Telling old stories
just to feel you
on my lips
once again

I bring you a gift
Wrapped in silk
A scarlet bow
Sits on top
With much glee
You open it
Inside lies my heart
Your face
Does not match
The reaction I expect
You pick it up
Examine it closely
Before dropping it
Stomping on it
You smirk at me
Laughing to yourself

Why don't grownups tell us about how much it hurts
To grow up and to be, to be alone
To find yourself at 2 am, after a party, in solitude and crying
They never warn you about indifference, only hate
But it hurts so much
And you're driving in an Uber at 3 am to your parents' house because you can't stand feeling empty
Because everything hurts and you don't feel safe without a knife or your father

We weren't hot and cold,
We were the sun and liquid nitrogen meeting
And in the end I could play him,
like a beaten marionette

Red on red on red
Oh how the blood runs red
Bricks on bricks on bricks
In-between it drips
Life on life on life
Still continue to fight
Tear on tear on tear
A mother lives in fear

Everyone expected a monster,
but I didn't
They were looking for the poison ivy
Their noses ready for the noxious fumes,
when all I could smell was salt
All expected the green monster to claw her way out of my throat,
to jump on his back
I did not expect a monster,
Yet here she is.
Not the color of growing Mother Earth, no.
This monster was sulfur, lightning, and rose thorns
Rusted red and strong in her gaze, this monster clung to me
They looked for a choking green, but my monster?
My monster was a red that screams

It's hard to outrun the darkness when it comes from within you
When the inky tendrils creep out to caress your cheek, gliding from your brow to your chin,
Leaving a smoky haze in it's wake
Wrack your mind, trying to pick out the details of the smoke, where it begins, where it ends
You know anatomically its structure, from birth to death,
but you've never really seen it, even though you lived it
So in order to survive, you stopped trying to find color in your internal mental abyss.
It's hard to see the darkness when your life is a kaleidoscope of party strobes flashing purple and green
Yet every once in awhile, one of the lights will shine directly into your mind and touch the inky soul
Teasing it.
Taunting it.
Making you turn and face the  empty and once more try to put pieces together
Are you scared little girl?
Does the blackhole frighten you?
No. But a light piercing through this darkness does.