i cause the deaths of so many beautiful things because i fear they will fall apart anyway.
i feared you would run away,
leave me dusty and frail,
but you loved me until you couldn’t anymore
until my fire singed your skin
and your soul just couldn’t bear one more second of torture.
i understand fully why you had to let me go.

hands are black.
eyes are red from disappointment.
one young naive heart
pursed against a window frame,
breathing misty white circles
on the glassy pane.
waiting for the rusty red car to pull up
in the drive
and she would tug on his satin shirt and plead with her satin eyes.
he would brush his sleeve over soon-expired tears
and hold her clumsy hand
by the rocking chair.
her pupils dilating, flesh smiling.
the years slip by with quick waving hands
forcing me to question my circumstance.
believing still, yet whispers are unsure.  
the blood is young, the doubt fresh,
the driveway empty, the crabapples dead.
he saunters with a limp
and can’t lift me up as far as before.
shoulders weighed heavy from guilt,
cold floors, socks with holes.
his hands are yellow, his chair all creaky.
i read the books, they inform me of wars
and i shut their dark pages with a forcefulness.
i haven’t read the letters from friends; they wouldn’t understand.
they pick blossomed fruits from singing trees
and insert their souls into eternity.
the dirt roads are quiet, the music dull and haunting,
my prized smile is a fraud, the new winter frost a sworn enemy.
by the time the day retires, the aching has only set one foot inside the house,
leaving a bare-bones home
and a shiver hovering around every corner.
i notice no deer, no sparrows, no foxes.
no signs of hope, no signs of rebirth.
i see you beside me with limbs as cold as ice
and the love we had to bury will not suffice.
there are no flowers at our graves,
only frozen branches
lingering
in a place they had not decided themselves
to lay.

on the water
i feel so alone
no friends
no shoulders to lean on
why did i ever think i was special?


my heart aches to be loved
or just noticed.
loneliness is so alone.
the aching of my heart to be held and cherished.
on the water, the ripples beckon me
must be sweet to be with someone just like you
every bubble combined to make a better system.
i want to combine with you
and be who you’ve always wanted me to be.
i’ll never steal the show,
i’ll never be the girl who belongs
i want to dance; i really do,
but my feet will not pick up or stomp or walk or move.
i only wanted to be soft in your hands
so you could mold me in any way you desire.
and i would comply
because who wouldn’t when they realized that they are so difficult to love.
i wanted to be easy.
easy to understand,
easy to speak with,
easy to love:
that is all i’ve ever wanted to be.
not even a “yours”
just someone worthwhile enough.
the water is beautiful this time of evening
i’m wasting it.
i waste my life
and my youth
and the love i get.
i waste it all,
but i’m so terrified.
so terrified of being alone
it keeps me awake at night.
and then i dream of you
and it’s all better because you patch up my wounds
and you leave my bones just as they are.
i dream of you
and that’s so enormously stupid of me.
i’m ashamed for loving you the way that i do,
but it’s just so simple to.
i’m weak and i’ll never be good enough
but please don’t leave me like this:
completely alone
and wasting my own life
being so scared of everything.
i loved you and i never told you.
i’m so alone;
i couldn’t even convince myself to change that
by allowing you in.

i pray i will be able to love those who i am afraid of loving
for fear of seeming too sensitive.
i pray i will be able to pick up the phone for someone who really appreciates my time
because he will not hurt you.
i pray i will be able to confess my emotions
not cowering behind a facade.
i pray i will be able to love you
and i pray that i will not push you away.


—he will not hurt you. you will only hurt him.

i love you,
and that terrifies me.
pull you by the cars
tell you how i feel
let you contemplate.
even though i rejected you many times,
it was all a lie.
because i love you,
i’m just so terrified.
how would you react
if i texted you right now at almost midnight
and said i adore your company
and want to be your girl?
would you ask me if i was drunk or sick or stupid or dumb
or would you say ‘yes’ in an instant, barely even thinking?
would you apologize for losing feelings because i had told you ‘no’ countless times before?
or would you say ‘i love you too,
and that terrifies me’?

who said this would ever be fun?
i am a gaping wound
just passed back in forth between my mind and my heart.
i don’t know how to breathe without an oxygen tank
pumping filtered air into my body.
i’d much rather be dead than have some machine breathe for me.
i am a gaping wound
at every party, i wasn’t invited.
i just stand in the background
and watch everyone else
live till they puke
love till they collapse.
special: why did i ever feel so?
every place hurts
because i smell your scent here
i see traces of your sweat on every chair.
everywhere i look, you had been there before.
dancing with your heart on your sleeve,
you learned how to live at such a young age,
can you teach me how to breathe by myself?
show me the ropes, i can repeat it,
even if you only do it once, i’ll break my ankles and shatter my lungs piecing together any little part i remember.
teach me how to breathe without apologizing,
how to lucid dream,
how to be someone you would never ever forget
even if you get dementia and your brain doesn’t remember how to function anymore.
i am a gaping wound,
but please wipe the blood and bandage me up.
never mind; i don’t wanna damage you too.

