I feel like i’m going through a bad breakup with all my friends.
Maybe it’s just the rain
maybe its cause i’m emotional
maybe it’s cause I haven’t showered in 3 days
maybe it’s cause i spend more time on social media than I do living
maybe it’s cause i don’t really eat anymore
maybe it’s because i’ve hit a creative high and everything is coming to the surface
maybe its cause i’m home alone
maybe it’s cause my sleep schedule is STILL messed up
maybe its cause i dream about you
maybe it’s because waking up hurts
maybe its because there’s a hole in my chest
maybe its cause i expect too much
maybe it’s cause life happens, life gets busy, life forgets to care
maybe it’s cause I forgot to care
Maybe its cause trying hurts
maybe its cause bitterness just tastes so **** good
maybe it’s cause i’m passive aggressive sometimes
maybe its cause the world consists of more than I
maybe it’s cause I tried to hold on, I fought, i thought
Maybe it’s cause they don’t answer my calls or texts anymore
maybe it’s cause for every “definitely tomorrow” there never was one
maybe its cause this is growing up
maybe it’s cause this is just how it is now
I feel like i’m going through a bad breakup with my friends
we talk only three sentences at a time
and it hurts
so I hope you’re happy
tell adulthood I said hi.

Structure

Chaos

Society way.

Bars

Shackles

Time taken away.

Heart beat

Don't breathe.

Steady hands

Shaking feet.

Conform, conform, conform, repeat.

Comfort

Ignorance

Keep us enslaved.

Unaware

Unquestioning

We weren't born this way.

Face made of stone

Eyes made of glass

Hearts made of plastic

Mind made of brass.

Opinions

Creativity

Individuality

Wash it all away.

Conform, conform, conform, repeat.

Will I be a robot one day?



Watch

Don't talk.

Read

Don't speak.

Walls built tall

Privacy in breech.

Complacency

Security

Uniformity

Preach.

Don't chip the marble

Originality is inside.

Don't break the bottle

Thats where everyones feelings hide.

Inside, Inside, Inside, Internalize.

Destroying humanity

One insecurity at a time.

I'm driving down the interstate
i've got an hour and a half till I reach home
it's 10:30 pm and ......I'm alone.
and i don't know if its because i'm alone or because its night or because its both that I start sinking
Down into my thoughts
an uncomfortable disease but a comfortable numbness
to the girl who feels to much.

As I was driving I began thinking about how things ended up like this?
How you started putting up thick glass walls with a closed curtain wherever I used to be able to enter in
a concussion waiting to happen
because I used to not have to ask for permission
and when i ask you will gouge out my eyes
because you can't hide the guilt
of overgrown insides coming out of your face.

How the one time I poured out dripping paint bottles of every color till they were empty down the stream
in an attempt to make a watercolor I made muddy water filthy
and you mocked me.
You the cleansing rain who was pure enough for any man
You the garden whose soil could birth life from any death
You the lovers
You the adventures
You the foreigners
to the girl who feels too much.

How does one get to the scene of a car wreck
when there is traffic, distance, and impatience in-between
where you need to be
and where you were six months ago.


I started thinking,
wondering,
If I was getting bad again
and
what the heck that meant.
and if the numbness of the night is just an aesthetic
giving drugged consent to the monsters
so that they can wreck havoc
without me experiencing any of the consequences
at least
not until morning.

I started thinking about the future
and
what the heck that meant
and how it feels more like the present
except its not gift wrapped
its a broken duck taped
cardboard box.
When I pick it up it feels like nothing
When I shake it it sounds like
people telling me to
go back to school
people telling me
to get a job
people asking me
"what are you doing?"
and "when?"
and "how?"
which are all things I don't have the answer to.

People say I have time
but there's only an hour left on this highway
and I am miles behind
watching every tail light pass.

But as I notice the taillights I notice the headlights
and remember that when I was little I used to squint my eyes at them
tilt my head from side to side
and make them dance.
Then I began to think about hope
and how it is nowhere and everywhere
in nothing
and in everything
the difference
is up to you.
How just as the waves never grow tired of kissing the shore
The stars never grow tired of shining into the night
No matter how dark and how hard it may be sometimes
They shine.
and if a speck of burning exploding gas can fight and sacrifice itself to be a dot of light in a dark world
Then I will poke holes with this pencil into my consuming darkness
and explode into my own night sky
leaving those who take the time to notice in breathless awe.
Because darkness might be the blanket you sleep under
but hope is the pillow under your head, the person you're sleeping next to, the stuffed animal you've cuddled with since you were five.

