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.

it was the greatest
a fairytale in front of my very eyes
theme park joy and bubblegum
my favorite destination was you
with your arms wide open like angel wings
patient and kind, never filled with pride
as i weeped on your shoulder,
yeah, i might have seemed cold,
but i didn’t mean it

you were ruthless
cut my wings just to prove your “innocence”
you’re a flute playing hypnotic tunes
but i’m not amused
with your faking and pacing and erasing of me
at the party when you stopped talking abruptly
and left me standing on the porch by the lamppost that moths were glued to
shivering in a state of paranoia
hearing the droning sound of voices unfamiliar
from the curtained window

perfume stuck in your hair
our promises float in smoke rings around us
it’s the holidays and you look as handsome as ever
i borrowed your sweater
and it feels like a warm hug
your nervous laugh, it’s so wholesome
the candlelight bounces along the wall
what would i ever do if i lost you?

a mirage of you
i sat on the docks
december rain poured on my back
an ache never soothed
a pathetic ruse of a love you tried to convince me we had
an empty fireplace
the moon a distant creature, she reaches out to me
but it’s violence and anger and blood on my sweater
you stole it, “control,” you wept
i lay in bed so afraid of the morning’s first breath
just nightmare fuel left

trust in the palms of your hands
you told me you don’t wanna leave me
it’s summer sunglasses weather
love you forever
in hazy afternoon smiles
your forever wild child
alive on the porch in the breeze
drunk on liberty
in between a quick kiss on the cheek
what a lovely rapture
intensity, love me, your silk shorts and pillows
you make me angry sometimes, but just for a while
you’re always apologizing for your wrongs
so easily, so selfishly

the thrashing and pounding from downstairs i hear
there’s a window pane and there’s not a single speck of dust there
a hush and covers going over my head as the stairs creak from a weight under them
it’s so quiet in Heaven
so silent in my reveries
but soon covers are pulled
legend of
cruelty  
lended itself to me
voice cracks and wine bottles broken
i shouldn’t have made the point to correct you
out of turn, out of time
always tears in my eyes
holes in the drywall  
trusting you is a mistake maybe i was willing to make
was it my fault?
it must be
it’s so cold in this room, so unfathomably freezing
but it’s summer; the time for believing
the time to find reason,
but i’m just a shell of a man with no guts to fight back when the pressure attacks
like a shark in the water
a bear hungry for flesh,
a lunging beast
beneath the undergarments
there are bruises and echoes that don’t show themselves
how could they?
no one would comprehend how fires diminish with enough wind

you’re overreacting, it’s just a simple scolding
let’s go on a ferris wheel and see how you just need a bird’s eye view
you’re the reason i wake up to chirping and coffee mugs and salvation
you’re the reason the day is bearable
to someone like me, how could you leave me in the dust
on the side of the unforgiving road?
i will be a rain puddle if leaving suits you best
you’ll never be happy
without me
over and over,
find a lover,
then they disappear behind the grocery store
you’ll never find satisfaction again
doomed to wander and wander and wander
but i am right here
with my arms open wide like angel wings
i’ll give you the strength to fly, just stay or there’s no point to do anything but—

“will you just listen?” stays my internal monologue
“if guilty had a soul, it would be yours.”
a worn down heart, so low in the ocean
i still will lift the blame from your shoulders any day if you desire
if it hurts you to realize the pain you caused me
it’s a black night and it’s cold, so terribly freezing
i can’t see life through the windshield foggy with rain
what am i if not a ghost in the dark of the night, looking for others like me
who cry in secrecy
and hide their nerves in scratched up arms?
what am i if not bent like a willow to your whim?
who am i if not alone in my own sorrow, begging to be yours, even when i want to be as far away from you as possible?
so easy to forget me
in story, you would have been kind to me
living in harmony
live for me, never laying a hand on me
but anger won you over and wrecked you
are you just as lonely as—

and what if you’re the one that got away?
what if i wasted all those months hopelessly in denial,
swimming in my passivity?
those records play
my head spins
favorite friend;
you’re sick of me, i have a sneaking suspicion.
what if i’m still hanging onto your diction,
every party waiting for the way you crinkle your face when you laugh?
don’t be bitter, i didn’t understand the feelings when they were all that was floating around.
forgive my cluelessness.
i’ve been chasing immovable objects,
bodies that dance like fireflies,
bodies that fail to understand why everything has significance.
i cannot prove this to you;
i’ve run out of all my blood
and now the mosquitos have nothing to take from me.

