I must be allergic to you
every time you come near me I swear
my stomach starts doing somersaults
My palms grow slick with perspiration
and I start to asphyxiate on fantasies of you
Surely I must be allergic
Why else would my eyes water at the thought of losing you
why else would I hold onto hope like an epi-pen that you are meant for me?

We she ran into my store begging for a hedgehog I didnt know how much she'd affect my life
Over time she became a regular
A familiar face to chat with semi-awkwardly because I'm still on the clock and doing my job but I'm lonely and dont have friends and I want to be yours
We bonded and exchanged numbers
Eventually we hung out nearly weekly on our so called dates
Painting pottery
Getting tattooed
Going shopping
All the things we said we'd do with our boyfriends but they never wanted to
I saw you blossom
I saw you grow
I knew the most complex things about you but if someone asked me your favorite color I would have to make a guess
It's somewhat comforting to know the trivial things dont hold much weight with us
Our friendship was deep from the start
You're moving now
Hours away
And I'm still trying to come to that realization that I'll be alone once again
I've never really had friends before
I say I do but when you get down to it it's just me, myself, and I
You wedged your way into my solemn trio
Thank you for running into my store that day
I'm sorry we didn't have hedgehogs but I'm glad you came.
I'll miss you when you're gone, but I'll visit I swear.
After all, we never did get to go rollar skating and my skates are still waiting in my car.

It starts here with your hand gripping the bottle too tightly
It ends with stained hands
Impulse
Mania
Change
For now this will do.
A small semblance of control back over your life.
It will satisfy for a bit until it washes out
And the stains are slowly lifted from your hands
New skin cells replacing the old
And you'll be back here again in time
Gripping a bottle too tightly
Breathing in fumes too precariously
Listing to music too loudly
Chasing a minuscule sense of control and steadiness and power and change
And change

--Dying my hair

Love, as I've come to know, is  a shapeshifter
every time I experience her she is in a different form
but there is always some semblance of nostalgia every time
I used to think every new love would be my last
and figured that every past love was a misunderstanding of the term
but I've come to realize that every love will be different
every love teaches me new lessons
and I could not be more grateful for what she's taught me

It should have been easy
I shouldnt have had that unsettled feeling in my stomach when kissing you
And honestly I really don't
But the thought of anything else makes me uneasy
I'm attracted to you
I'm comfortable with you
So why can't I make myself go further?
I thought it was just that I hadnt found the right person
Or maybe we just hadn't been together long enough
Or that my religious upbringing caused me to have an avoidance to ***
Some psychological training in the back of my mind telling me I would be shunned from God
I never understood cheaters
How *** could be so tempting
How anyone could get addicted to it
How random hook-ups and one night stands were the norm in our world
I am out of place here
It's not like I dont want to have that connection
I just don't feel the drive
Then I thought it was my medication
But I realized long before the chemistry in my brain was artificial that I wasn't intrested in the ****** acts most people were
And to be honest even when I am in the act, I dont really have a drive
Never felt the need to ******
Always focused on satisfying the other partner
Because this was a relationship and it's what I'm supposed to give and I dont want to keep that from them
It causes strain in them
Causes a distance that I dont feel is there
For a long time I thought I was broken
Now I know for sure that I am
But I want you to feel secure,
So I'll fake it again and again
Let you do to me what I have no interest in
Maybe this time will be different.

I know you by the state of your hands
Calloused palms and split nail beds
Your voice can grow flowers and root seeds your hands can never touch

I think the reason I'm so depressed is because i'm always unfulfilled
I live my life day to day
I crave knowledge and passion
but finding it is hard
when I know the only things that would ever hold my interest long enough for a satisfying career need doctorates
and I'm too lazy and unmotivated to go to classes every day to be told things I already know
to go into debt for knowledge I obtained years ago
There's no easy way to get into infectious or rare genetic diseases
no easy way to become an exotics vet
I wish I could skip the basics
The day to day is taxing

broken conversation
awkward and too overly formal for both our tastes
I tried to hide my anger and pain behind politeness
feigned interest about your day and life
when really the only thing I wanted to know was how you were doing without me
you expected to do better without me
I dont think you're doing better without me
I won't say it though,
trying to give you some semblance of pride in the mess you created
in our short conversation I tried to make you feel something again for me
not love, no--
maybe something along the lines of regret and jealousy
I am doing better
I am doing fine without you
My world is moving on just like how you said yours would
I think your world is moving too
only yours is in a slow reverse
and mine is in a steady, forward pace