And If there is hope in the stars
then there is hope in the streetlights
and the headlights
and the city lights
for they would serve no purpose without their dark.
So I too will strike a match of purpose against my dark
and even when they go out
I will strike
I will strike
and I will strike
because sometimes hope is work
but it's in endless supply
and sometimes just like the lights on a cell tower
hope blinks.

Maybe I am bound to be the girl who feels too much
with the car wreck life
and the cardboard box
and veins that will always half expect to be put to sleep
but as I pull into my driveway
I notice
I never did have an empty passenger seat.

Do you ever meet someone who has a messy room
clothes scattered everywhere knickknacks empty food wrappers piled so high you can't even see or find the floor because it's buried under miles of a mess
and when you ask the person why they don't clean it up they say
I know where everything is
I like it this way
it's comfortable
I'm used to it
comfortable messes
we make those a lot in our lives maybe not in our rooms but certainly in our minds
we the ones that feel too much
Misunderstood
rejected
Neglected
Ignored
spending our whole life fighting for just a scrap of attention
that falls from the table of the normal ones
the holy gods
who know what love without doubt reflection without disgust
friendship without fear
life without a façade feel like
because they aren't being constantly traumatized by their thoughts.
I am on a first name basis with depression and anxiety
They come over nightly and are the first ones that greet me in the morning. Trash talking me to sleep and warping my perception when I wake. Apologizing with every inhale cursing me with every exhale but at least they hold me and say "I'm here" an abusive comfort but it's comfort none the less since nothing else offered it's hand when I asked
Its front door is my ribcage
its favorite place is my cheeks.
I became a home
letting sadness fill the vacancy tragedy put in my chest
and I guess being needed was nice when I didn't think anyone else did.
I was unaware of renovation they had in mind
Replacing my passions with paralysis
My deity with doubt
My social scene with solitude
My self esteem with sharp objects
And the persuasive whisper that it will feel good I promise replaced my cry for help and turned me into an addict with the pink flesh to prove it.
I even get to wear short sleeves cause nobody notices
Cue the incessant bullying of being an attention seeker
Because I didn't pull down the curtain of long sleeves over my struggle
I was honest and you said I was weak
But you're right
I am not sick
I do not need a doctor
I am a circus act
And the ringmaster is suicide.
I did all I could
I asked and you denied
I verbalized and you said it was an illusion
Well how about a disappearing act
Where I will hear the applause of my consistent companions depression and anxiety and all the boys and girls who mocked me and even you who kept going even though I said no
You took my worth by the roots and planted deception in its place and deception became truth because worth had already withered away
I am standing in a room and I cannot find the floor
It is a mess but I am used to it
This is how I was raised
Drowning in the sorrow and it's comfortable.



But you'd miss the colors wouldn't you?
The green of the grass
The blue of the water
The pink of bubblegum
The red of roses
You'd miss the sunsets wouldn't you?
For every time you went on a walk at dusk and said "this can't be the last one I see"
And you'd miss the future wouldn't you even though it seems incredibly dim right now and the pointlessness is the point to a pen of grief with which you'd scratch out every what if and possibility
But the pens not in your hand
And the right king can put Humpty Dumpty back together again
Your life doesn't always have to be held together by a safety pin
It will take time but there is always the option of a needle and thread
So once more will you extend you hand if I told you that hope is willing to reach back
And it has scars just like you
Misunderstood
Rejected
Abandoned
And bullied too
Hope isn't ashamed to associate with you it
It's favorite sound is your voice
So you have a choice  
Will you let the reasons win or will you let hope in?
You can still be a home
You have a garden inside you but you now have a gardener that knows how to let worth grow
And it's only renovation plan is to evict the
Unwanted
Unneeded
Unloved
Unimportant
Identity you've been
Living in
Because you may be on a first name basis with depression and anxiety but they are not your friends
Because they never fed you love they made you overweight with lies instead
But hope has a scarlet thread and it knit a sweater for your heart because it is fragile and hope never wants to tear it apart and I promise you that redemptive love says you're enough
And it washes over you like the euphoria of a kid going to Disney for the first time
Acceptance without alteration
Kindness overthrows isolation
You are so much more than the stress that got to you, that's why Hope died on a cross, to say I love you.
I am standing in a room
It's a mess that's im used to
But I'm finally uncomfortable
I'm willing to risk starting again
I'm on a first name basis with Jesus
And as he clears it all away
The weight of freedom falls
My sadness doesn't own me anymore
I can finally see the floor.