i love my body
my waist that isn’t the slimmest
but it’s doing the job
my lips aren’t the fullest
but they can taste
i admit i used to hate my legs
i despised the way they fell together
no thigh gap
plump in the mirror and through my judgmental eyes
but i had body dysmorphia
and she was so cruel to me
hitting me and shaming me for every little crease and imperfection on my body
she obsessed and i listened
and i cried and i watched myself twenty four seven
but now my legs are powerful
they could take down anyone
they’ve got a mind of their own
idk when i started loving every swoop and curve and turn my body took
i still think my stomach is too fat
it’s not flat enough
and i would and still **** in to create an effect as if i didn’t eat the two burgers
that i only ate one
but i know i shouldn’t be perfect
i should be human, after all
but how am i supposed to adore the parts of my stomach that don’t look like other womens’ do?
eat less, don’t bloat, stop drinking or you’ll float
i don’t take that type of criticism anymore
my body ain’t perfect
not even a bit
but i am human
what’s wrong with it?
cause it’s a built in truth teller
i won’t let any man stick around who doesn’t beg at my feet
and touch my body as if it were blessed by God
who doesn’t dream of tracing every edge of me and doesn’t say i’m pretty
he better wanna explore every part and dive in deep
love me in my rawest form, beautifully
i will leave him if he uses me for my body
i will love him if he waits for me
you know a body is just a outer wall
for the goopiness and strength of ones heart
so i will love my body
because it is a part of me
and not obsess over it
because it doesn’t matter at all to me

when my breath fogs up the inside of this glass jar
that you keep me confined in,
my body pulses with the familiar letdown:
that you’d leave me on the side of the highway
if further instructed, pushed.
i am but a daughter trapped in her expectations
of love never comprehended.
below the knife,
i’m being watched
so i listen,
clip my own wings,
cut off my own tongue.

love is something you taught me
now i do believe it roams this earth, slowly,
perhaps too slowly, is taunting
me with its childish games
that someone like me doesn't understand.
i have been selfish with love: wanting too much,
touching it with greasy hands, disregarding it.
but, somehow, still,
there's always a bed with love waiting at the door
after tucking me in.
perhaps love does care, desires to bandage
my aching wounds, scraped knees, watery eyes.
love isn't some boy at a party i wasn't invited to,
it's the familiar smell of pumpkin pie, the conversations
had at the dinner table that
bring the laughter
and prevent the hunger,
the warm apple cider steaming in a mug,
the fresh laundry done and folded.
love has hidden for so long,
i almost didn't know it still existed
and sang.
in the morning when i wake up
and hear the quiet chatter of my parents in the kitchen,
for some reason, it never feels as if love is absent.

am i inherently evil cause of my skin color?
do these blue eyes define evil in the shadow of brown eyes?
why must i feel ashamed for my pale skin?
i didn’t chose to be in this body.
didn’t chose to look this way.
half of the time i wanna punch myself in the face and turn purple so my skin color doesn’t protrude through my clothes.
i wanna hide in my blankets, cover my head with a bucket, my legs with a floor length gown.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
let me be someone else.
someone with browner eyes.
someone with black flowing hair.
someone with darker skin.
someone with more joy.
someone from a place prettier than here.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate who i am.
i hate it.
i hate it.
i absolutely hate it.

de vez en cuando,
me siento con Esperanza
sobre una silla
en el patio.
hablamos como amigas
pero no conozco a ella.

con una voz como una brisa de la primavera
el sol palidece en comparación
a su sonrisa.
un olor hecho de cerezas.
ella se sienta a mi lado
y,
a veces,
hay un vacío que llena

ella sabe libertad
ella la tuvo
aunque se parece que
ella está atrapada
cada día
ella no es una esclava.

de vez en cuando,
ella se besa mis mejillas
entonces
deja con mi alma
y espero que
ella regresa
algún día.

these quiet soft bodies in the forest are suffering
there is an endless question in the mouths of the rivers
there are scoundrels dressed in foggy black smoke
making peace with themselves while killing everyone else
their canines sharp, their chilling howling winds making the spirits’ hair stand on edge

these quiet soft bodies in the woods are suffering
there is a constant pounding of war drums beyond the horizon
buried underneath silk-spinning spiders and fool’s gold
there are ghastly ghosts shrieking for eternity in their eternal vacant brains
their tepid seething souls scavenging the abandoned corpses like vultures

these quiet soft bodies in the darkness are suffering
there is a hazy fog that blinds the earth from the heathens that have been buried in vain
they have bulging eyes and stigmatic circumstances protruding through the silence
tempestuousness swirling beneath their feet as in a hurricane churns up the foamy water
they see red coals and embers in the cores of any sane soul
they will gag you with a temper, leaving anger imprinted on your skin  

