I am an open wound in a world of bandaids

I'd say I passed
right through you.

Could you feel (if it killed you)
heat from burning bridges.

Ghosts reached
out of pity giving matter
to tie me to this slowing stone
before I floated by.

I'd say I passed
right through you.

I'd be fooled into thinking you could feel:
I could have sworn I saw
you
blink

And I'd rather be on fire
disintegrate within desire
than circle such a great, unknowing  

drain.

Maybe you were nothing more than a Friday night

Sometimes I think about me and you
smoking prime times in the park
and how being outside was all it took
to feel awake and wide open
and how it felt to be
just three feet from you
and stare at our shoes.

We climbed the tiny jungle gym
where daylight fell on children playing
and then the sun went down and
children's dreams of kings and queens
yielded to tiny, almost-adult dreams
of being free.

This world was ours
and they meant so much
and nothing at all to talk about
our lives and how big they felt.
And how small we really were.

Hands slid along ***** chains
and legs pumped and
here we were, whimsical
with childhood past
and yet untouched by what would pass.

The air a canvas for laughter
and smoke
and bravado,
who knew?

Even if you were still here with us,
I'd still miss you.

I keep the TV on, because when I do it feels like I'm living.
I keep my browser running, because when I do, it feels like I'm feeling.
I keep my movement low, because I'm slow, because I'm softer
and I burrow deep beneath my sheets to forget that I'm a daughter.
World's potential rages, shapes and faces overwhelm me,
and I'm screaming silent for the quiet that I feel like I am missing.
I want to touch you, see you, hold you, speak without restriction.
But I numb my mind in sounds and lights, so that I can slip away.

Over-stimulation cradles what craves to be kinetic,
pacifies the glowing inside craving open air.
I cannot move, I cannot go, I'm too afraid to ride the ride
and so I'll sit behind the lines
and participate by watching.

And here we'll watch the world together- and also so alone
would that I could
rip free the bandage
and leave my ***** home.

and the internet praises the introvert and tells us we're secretly deep.
And we dress our wounds with wasted time until we fall asleep.

And in my dreams I'm running, fighting, TRYING SO HARD
to break free.
And in the morning, I shudder, shake them off
and dim the light in me.

And day after day
back, here we go,
back to the flickering screen.

Can't you hear it?
Every day
can't you feel it?

would that I could
draw hundreds of pictures
in lieu of thousands of words,
jumbled.
lost,
without point, without bottom
chickens, cows, cats, macaques,
crowded classrooms
and hearts, spilling out in a thousand directions

Don't you hear it?
Don't you feel it?
Screams, vibrating the walls
the collective wave of something we walk by every day
--and don't ******* me about your progress--
Can't you hear it?

How can you not feel our body bruised,
thin-lined, square, red ditches pucker fields of flesh:
if wasted sweat were rain, we'd be fed.
Necks stiff, eyes low, teeth bleached and thin.
lips chapped.
Seizing from impulse but too dead to act

The world is shaking
crying, laughing, moving, screaming
waiting for death
praying for life
singing

Can't you hear it?

The stars are beautiful and bright, and they are *burning