I don't want to exsist for awhile
But I'm told that's suicidal ideation
And I realize time again that yes I have depression
I want to call into work sad
Tell them I cant do this today
Or any day for that matter
That my brain is missing chemicals here and has too many chemicals there and it makes me exhausted physically, mentally, emotionally
But I can't call into work sad
I can't take a personal day to not exsist
There are jobs to be done and people counting on me
Ironic that anyone would when I cant even count on myself
How could I ever explain that I fight every day with a body that doesn't want me to exsist
How do I explain that showing up to work took more energy than my coffee fueled brain has
How do I explain that while I dont want to die,

I dont want to be.

The only steady thing in this world is the fire in yourself--
A burning, constanly flickering flame refusing against all odds to die out
You are here
You are burning

I hate the way we teach English in schools
it's so structerd
and rigid
and every paper is a carbon-copied version of a paragraph template we all learned in the fourth grade
I wish I could break that system
show students its okay to use personal pronouns and to stray from the example
that not every writer needs an outline, rough draft, second drafts, etc
That you can and should just sit down and write
don't think
just let the words fall from your fingers
I wish I could show students how incredible writing is
that poetry is all just big anlogies
that books give you better screen time than televison
that grammar and wordplay isn't hard if you find a love of language
I want to indulge every child that way I was with nights filled sitting in my mother's lap reading books instead of watching cartoons
I want to give every child the opportunity to grow and express themselves
I want to show people that writing can be and is so therapeutic and that paper and ink are much better listeners than most people could ever be
that words are so much more than they ever thought they were

There was a time I was drowning--
screaming--
air filled bubbles rising to the surface
until the darkness took over;
after awhile I found a cave,
an underwater haven where I could breathe
alone:
hidden

I managed some days to float--
aimlessly--
there in the dark;
it was cold,
and lonely;
the saltwater mixed with the tears
I didn't know I was crying;
I managed to dredge back to the cave

I was always waiting for something--
change,
light,
a hand,
but there was nothing but more darkness as far as I could see:
no way out,
the water too deep

I decided one day to take a chance--
to swim--
further than I ever had before;
up to the surface I was sure was there,
and if I drowned in the process, well
--I had already been drowning--

I was soon running out of air--
my chest burning--
I thought that:
surely this was the end

Then, a hand grabbed mine

a sudden pull

I was ****** to the surface


I saw the light for the first time in years,
and I breathed clean air into my lungs;
I stood on stable land;
I learned to walk again without the flow of water pushing against my chest

This was new--unfamiliar--
fear mixed with anticipation:
the promise that I could breathe easy again,
walk among the light,
float without sinking

It's still new--
still frightening--
but I am trying,
and I am healing,
the pruning of my fingers slowly dying down--
the salt in my chest no longer as coarse--
the darkness not nearly as daunting

you used to tell me that you could never be certain if what I told you was the truth when I had never spoken anything to you without my soul open and exposed
My honesty was always laid out before you like an animal in a trap
wounded, hiding, scared, but utterly raw and open for the ****
In truth (if you can believe me) I am not the pathological liar everyone says I am

I wish I could shed my skin like a snake
Maybe then I would feel content knowing
That this body has never been yours

  --The only time I was grateful for taking martial arts was when you were on top of me

I wish I was someone who took risks instead of calculated safe
I wish I could be spontaneous money worthless
Instead I'm careful and blunt
I am selfish to those who don't know me well
Resting ***** face is my second name
If you invite her she will back out
we're not worth her time
my time is instead spent lying on my bed reading a book I've read a hundred times over
because leaving and doing something takes so much out of me
I can't live wrecklessly
I can't be adventerous
I am too much impulse control
here take some of mine
I don't need it
I don't want it
I don't want this