these quiet soft bodies in the emptiness are suffering
their cries for help are being intercepted by the government that birthed them
leaving them to be swallowed by the jet-black monsters that lurk in the shadows
there is a mask that is worn over their heads before their sense gets scraped off of their skin
they never have to feel a thing, the gashes only give a sense of victimhood

these quiet soft bodies in the nothingness are suffering
they are getting eroded away, thrown up in flames, spewing out ****** teardrops
they are hunted down and shot, seasoned perfectly and oiled
the trees groan from the fumes exuding up beyond the sky line
their branches fall off as they look the other way, vapid in their deliberations

i never liked myself.
barely picking
myself
off the shower floor.
now there’s a storm
and it’s within me—
a dull buzzing
of a radiator
and a quiet alarm
singing its apocalyptic peace.

i don’t crave your big green eyes
but you’re using them to watch over somebody else.
i know this relationship is over
but i wish i could’ve ended it with somebody else.
and i don’t like that you’re sharing drinks with another woman
who sells her body to get money
wouldn’t you have liked to be with somebody else?
she has your favorite songs on cds and i never did
i wish you could’ve ended up loving somebody else.
somebody who’s rude to waiters, somebody who is only good for a first date or
at least somebody else.
now i have to hide my cold hands under my winter coat
cause you’re too busy holding somebody else’s.
your dog still loves me more
but he has to spend some time with somebody else.
just like you went and forgot me
cause it was more beneficial to see yourself with somebody else.
now you’re happy go lucky
since you’ve replaced me with somebody else.
lonely eating ice cream
while you’re shoving it down in the house of somebody else.
perhaps, i don’t miss your company
i’ve just been enjoying it more with somebody else.
or maybe this is hopeless
and i should let you make love to somebody else.

i don’t want your body
but i hate to think about you with somebody else.

violent thrash of a sword
to the fortress
that i call home.
there is always some
silver coin
or biology
that takes from me.
i have no one, but…
individuality and religion.
each destined to be stolen from me
yet i will not surrender
like the blue girl
that lurks by the docks
resembling the runny river water.
i will not lose the lens
that formed me.
the end of the tunnel
is bleak and empty.
there is nothing to hold your flaky body
if you don’t have the lens.
what do you see in your reflection
if not an extension of what you dislike the most?
the inner workings of you
are strikingly wholesome
but the lights within you
are soon to be stomped out.
when you change yourself for the unforgiving blank void of life,
what is there left but a shell of fool’s happiness?
the point in feeling whole is
lost. my hands tremble, a stormy body
on the edge of today. and what is it worth
if not living for the truth? what is it worth
if my existence goes completely unacknowledged?
who will be themselves?

it’s november
time is slower than i remember
but it’s faster and faster.
your body isn’t next to mine anymore,
there are new pains unfamiliar.
somehow i get even sicker
and ache for december or
warmer weather.

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.

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.

𝘆𝗼𝘂 wake up and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 smell the flowers and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 yawn and make coffee for 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗳
𝘆𝗼𝘂 live in a demonic world and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 look through it with demonic eyes
the floor shakes under 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 weight and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 feel every single step 𝘆𝗼𝘂 take
𝘆𝗼𝘂 pose in front of the million dollar camera and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 smile at the homeless laying barefoot on the street
but do 𝘆𝗼𝘂 give them money?
they sit there in rags and they beg and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 watch them and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 reply “have a nice day”
𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 clothes are made of silk and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 go to work in fancy wear every single waking day
𝘆𝗼𝘂 sleep in linen sheets and 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 pillow is so soft that 𝘆𝗼𝘂 fall into the night so easily
𝘆𝗼𝘂 wave to passerby’s in cars and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 yell across the street to girls 𝘆𝗼𝘂 find pretty
𝘆𝗼𝘂 strut in the alley, but only the one with twenty plus people
𝘆𝗼𝘂 switch sidewalks when 𝘆𝗼𝘂 see a man with a rapid heart rate who’s walking faster than usual due to being late
𝘆𝗼𝘂 grimace at him and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 continue along 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 way
𝘆𝗼𝘂 don’t tuck 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 kids in bed at night cause 𝘆𝗼𝘂 don’t have any
𝘆𝗼𝘂 don’t cry when falling onto the comforter, 𝘆𝗼𝘂 laugh instead
𝘆𝗼𝘂 online shop during the midnight hour and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 purchase Indonesian products that were made in sweatshops
𝘆𝗼𝘂 don’t condemn those who killed for no reason, but 𝘆𝗼𝘂 don’t have such ruthless shower thoughts, i suppose
𝘆𝗼𝘂 witness the moon glimmer in the desolate night as the world remains still
𝘆𝗼𝘂 fall asleep quickly and 𝘆𝗼𝘂 repeat
𝘆𝗼𝘂 do this all when the sun hasn’t risen for some
the moon hadn’t shined in the darkest of nights
the war was fueled with gaslighting and bombs
the fog hasn’t lifted, it barricades the doors of little houses
the street wasn’t bright enough and someone got tackled
the gun hasn’t stop shooting in the courtyard
the prayer was never uttered from such posh lips
the emptiness never ceased to exist
how could 𝘆𝗼𝘂 be so selfish?