i thought i broke my ribs laughing,
young and dying to be seen
i have no better place to be at 12 a.m, but beside you.
i wanna love you
so unapologetically.
you’re the cure to my illnesses.
we ran like little kids and the playground was blue, illuminated by the lights of little houses.
we ran and bolted and had no regrets;
i have no regrets.
i want to love you
like that playground loved school children
its only purpose to love the laughter till it disappears along with the breeze.
i had to disappear too.
i am older now,
and lost and you grabbed my hand and took me with you
and you are so wonderful,
allowing me to become a little kid again
chasing in the street
laughing till our ribs are soft and shattering.
what are we now?
swim with me.
let’s leap from the dock and become one.
i am a kid and you are who i look up to with wide eyes
and a tender soul
hold me in your lap
let me sleep and hold me
hold me
hold me.
so softly
so my ribs do not shatter.

she touches me—
leaves me for extinct
while you
graze your fingers up my arms
and i am a desert revived by your touch.
i feel like if i showed you my favorite songs
you would nod along
and appreciate every sound.
her mouth is like a razor-blade
splitting the hairs on my skin
like a viper, she pounces
streaked red crimson blood
with bite marks like tattoos.
you’re a calm ripple to her tsunami waters;
i drown under her oppression,
i live for just a taste of your connection.

i harbored the monster inside of me
fed it juice and the best parts of me.
now honestly,
i just wish he would go away.

everything we ever did is now collapsing in front of my feet
barefoot and dragging over glass shards, fire sparks, and your skull.
i feed the monster
my insecurities
and it lays them in its teeth.
takes you from my liquid hands
leaving me empty handed
every
time.

everything you are is everything i am not
….will never be
radically selfish, i am, causing you pain.
the monster screams and screeches and i have to give in
every
time.

my teeth are glass and they puncture your perfect skin.
the monster laughs at my attempts
he tells me you don’t want me here, don’t love me.
he feeds me lies;
i believe them
and i am ashamed
for i let him get away with it
every
time.

i am ashamed that i have let you burn
every
single
time.

everything you ever did for me
is wasted and washed away.
i want to forgive myself,
but he will not let me.
he will not let me be free.

the moon—she knows of who she is;
i have no idea who i am.

perhaps a jellyfish
who stings when she’s provoked
not always under duress, sometimes
just because she feels threatened by the enormous depths of the sea.
perhaps a lover,
a silly little heart
that glows when it’s full
that beats when nerves flood in.
perhaps a sailor,
wandering and contemplating a world
where one could be free
and devoid of responsibilities,
chasing the stars and seas
yet somehow sees them as omens
she must avoid.
perhaps a daughter
with harp string fingertips
with legs that waltz with no regrets,
who breaks her back to measure up
and sings the craving to bed at night.
perhaps a flame,
one swallowing all the elements
destroying every path,
begging that they’ll stay.
perhaps a girl
who loves unashamedly
and naked and like an ember
like a forest fire
like a jellyfish
like a navigator of the seas
like a throbbing heart
like a delicate daughter,
perhaps everything all at once
everything and everyone that ever breathed in my vicinity
perhaps an amalgamation of all the creatures leaping in my chest,
scraping at my rib cage—thoughts dying to be uttered
said
muttered.

perhaps no one.

there used to be a terrifying place i had to go
but you came in with your skyscraper touch, now i have vertigo.
not sick to my stomach, just a little bit distressed
how you would want to see me loved limitlessly and dressed.
these wounds are boils
little coils round my throat
and you look at me long enough for me to almost explode.
never been a volcano, always an accidental surge
now i guess you mean it this time, i will surely self-implode.
never dying alone,
saw you in your overcoat,
we drove twenty miles south to a sweet girl’s house
then, when you saw me falling asleep you said it was time to go.
oh, i’ve never been so carefully watched over,
always straddled the line of being a complete soulless loner.
you are not my owner, when we get much older
do you think we’d be happy with our heads on the other’s shoulders?