I guess I was surprised when I met him
he often asks me what I love about him
I always feel bad because I’m never able to tell him
I’m always at a loss for words
and that’s a scary thing for a writer
it’s a terrifying thing to be completely speechless--letting the silence stop thoughts in a chokehold
letting that blank piece of paper blind you from
writing with its whiteness
it’s a terrifying thing to not know what to say
normally it all comes so naturally to me,
I’m able to create worlds with words,
but when I look at him, my mind suddenly forgets
what an article is and what an adjective does
it’s a terrifying thing, truly
but it’s a beautiful thing to feel the silence
for once instead of the constant hurricane of ideas pounding
at my skull, and I have to wonder if this is how it must be for everyone else

I have a bad habit of holding on to things I no longer need
I hold onto people the same way
believe in them---
try to build them up while they break themselves down
But I'm not a contractor
I don't have a permit for this operation
I can't keep avoiding the inevitable
I hate this part
This part always comes with a goodbye

maybe it wasn't love
maybe it was the perfect illusion
one where I saw myself as someone
being capable of such a concept of love
where I saw myself happier than I really was
where I didn't make compromises for
my happiness to allow you some of yours

Maybe it was fear
the fear of being alone again
the fear that it was always me all along
who wasn't capable of making a relationship last
the fear that if you weren't the one then
there was nobody else out there that could be

And you know, maybe it wasn't love
maybe it was contentedness
the feeling that I was comfortable
so that should be enough, right?
that I should be happy with being comfortable
and not being truly happy

But maybe it was love
Maybe it was love that kept me with you
so much longer than I should have been
maybe it was love causing me to sacrifice
so much time and effort and energy into us
love causing me to think differently about my future
love making me blind to other possibilities
love making me selfless rather than selfish

So I guess I should thank you
because I've realized now that it's okay to be selfish
that I don't have to compromise to be happy
that I don't have to change my wants and
dreams to match yours
and that I can find someone who shares my goals

I can thank you for the growth
Thank you for the insight
for the days of joy
and for the nights of pain that made
those happy times even sweeter

So maybe it wasn't all love
But it was real
We were real

I painted my face today and did not seek your validation
I did not think of your words telling me that I look better without it
I did not argue back saying I wore it because I liked it
We did not end the fight with me wiping my art off my skin
I wish it was because you finally learned to accept my fondness of the result
Rather than the reality that you are no longer here.

The worst birthday present I ever received
Words my sister says to me
End of August never belonged to me
It belonged to my sister, a day after mine yet two years older
It belonged to my cousin a year older same day
It belonged to my other cousin four days before mine
It belonged to my cousin younger but died of leukemia before childhood could end
My birthday has never belonged to me
It never will

It has been said tears excel as makeshift
facials
How understandably then my skin is raw

    --I haven’t cried this much in years

I think I missed something
I think I was supposed to have a hiccup in my aging where I partied and went crazy
college right?
high school?
my 20's?
I think I missed it.
I think I went straight from being a child to
a 65 year old lady who goes to bed early
with bad eyesight and who wears cardigans in
90 degree heat beause you're always cold when you're old
I think I missed it

If I could redo my life
I would change more than I probably would be able to
I would pursue the arts
As my heart has always felt at home on the stage
I would listen to everyone who told me I was worth more
I would take more time for myself
I would stop trying to please everyone
I would read more books
I would go on more night walks
I would keep in touch with more people
I would be kinder and softer and more understanding
But most of all
I wouldn’t be me

  --Experience and Regret make a person

I'm starting this new life
new town
new job
better fiends
I'm building myself up and you're still demanding a roof with no foundation
you're complaining about the lack of paintings but you don't have any walls to put them on
I've given you all the materials that I can
It hurts me to know that you wont be with me the same way on this journey anymore
seventeen years of growth has changed us both
and while I'm terrified to go without you
I know you will hold be back
I am excited to see how far I can go by only taking care of myself

I will always be your best friend

--I think you stopped being mine awhile ago

I wish my life were an etch-a-sketch
I wish I could just shake the screen
and have a blank slate
or have at least been born an
artist or a geometrist
so that my life weren't just a series of confused squiggles
because I've never been one to walk in a straight line
and I have no clue where I am or where I'm going.