our bodies touch, but what did it mean?
is selfishness all that you’re seeking?
are my highs and lows getting you off?
do you see my attachment rubbing off?
if i cry any more tears,
i’ll be a river, a stream,
a valley beneath your holy mountainside.
our lives touch but what did it mean?
nothing to me when before i was less naive.
i’m watching others finding new lovers
turn them inside out
but they stay.
i’m contemplating whether it’s a me thing
or if i can’t find what i’m searching for.
our bodies touch, but was it more than
what we had on our lips?
i’m lacking inhibitions, so grossly optimistic
and i end up collapsed on the floor.
the floor of your heart,
is there any room left,
were there ever any guests?
i’m not even angry at you,
only mad at myself for believing
there was any room left
for you, your ego and i.

teach me how to drift in the wind
how to build homes out of charred wood
teach me how to dream
how to change stuck mindsets
teach me how to grow as wild and as old as the aged sycamore trees
how to paint stars in gloomy night skies
teach me how to capture saturn on film
how to be the best i possibly can
teach me to be unbothered like the ocean tide
how to make imaginary planets with the cellulite on my thighs
teach me how to love myself
how to love you as well
teach me all you know
the waves, the breeze, the undertow
teach me how to adore love
how to preserve nature
teach me how to be carefree like dolphins
how to roll in flower fields
and how to feel beautiful
teach me everything you know
everything

there is
no beggar that isn’t starving for a feast
of the heart, of substance.
i beg at your doorstep, count the minutes i wait with bulging eyes.
your mother is by the television,
your sister gathers newspaper clippings,
and you, are you even home?
is your light on?
i can’t tell.
and if i beg for the love you give,
will it feel just as i’ve dreamed
or will it feel like complacency?
there’s dinner being cooked
and the steam rises to the ceiling.
my stomach growls,
but the door remains closed
and you do not come down the stairs.
i watch through the window,
are you even home?
do you even notice my shivering,
my eagerness?
would you even love the person i’ve become,
the beggar pleading at your door
to just give her substance, love?

the dance floor is crowded and the floor shines like it was freshly polished.
dresses fitted tightly and loosely, dresses purple, blue, yellow, unladylike.
hands moving like torpedoes, high kicks, deep dips, choreographed nonsense.
twirls, spinning in tent like shapes, hips gracefully swaying as the trumpets scream.
waltzing my way back into reality, into the arms of a familiar stranger.
clouded with the strawberry coated thoughts of a busted up balcony with my dance partner swinging me into a trance.
must have been love in the folds on your forehead, must have been love in the lights reflecting on the dance floor, must have been love in that gloomy air upstate, must have been love where i never saw it appear before, must have been love; nothing else has ever made me feel the same brilliant surge of energy as your touch on my back.
it must have been true love.

as a girl with a brain who is taught not to use it
to abuse it
to misuse it
i refused it
concluded
that i wouldn’t yelp about every single non congruent disillusionment
told to be angry
to be discontent
with the world and its faux barbed wire
but i’m not discontent.
i am quite very content.

i feel you in the dark
and i feel you in the candlelight.
i see you in the stars
and yet, i can never reach them.
you’re so close
yet so far
you dance all alone
outside the bar
by the place we first exchanged
eye contact
and i saw you in the embers of the street fires.
you gave me happiness
or even just a moment of contentment.
you gave me something tangible to feel
something genuine,
something actually real.
a figment of my imagination
you’ve become
in such short of time.
i miss the optimistic smile
that would
light up in your eyes
and i knew you felt the smoke arise
in my body
after the ravenous fire inside of me diminished.
i feel you as the curtain closes
as the locket i keep as a memorandum
shakes along with my morally stained hands.
i can’t keep a steady eye on the
realness of life.
it all fades into the blue
along with my rare smile.
i haven’t felt the wild wind pull my hair in
different directions.
are you even listening?
i haven’t seen the stars at night
only factory smoke in sight
and the dress you wore is ******
and so lonely.
i traverse through town
and always seem more bitter.
the ripped-up constitution of my
feeble institution
it just crumbles at my feet.
they can’t hear me when i breathe.
it’s as if the world is turning
into a frenzy
and i’m slowly
becoming more and more formidable.
they don’t want to knock upon my door
and they don’t want to fear me anymore.
yet i just want them to fear me more
than they ever have before.
i’m sick of finding solace in the ghost of you.
i’m sick of seeing my forcefulness multiply
into knives that stab
you from beneath your grave.
the dress you wore is ******
and so lonely.
can you teach me how to heal my wounds?
i already lost you,
i can’t lose myself.

