i. you broke both my legs and i'm still trying to walk. you ripped concertos from the back of my throat and said,
"look how beautiful you are."

ii. you don't have a nice smile. you smile like it's hurting you, like it's tearing you apart from the inside and you choke out words like stakes digging into my back, saying,
"then again, you did seem heaven sent."

iii. you sing church hymns with your whole self, your body pulsating with the force of it. you look at me when you sing, narrow your eyes as you kiss me, singing amazing grace like it actually meant something to you.

iv. you're biblical. you kiss my fingers and hiss holy words into the spaces between them, recite verses when we go to sleep at night, whispering,
"i don't have much faith left for messiahs, but i'm pretty sure you could be one."

v. i hate you and i don't know why. actually, that's wrong. i hate you because you never really died, did you, you're still here, imprinted across every surface in my house did you know that having an eidetic memory means i will never be able to forget you?

vi. you shattered my jaw and took the remains with you, painting a mural in different shades of red, saying,
"sweetheart, this is how you look best."

vii. you told me once that vampires are just vengeful angels and i don't know if i still believe that. i don't know if i ever believed that. i don't know what you believe when you tell me,
"look at the mess you've made."

viii. i wonder how long i've been faithless, or faithful. whatever you want to call it, sweetheart, when you say,
"you could have been all this, love, and more."

my retainer broke and i held it in my hand
my nails were ***** because we were at camp
it was red plastic despite tasting like metal
and you were there, we walked into a boat
abandoned in the dry sand piled high
i kept seeing flies and i felt my heart
it was enormous and i couldn't stand
you made a face to show that you felt the same
when i told you about my fear of them,
and i made a face when you said you'd
forgotten to let me know, that in seven weeks
it would be goodbye, and you were leaving
for the empty deserts of California

i thought about the days and how to tell you
that i loved you, that i loved you, here,
that goodbye was all i had and all i could give
because my mouth was full from all the camp food
and the darkness you had chased away

you told me to sit by you later
when we watched the symphony play

when i woke up i couldn't shake the feeling that you had
died

You are small
notes on
worn paper,
"don't eat that,
you'll hate yourself
later."

You have holes
in your sheets
from your last
lover.

I do not function well within the confines of society
Life frequently comes to a standstill
Where in a short period
I cut loose
Cut away everything
Because the emotions that I bleed
When I release myself from all these binds
They purge, cathartic, hurt
The act of violently giving up
Knowing you're kicking in your own doors
Destroying your own windows
Shooting your own two feet so you no longer stand
And on your knees among the pieces
Is where you come apart
With nothing left to live for
Only unsaid words bleeding from the heart

So you write them out
You write out all that swirls around inside your plagued mind
And the broken pieces that cut like glass
Carve inside their meanings
Hollowed out inside your hollow bones
So that the wind might pick you up
And you may be set adrift
Becoming that haunting voice carried on a breeze
Murmurs of a past life trying to be forgotten
And as you meander along
All the landscapes where you never belonged
You thin out bit by bit with each moment gone
The weight falling out until what remains
Is but the skeleton of a whisper
That to those with ears to hear
Becomes the shadow of unrest

They'll find themselves clutching those they love
As inside enters a mouth of fear
Where they feel the desert of the loneliness
Breathing its years of solitude down their neck
Voices of a quiet death
With a foreign memory reminding
Darkness always falls
And inside they wait
Until one day they too
Will hear its haunting call
And they will let go of love
They will let go of it all
To join the chorus of a quiet breeze
That travels around the world
Whispering the words
That their hearts will bleed