when i skipped in the street
and you blinked your flashlight fifteen times at me
my high beams bursting through the windows of the neighbors,
i started to feel like she wrote those songs for us
and for our teenage recklessness.
can you teach me how to stay,
how to sit still and just love
with no shame and no repercussions?
because how are you so close in my rearview mirror
and then so much farther than you appear?
i would’ve cranked the heater, the same for you
the same simple cares
that you bestowed on
someone as wretched as me.
i would’ve called you my favorite person,
denying your insecurities and making them seem insignificant,
just as you had.
i would’ve laid in your lap retrieving my phone
as we laugh with our entire stomachs
and your friend says there must be something between us;
how does that make you feel?
i would’ve said it was finally time to go if i saw you sleeping,
almost too tired to drive home.
i would’ve asked you to drive safely for fear of deer around,
the same as you had.
i would’ve invited you to my cracking house,
just as you did,
answering the doorbell and smiling,
“you can take your shoes off”

“i love you as you are”

i wrote you a poem
where i’m scared to say everything
for fear of seeming too open.
where i loved you without embarrassment
or agitation
or sudden fear.
i wrote you a poem
where you were shining—
the sun looked like you tonight—
so i cried
staining ill-fitting clothes
on an ill-fitted body.
i wrote you a poem
where i showed you the admiration
i hold quietly inside
in tender unspeakable dreams.
i have countless dreams
sleepless feelings
of you and to my dismay
i drift to sleep
with your name floating above my forehead like counting sheep.
i wrote you a poem
where you smiled
and your tear drops fell,
up sprouted a garden.
i harvested your flowers;
put them in my hair.
i wrote a poem
where you care.

all nights bathing in the print of my own shadow
flow
in the same rhythm;
the same continuous rhythm
slithering
grasping onto its victim.

how dare i let myself sleep
in wishful periodic dazzling daydreams?

i taught myself how to be alone
now i cannot relearn how to reach out for someone’s hand in the light i so erratically disguised as the dark

you may call me a coward for being incapable of reaching you,
but the ship you rode onto my shore
has suddenly started to drift down current
and i cannot save you with it.

it’s inevitable that i will have to let you drown.

i am continually alone in a crowded room
an immovable mass.
the time creeps
slow with a soft begging—a hard press.
it hurts my bones to sit still
and the time won’t move
won’t move
won’t move.
it doesn’t move ever
and i’m sick, bland, and alone
i don’t need sound to fill the space,
but this pains me in a way i cannot describe.
i have sat in crowded rooms with the pain pounding on my stomach
and i look like a strange life form that doesn’t belong
and everyone else does
and that’s why it is astronomically harder.
the silence is permanent; it will seldom leave my side
it’ll leave me in its wake and i’ll be a body
lost to the immense unknown of the ocean
wash up on your shore
and you can hold me
and you can tell me the quiet doesn’t make me who i am?
you said, “it’s not in your bones—the need to speak everything you feel”
and i just told that to myself because i have myself to hold.
my loneliness is everlasting and violent
i belonged and i ruined that image for myself.
my slow ability to start feeling like myself around people i adore
but i mess it up every single time.
i continually hold my tongue for fear of faux judgement.
THEY AREN’T GOING TO HURT YOU
THEY INVITED YOU PLACES
THEY CALLED YOU SWEET AND FUNNY
AND YOU MATTERED TO THEM
AND YET YOUR TSUNAMI WAYS DROWNED EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM.
YOU DESTROYED THEM.
YOU DEMOLISHED THEIR VILLAGES
AND DEVASTATED THEIR LAND.
YOU ARE EVIL.

they told you to book it in the opposite direction
with your back turned
never glance behind.
but you didn’t run
your feet stayed stationed, loyal soldiers
digging into the never-yet conquered land.
i made myself smaller,
a beautiful thoughtless daydream for your sharp obtuse thinking
but you weren’t even vicious like i made it up plainly in my mind.
i exaggerated your feelings
now i’m the only one left reeling
with my brain a foreigner in my own skull.
they told you to run,
but you stayed and hoped i would change.
forgive me for loving you in a psychotic way
where i locked up my affection in a jail cell
and never let it see the light of day
for your crystal-shining eyes
to see my true stance on you and us.
forget me
for your life could blossom if you free yourself from my shade
that prevents your soil from bringing up flowers
construct me a tower where i can hide
and you’ll never have to see my revolting face ever again.
they had told you to book it,
to blast down the road
and never look back
but you turned around
and smiled,
showing pristine white teeth,
and said you wouldn’t be leaving
because you had realized you loved me.
you were too naive to assume that i would accept that kind of adoration for myself
so i left you under the flickering street light
and when i looked back,
i could just see you crying