there are brats and rats and scumbags
crowbars and cheap cars and phantom stars
in the town of denial
down by the frothy beach
in the middle of a place called insanity

there are temptresses and trespasses and messages
phony ploys and bloodthirsty boys and aimless joys
in the dust-accompanying countryside
the place that silver wolves and pistols occupy
in foreboding high midnight sighs

there is loneliness and helplessness and acid
soda cans and grunge bands and peculiar bans and queer vans
all inside my throbbing heart
in the space i refuse to stay
in the place where it’s never “ok”

down by the frothy beach
in the middle of a place called insanity

me.

everything is nothing new
lose myself in the thought of you.
some rabid cliche in my palms,
awakening the mind that stands on guard.
there is something almost dead
crawling in your neighborhood,
trying to find the most unwelcoming house of all.
and in those walls, you stand tall,
i cower at your sight.

need to stop replaying the memory
why does it live under my skin?
at the bus station,
i’m watching these moments
pass by my head
i’m starting to wish i was her
but i don’t want his body nor his recklessness.
i’ll never be a girl you need
but then why did you tell me
all those falsities?
for me to keep them still
in the cavities of my chest,
to not dare release them
from their ribcage prisons?
there i go,
back to the memory,
back to the arms that weren’t ashamed to hold me
back to the rhythm of what seemed to matter
but now it just fades
and i’m expected to let it dissipate.
can you blame me for wanting to resuscitate it?

there’s only so much more dirt
i can pile over this tomb.
there are only so many doubts
i can bury
until i’m swallowing my tongue.
there are only so many times you can claim
you’re a man
before you start to sound like a child.
there are only so many times i can lie
before you see right through me.

Calligraphy
And my figures of speech
I’ll wait for a moment to pounce
But for now, I’ll be cooped up in my house
Nonchalantly
Engaged in pensive thought about you

And if I could see the summer sun
One more time before the waves turn black
Like a mysterious soul
Or like non renewable coal
I’ll want that

And if you could smile pleasantly up at me
Like you want to have a discussion with me
I will formally accept that offer
In the safety of my own room and the
shoulders of my country

And you’re partly stone
And half liquid
I ain’t trying to get in your business
But I can’t love from a distance
And I can’t breathe when you’re missing

Calligraphy
I’m writing pretty just to act like you didn’t wrong me
With your brand new friends and being a pain to society
That’s what being smart and needy gets you

I feel betrayed by my own tongue
By the rapid movement of my fingers when I’m writing about you
Cause I never wanted to admit anything
Not even the truth
When it comes to you

I know everyone else converses with the easy side of you
Lighting the cigarette and blinded by the reality
Of the way you use your words because you have a dang superiority complex
Or are you different?

Calligraphy
Slanting your definition so you’re not the villain in the story
I laugh in desperation and the thought that I might never see your eager face at 7:30 in the morning ever again
That is terrifying to me
I’m growing up and you are too
I feel like it’s a curse for me
A curse because of a plague of guilt and malevolence
I know she’s alive grinning, watching my life crumbling like the lost city of Pompeii
She stole you away from me
Not the pages of poetry
Or the growing apart because of vicinities
It’s the hostility, the spite, the animosity
Because I was having such a dang good year
Until she had to place her grummy hands over my happiness
And MY moments
Regurgitate them back to me
Please.

it’s so hard to stomach it
that i would feel freer without your grip
to leap from the cascade of waterfall
blood in the water
stab wound under the blouse
it’s a woman killer,
staying put.
that when it’s airplanes plummeting from the gaping sky,
or when it’s thrashing swords,
it’s better to just stay silent
or run away
but how come running away is so tricky?
to just move those little feet
and leave the ditch you lay in
for blooming gardens and sky-kissing cities
but it’s impossible.
bruises gather on satin skin
snake bites bubble
and tears slip
and
the realization hits
but doesn’t hit hard enough
and it’s just sitting in trenches
waiting for the enemy to consume
me
but it’s a slow burn
and
it burns so terribly.
i have remained unspoken
i have let the automobiles crash into my haven
i have given them a place to rest,
a place to stay in
and i
regret it.
regret meeting you
regret encouraging you
regret being anything near you.
you’ll stare at my grave in the ground
and you’ll just shrug it off,
move some dirt over it,
but it only covers the evidence
not the girl that sits
with her knees clenched
sobbing in fits
of anguish
caused by your tyrannical hunger
to give life to lonely people
and then take it away.