These poems of mine always seem strangled
Tangled in a web of tight vocal chords
My throat can't get the words out it needs to so my hands do their bidding instead
I guess that's why none of my poems seem happy
Those words burst from my chest like firecrackers
My laugh unsurpessesble and bellowing
Much too fast for hands to grab
Happy emotions are light and feeble. Carefree and quick
Trying to grab them is fistfuls of sand in water
But the dark
The taboo
They are much more heavy
Easier to grab
The weight of those feelings only leaving by typeface
Wet cement drying then being slowly chipped away
And I am free again

And eventually your name will stop tasting like poison
and your picture will no longer stab like a knife
I will be able to face you without slowly dying
Finally able to continue on with my life

Call me basic white as I sip my iced coffee
and feel free to laugh at my obviously fake spray tan
this orange could never be natural anyways
I watch the hairdressers roll their eyes every time
I ask for black
It's my natural color, I promise them but they doubt me anyways
I became a guessing game for my co-workers
my ethnicity a puzzle with missing piece
I know Spanish but I'm not Hispanic
You look Arabic but that side of the world was never familiar to me
I say I am Native
Native American on my dad's side
Half my blood flows with that of my mutilated ancestors
Yet you see my white, coffee sipping lips and doubt
My skin in the winter is snow
but my nick name is at summer camp was snooki
my tan unbelievably orange
yet you wonder why red-skin is an insult
I am native and proud of my heritage
the only questions I get are about scholarships I never received
You say that I am lucky
and that I must be receiving so many benefits
I resist the urge to punch you in the face
I have received nothing from your people
and I never will

Everything about me dwindles down to this
broken body, mangled branches, rivers of blood
I am nothing more than true unbridled feeling
and sometimes that scares me

I blame it on a lot of things
The timing was wrong
We had different goals
The spark was gone
We just weren't on the same path
I blame a lot on outside forces
I should own up though
I only spoke when spoken to
Only hung out when asked
Never me being the one to iniate contact
I distanced myself
Emotionally
Physically
Mentally
I was our ruin
As with every relationship I've been in
I am my own downfall

I had to take a CPR class last september.
and my instructor told us we learn this
to save lives because everyone has a reason
for living
going around the table he asked us why
we were alive
family
friends
people that anchor us to the world
all the answers you would expect
for someone who was asked why they were still
alive
but when he asked me I told him I didn't have reason
how was I supposed to say that mine is spite?

I can't be there for you if you push me away
too bad for you though,
I'm quite stubborn with things that I love
You're dating a force to reckon with

I'm playing Uno with God
And they keep hitting me with a draw four.

I want someone to treat me the way I treat my poetry
With care--delibrately chosen words
I want someone to feel that rush of nostalgia and pride when they look at me,
The same way I feel when I read past font
I want someone to wonder what else I could mean to them, as if I am more than a passing fancy to be briefly admired and then forgotten
But then I think and remember
When I write my poetry I am enthralled, proud, captivated by it's words
I read it again until it's perfect and keep it close to my heart
And when it is finished it is done
Another page on my laptop
Another document to title and hide from the world
Another poem just like the rest
I go back and re read
More often than not forgetting the emotions that were once so strong I felt the need to make them physical
Forgetting what made that poem so special in that moment
Forgetting why I ever thought it was once one of my best now seeing that it was just okay
And it makes me wonder if I really want that at all

We're done, aren't we?
I've been feeling it now for a while
Too scared to let go of the one person that has been consistantly in my life that
I've been selfish
I'm sorry
But we're done aren't we?
You stopped talking to me
Say you'd rather be alone
Stopped telling me where you were going
So we're done, right?
I think I did my grieving that week you were crying and overwhelmed and I gave you some time to think about us.
I told you I'd give you some space but I'm pretty sure this is more than I bargained for
So we're done, huh?
I cant be the only one here not feeling anything
I know that you feel just as trapped as I do
And I'm tired of being emotionally used.
So we're done, aren't we?

