It's all my fault
You never held me near
No mother's bond is here
I will be strong, no pain, no fear

It's all my fault
Cast off for them to betray
Who will wipe these tears away
I will be strong, no pain, no fear

It's all my fault
Dry eyes now my only shield
This fortress will not yield
I will be strong, no pain, no fear

It's all my fault                          
The dark night cloaks the beast
Prowling with torch to feast
I will be strong, no pain, no fear

It's all my fault    
He hunts with clawing hand    
His strength I can't withstand
I will be strong no pain no fear
                                  
It's all my fault
Defense a moment lax
My protector attacks
I will be strong, no pain, no fear

It's all my fault
Inside part of me dies
As he takes his foul prize
I will be strong, no pain, no fear
        
It's not my fault
In teacher's guise you came
This child soiled in your shame
I am strong I will shed the fear

everybody deserves
to have their dreams
come true;

I look outside of the
window and see an
ocean of faces;

I realize that
others deserve
it more

They
told me
“Go out and
meet new and different people
called strangers,” but I asked, “Where do
I meet them?” They shrugged
so I gave
them a
Mirror.

whenever you feel
inconsequentially small
remember one thing:
the period.

a dark pixel
a tiny nuanced dot
that manages to
transform everything.

"I'm fine"
becomes "I'm fine."
"Okay"
becomes "Okay."

but perhaps the most painful
of all is to see
"goodbye"
change into "goodbye."

They say when you think about someone you “like,” you get butterflies in your stomach.
When I first heard that, I laughed.
I don’t feel butterflies with you.
I feel a wildfire.          
Every word you spit is kindling to the scalding embers in my throat,        
welding my words into bars too heavy for my tongue to lift.                    
I scream fire yet you wouldn’t **** to put me out.
Sweet suffering;
The sickness in my stomach
Like eating too much ice cream at once        
And your heat is inescapable.
Why?
I don’t know
Why?
I don’t know.        
Why?
I don’t know!
Why?
I can’t!
Because the truth is: you could burn away every string of flesh in my body and I would still find 206 reasons to stay carved into the marrow of my bones.
You are not the exhilaration of the fall,
You are the sweat in my palms before I jump.
You are not the volume in my voice,
You are the way I bite my lip before I speak.
You are the finish line on a hot mid-day
And I am the last runner to finish.
If you are a wildfire,              
Then time is a pile of dead Autumn leaves
And we didn’t know any better.
One day I hope you look back and see all that you’ve burned.
There will be people who are rivers and streams and men in yellow
Who will drown you with words and water                
Because they’ve never seen red
And you will always be the only force in existence they cannot touch.
I think you will always be a wildfire
Even when I become a storm-cloud
And you are a timid flame.