yet sometimes the water is calm;
there are no ripples caused by incongruity
no collapsing dams, no inundations
just peace.
and it’s safe in this place
i say
but one ever knows when rain
might be too heavy
and one never knows when their house is about to get flooded.

all i do is damage myself for you.

forgetting isn’t so bad after all
me not checking my test score cause if i don’t see it then i didn’t get that bad grade
isn’t exactly crazy
if i forget those words that imbecile described me as
oh, they’ll go away
disperse into the air
fly to someplace i’m forbidden to go to
i wouldn’t let those stupid words singe my bones
dangle in the mirror, ready to puncture me with those razor-sharp teeth
let me forget
this entire year of excruciating pain and crippling anxiety
feed it to the hungry souls in the graveyard
they will enjoy my disfavor
the ghouls can haunt that imbecile with his petty attitude and ruthless words that he thinks don’t incapacitate people
teach him a lesson in being a decent human being
he’s lucky i’m not vengeful
i don’t crave revenge, i crave to forget
to forget those years that felt like below freezing ocean waves over emaciated bodies
that stripped away comfort and shoved anguish down the throats even of entitled jerks
my brain wishes it could comprehend math and chemistry like he could
if it was that simple, i wouldn’t be worried at this point of the year when i don’t even care enough to pretend to care
let me forget that i let my friends down by talking out loud or shutting my mouth or by hesitating
i don’t wanna be the new doll placed in front of the county that i don’t belong in
those days when i went to Lake Erie and saw hot air balloons lift up into the horizon and ate sausages at some pretty hotel and then went to the beach and let the waves crash into my small figure and i’d smile because life was so easy and simple
i didn’t have to worry about failing chemistry for the year
or what ***** was gonna call me ugly when i entered that ancient building
let me forget the torment
let me forget

no man is an island, but all that i see is salt water for miles. its taste as bitter as a slap; i must consume it. get drunk off of it. get lost off of it. die off of it.
there are dangerous things i have loved before. there are dangerous things i can sing lullabies to bed. dangerous things with beautiful faces and symmetrical smiles, bodies buried underneath acres of sandy beaches. for an instant, the harm solely seems to be self-inflicted, a wound the size of an almond, just big enough to recall. but i have swam entire ocean lengths to be someone you’d love, someone you’d capsize a ship for, someone you’d sing lullabies to. i know now i am a hazard, built to strand you until the uncertainty devours you too. the only feeling i’ve ever truly known is to be devoured, by everything / almost as if everything i may love is meant to destroy me, leave me stranded, dehydrated and muffled. sometimes i feel as if it’s just a part of being human—something so human; so deeply human that i am not immune.

only true poets listen to the voices in their heads

happy birthday to the best friend who left me in the dust. who left me to fend for myself and my frail bones. i guess i am wishing you a happy birthday from an app whilst your new friends are probably throwing you a rager, but i am not mad. i am never mad at you.

some of the best memories and moments that came from you; they sure aren’t the same:
you told me about stranger things, that was the first i heard from it. now the fourth season has come out and i haven’t heard a peep. and don’t even think i forgot about how you told me the entire plot and how scared you were in your little bedroom in your old and memory filled house. how the horror lined your bones and made you tense. and you couldn’t forget it even as the night air twinged your skin. it stung a little as you begged to forget you ever saw the demagorgan or realized will was missing.
i still watch the dang show.

you and i trampled around in the woods with my older sister who you were super close with because i couldn’t leave her alone. you ate some snow and i told you it would be *****, but you said it’s clean.
don’t eat the yellow kind.

my teacher and you had the same birthday. as well as donald trump. but he doesn’t matter. you laughed with her and showed her your teeth. must be nice to be birthday buddies with someone. someone who desired to be.
you better wish her a happy birthday.

i was jealous back in fourth grade because you liked leah better...or so i thought. you sat on the opposite end of the table although i told you to set yourself by me. it bothered me. walls of jealousy put up just because i realized that was the first time i had low self esteem. a picture of you and i at the lunch table still made the year book.
leah was in it though.

sleepovers at your house. that same stupid house. in a different town than you live now. by the pit bulls you told me about as soon as you moved in. you better have gotten that pepper spray to ward them off. anyway, i brought my sleeping bags and threw em’ in your mother’s car. you played basketball and i had to watch from the sidelines. with your dang mom and dad. your dog ate our popcorn when we clothed it in salt cause of course God gave me allergies to everything i can see. we laughed so hard our stomachs hurt. or the time when you invited all your sporty friends from other schools and they made me uncomfortable. they were too mature and riskay for my nine year old liking. we watched the sand lot.
i am on the bench.