I always thought that I
was the protagonist of my story,
why then, are you trying
to make it about yourself

I'm rocking, I'm rocking, I'm rocking
back-and-forth
and my senses are being overwhelmed
and my hands won't stop shaking
and my heart is beating loud and fast
my skin is crawling
back
forth
back
forth
I try to hum
to cancel out the quiet ringing
back
forth
my hair is touching me
my clothes suddenly feel like walls closing in back
forth
back
forth
the gentle constant motion steady
my breathing tries to mimic it
I'm rocking, I'm rocking, I'm rocking
back-and-forth

Like you my muse has been lacking; distant
Like you
My muse went from lover to friend
Upbruptly and unexpected
Like you my muse is becoming less and less of someone I know very well and very fondly and more of a tense acquaintance I pass in the grocery store with heavy eyes and a forced smile
Grocery stores are the worst though
We're always forced to meet up in a different isle
And we continue this ruse of feigned "okayness"
And you take your handfull of items and emotions to self-checkout
While I'm drowning in a cart full of ingredients I can't feasibly make a meal out of
And check out with a clerk I pay a hundred dollars every visit
And meet a nutritionist to help me shop
And you
You just get on with your life

There's a moment every day I remember
that I'm here
phone calls and probing questions
I'm forced to face the reality of my situation it's therapeutic knowing
--the process is progress--
I may not see it yet,
but slow happenings are still happening

  --- I'll get there soon

I hold resentment towards you deep in my veins
every mention of you stirs something thick and dark--
I try to add water to thin it
the tears are never enough to smooth the churning
I feel the shame I don't believe you feel
this has become my normal
I keep trying to feel other things;
but resentment becomes anger and hurt rather than healing and forgiveness--
Still I stir

I heard just what you said
empty promises on your breath
A cup of coffee in between
I'm meeting your eyes through the steam
But it's like when I talk
I'm a coprse not a human being
Because I'm sure you heard what I said
But I can tell you don't really see me

And like you
The coffee is bitter on my tongue
I hope next time you shoot your shot
That you're the one who gets stung

Growing up,
my mother always said
that life isn’t always fair.
I’ve come to realize
that this is only one of the
many lessons that I will take
away from my mother

    --But it should be

And I want to mark you as my territory like how girls mark theirs in Bobby pins on bathroom sinks

I hold these superstitions dear to me
knowing they're nonsense and choosing to ignore that reality
I step cautiously over the cracks in the sidewalk on good days
and on bad ones I stomp on every one hoping you feel the pain that I do
I know you don't deserve it mother, but my feet land on them still
I still throw spilled salt over my shoulder
hoping that maybe this time some luck will come of it
and I avoid walking under ladders if not for safety's reason than for those years of bad luck
Believe me when I say that I know these petty rituals won't affect an invisible force like luck
But I wear my night shirt inside out and backwards thinking that somehow it will cause snow to appear
These superstitions of mine may be childish
It may be downright insane for any sensible young woman to believe in such a thing
But I hold onto this childish hope that maybe
just maybe
If I do enough of these superstitious acts
that my life will finally turn around
and for once I will be lucky....

I've always been a liar. Compulsively, reluctantly, neededly, jokingly, egotistically a liar. Yet, the one I've told the most lies to is myself. I believe sometimes if you say a lie enough that sometimes it becomes the truth. I believed that if I said I'm fine enough that eventually it would come to pass. But it doesn't work. I can fool every other person on this earth, but the one person who can see through my lies is the only one I wish could believe them.

I dont speak truthfully with my psychiatrist
The fear of mental hospitals keep my lips glued
I know that there should be somebody that I can speak to about anything
But the daunting premonition of being crazy keeps me chained in this cage of mine
These glass walls in my brain are bullet proof
No amount of "how does that make you feel" will ever break through
I want to tell someone everything
How I want to **** myself
How I have multiple ways planned out
But those plans would leave me institutionalized and the fear of that chokes down the words in my throat
I wont do it
I wont commit that taboo
But the fact that I have plans
That I close my eyes driving cars
That I see how long I can last without medication in a hospitalized withdrawal keeps me quiet
I fear to be known by my illness
By my crazy and my unpredictable
I got help once
Medication paired with therapy
And lies fighting back the truth
I wouldn't be here If my impulse control was normal
I wouldn't be here if they knew