and it’s your birthday. another year has passed and you’re still gone. i think it’s too surreal for me to handle, so i keep writing you little notes (or long ones) hoping you’ll stumble your way back to me.
i still miss you but

happy birthday for now

the laundry done and hanging
the bread kneaded and baking
the smell of Levi jeans
with rips on the thighs
Pablo Neruda’s poems
rolling off my tongue
along lakeside vistas
piles of ice in soda drinks
he hums “la vie en rose”
and i get lost in the world
i envisioned.

you, a garden of hydrangeas and rhododendron bushes.
me, a nomadic soul too obsessed with being accepted in the natural slip of life.
my midnight moonlit sorrow
is eating me alive.
you, a sun-drop dandelion, too glorious to be planted near my seeds.
my tainted heart,
an obese beast lingering like a ghost that never passed to Heaven.
my inability to place value on that vessel.
you, a rose petal blowing in the wind.
me, lost little ladybug trying to find her way back home.

you wouldn’t love me anyway.

when the taylor swift concert ended
and you didn’t even ask me how it was
that was the second i knew
when the only thing you commented was how
far away the stage was from my seat
your jealousy creeping up like a monster
you only talk about yourself, never ask me how i am
i might be asking for too much, but maybe you don’t ask for enough
and you didn’t ask about it once just, “how was the show?”
the most bluntly asked question ever
do you ever consider how you make me feel
when you constantly degrade and insult me?
wallowing in my own loneliness feels better than being around you
i’m sorry i don’t know who you are
wait—of course i do
you explain every detail of your life
lamenting over your “struggles” and your stupid little petty dramas
spouting out nonsense like a fountain
do you even know i have a brother
or that he beat down the walls
and the tears from the years of his constant fist fights and head banging?
do you even know about my love for taylor swift or lana del rey because it feels like they actually listen to the things i have to say
even if it’s just their lyrics that i sing to the dusty mirror by my bed?
do you even know i have anxiety festering underneath this forced porcelain skin?
do you even know how sad i get, just how unwanted and melancholy i feel when i pace around my room having nothing better to do?
do you even know how much i cry at night, just ripping myself apart and not even for anyone else’s sake?
do you even know the pain i feel knowing that even my best friend won’t ask me how i’m doing, won’t let me get the flames off my chest?
do you even know my dreams and aspirations?
do you even know that poetry twinkles in my soul and brings light into a vast void of nothingness?
do you even know how much i vouch for you in the vehement conversations i have with my parents?
do you even know my favorite songs, my favorite shows, my favorite movies, my favorite foods—the most basic facts ever?
how do you even sleep a wink at night knowing the lack of details that you know about me?
i saw my favorite artist two days ago and you didn’t even ask me how it was.
you didn’t ask me if she played my favorite song, if it was loud, if it was as fun as i expected, if it was the first time i’ve seen her, if it was a sudden realization that letting go is beautiful?
do you even care enough to ask me anything at all, or should i just keep asking about the boys who constantly blow up your phone, about the “friends” of yours who don’t want to see the best in you, of your “totally unfair” parents supposedly wronging you over and over again?
do you even care about the girl you call your best friend?
do you even care?

you shrink yourself down to someone else
create an image that might only work for a couple months
i hope you and him hate each other after all this
i hope you split his heart in half
i hope his knuckles get soft and his eyeballs rot
i hope you freak out when he’s beside you
i hope i echo like a freight train
in your brain
i hope the lies that you told attempt to sing you lullabies on your sleepless nights, but only conjure up nightmares
i hope you grip them hard in your palms and make him sob.
i hope your remembrance of me strikes you guilty,
i hope the circumstances make you wither,
but then i hope you don’t have to live with yourself any longer
and i hope you change
and stop worshipping yourself.
i hope this charade ends with you,
ashamed and sunken,
realizing that your ego will always crack
leaving only you and its remnants.
i hope you want it all back
but as you can see,
it is dead and buried.
i hope your body abandons your mind
 and finds a new host.
i hope you never go back to your scheming,
i hope you change
and never revert back to who you were.


i apologize; i am only a little spiteful.

when all the leaves fall and change
when the sunset gets sooner everyday
in that exact pale chilly darkness
that is where my heart rests
perhaps i have dreamed once before
i dreamed i would see a dinosaur
in real life, in real form
and maybe i dreamt big things for my future
i have watched the shower nozzle water cascade down me
like some kind of wanna-be hot spring
the leaves have turned brown alike my heart
and my lungs grow heavy and wet like the morning dew that falls
i imagine that if i was a painter i would sculpt myself in autumn
in a tiny little cottage
with smoke rising from the chimney
alone, in an opening of deciduous trees,
here the leaves fall softly and slowly
and my heart sinks quietly and slowly
underneath the sobbing trees

in the critical marsh of florida
he is still on the dock of the boat
cautiously & causally counting the cattails
poking up out of the half river half sea
half possibility
i am continuously confused with what you do
you were left by the marina
accidentally
and you reek of algae and a summer fling
while i participate in pretending just like your father did
losing your future to a buck of independence
lose your future to an underdressed miss
lose your future to me.

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.

if you love my writing, i’ll love you

i wanna feel your hands
on my body
like poetry
stanzas and alliterations
upon my guilty skin

your eyes twinkle
and they sing
i’m sure you would be good at writing
we could exchange ideas
paint words vividly
but maybe you do write out of
your own accord
i don’t actually know you, forgive me

i am tired of being invisible
know me
let me know you
in a way that no one else knows you
a way that is secretive
but capable

i’ll write your wrongs
and right down the street
are my open arms
to hold you in spite of the horror
to build you sanctuary
to construct buildings out of
your bulging eyes
hold me as well

i am not a handful
whatsoever
          just kidding

but whatever
let me be your muse
that way i can live forever in
hardback books and film screens
so i don’t doze off one day and leave
no memories
that way
you’ll always have me

i can stamp you on paper and
keep you in the paragraphs
and
line breaks

i can sketch your eyes into crystal *****
fortune tell for the distant future
inside of our tightly held palms

i will love every square inch of your
olive oil skin
and every ounce
of your soulful soul

i’ll write you into metaphors
about the land, sea, and animals
scream your name at the top of my
lungs until
you magically appear
i’ll wipe your tears
and
toss em’ off your pillowcase
read you bedtime stories about
how the moon adores the tides so
much, but they change every time
  she
    moves

also how the sun stopped shining
and ruined his true love
with the earth
and ever since then, all citizens
get burned in extra passionate heat
he wanted to make it up to her.
but he can’t.

please adore the way i draw the
rhyming into poetry
fantasize about me smiling on a bridge
in Chicago
so tiny in comparison to the
skyscrapers
that cling to the clouds
almost touching Heaven
(they think so)

be my muse
if not from closeup
at least far-away
or
at least
at arms length
cause
i wanna feel your chilly
hands grace my body
like choirs in unison
looovvvvveeeeee mmmmeeeee

(or at least like my poetry)

(you don’t even have to like me)

(just read it)

snapped out of existence
in a rustic flannel
lying at the bottom of a pit
far into the mushy ground
the core of the earth
pinned against my ribs
lips as cold as the Antarctic
stomach as empty as words
left to rot
as rain descends
on my emaciated corpse

firstly: i know one hundred and fifty percent that i will blush when i see your face after all these years. my smile will morph into a full face frenzy of happiness. and i will definitely hide behind my friend that i see basically every single day. sorry, you always brought out my nerves
secondly: i miss you and i have missed you so incredibly much ever since you left and i left too. i don’t want to admit that unless you read my poetry one day, which i might end up giving you the username and you’ll read every poem i have ever written, you will never know what i truly feel about you. breach of privacy, but it’s for you. cause i wrote almost every time i missed you and i tried to summon you as if you would appear outside of my window, throwing rocks, waking me up in the middle of the still night. maybe you don’t miss me?
thirdly: i will struggle making conversation with you. i was always horrible at doing that before, but now it’s gonna be even worse. you will laugh and say i am being awkward and then i will laugh to try to cover the awkward, but it will always creep around the corners where i reside. i am hoping it can be just like before without any hesitation
fourthly: i am gonna show up to impress, probably in ripped jeans that show off my thighs. maybe you will be encapsulated by my features and maybe ask for my number that you never got. who am i kidding? from you stemmed my worst insecurities and the nights when i sobbed the loudest in the pouring rain. but i will still put my heart and my body out on the line, ready for objection and rejection of all kinds. maybe this time you will call me “pretty” or “pleasing.”
and lastly: life hasn’t been the same since i have seen you. i am afraid that i will act differently than you have been expecting. a different girl from a different world in a different form. don’t judge me for shifting my personality to fit in. whatever, as long as you say hi and we all have great recollections of such fantastic memories, i think it will all be ok. in the end, i am the only one who can control what i do and how i speak. i just can’t wait to see you and everyone else. and read my poems :D