Cover me in the black sheet.
Flood me with taunts of the stars
Let them shoot at me.
I'll take a nova right to the chest,
Absorb its dying breath
A bursting beautiful chaotic mess.
Stardust, its existence, now ash.
I don't know why it gets harder at night
My chemicals collide, they kiss all night, but their love is my fight and I can't **** them every time because it is so passionate
like Romeo and Juliet, young and dumb, they'll sacrifice me so their love can live on.
Why am I the vessel of the lonely panging flesh.
Inhaling sharply taking wounds from someone else with each breath.
But I'm unaware of all the gaping holes in me because I'm a werewolf and by morning i have no recollection of bleeding.
But the holes are starved at night and they seep through my clothes soaking my mind.
I lie in pools of letting my insides roam but every day I swear that this will no longer be my home.
From the belly of the beast I'm now at it's nashing teeth,
it swallowed me once but after walking through guts I've finally reached
an opportunity, but the PM comes and the black ***** me back down the esophagus i have fought and fought leaving red scratches down it as my fingers claw.
I thought maybe if I loved enough it would ***** me up.
Maybe if I was content I'd be able to call this games bluff.
But the black sheet comes for me and I can hear the crickets sing
and when the dawn comes I'll be out again
but the sheet of night will come and take me right back in.

Do you think one day he'll look at me?
Do you think one day I'll be more important than a screen? There are treasures to plunder, worlds to explore, battles to fight, people to be.
He spends his time escaping from reality and I spend my time wishing he would notice me.
Is it a wasted wish? A futile matter of want pulled by the marionette strings of my parched heart?
There is no void for him to fill in me for I'm not half a person I'm fully complete. I just want someone to see me and think I'm more important than a gameboy or TV.
Am I worth anyone's while?
Is he a man or still a child?
Do I even like who he is or just the words he's written?
We are strangers, I am too shy and have no right to be smitten.
Who was I to think our palms were made to fit?
When my fingers are broken glass
Cracking shards no one wants to risk
touching for fear of infection
Held up by my arms that are vines I am twisted and limp with skewed perception.
That there is not beauty in this patchwork organism. Disfigured irrelevant objects sewn together. I am the antonym of humanity because my beating heart requires attention and we'd rather offer that commitment to things pixelated. Cyber connection no flesh relation.
Distant. Uninvolved.
Short attention spans because we don't want our hands in the soil of struggle we want them pristine in the waters of victory. When was the last time you felt mud between your feet? Your skin thirsts for the drink of the sun but instead you feed it wifi lethargy.
Binging every day
Looking for a reason to stay
Alive to stay connected networked together the new social interaction when no ones really saying anything we just throw ourselves out there with such little respect for transparency
We've forgotten how to laugh and how to live without our phones on our hips.
Love documented in texts and dating apps. We don't love anymore with phone calls or physical contact.
We are armadillos, turtles, and porcupines with our defenses up ready to strike or hide at any moment if you get close enough. But I want to be a comb jelly, all my insides you can see. I have no hard exoskeleton and no tentacles that sting just a rainbow illusion that propels me.
Then maybe I will be I intriguing enough. For you to put down your controller and start coming undone. I am vulnerable, I'd like to unravel you one thread at a time, I am fragile but we can make a three stranded rope that will be unbreakable overtime. And occasionally you can run back to your inviting adventure world of virtuality but please promise me that I'll always be more important than a screen.

140

She just needed to grow a little taller to be a little thinner to stare into the mirror she stood in front of in her mind. Disproportionate in one area, it's a joke that your late to bloom, but really you should try and fix that cause you don't have a lot of room. We love the way you smile just not the way you look. Applauded for her performance ability but heckled for her body imagery. At 10 years old she didn't look like the rest but it didn't bother her cause in a few years she would be the best.

158

"Excuse me can I ask you something?" Stopped by a group on the stairs, "sure" "are you pregnant?" "No" she was only a freshmen there. She fit the desk at school just fine, she exercised she ate kind of right, so why was her tummy just not the right size? Sticking out just a little past her breast and thighs. It started to get to her just a little bit more, as self consciousness got amplified she tried to ignore. Not fat just broad she told herself everyday but the doctor said overweight for your age and the little hope she had died that day.

155

So came the doctors appointment and the looking for clues, so came working out for months with no results, what else was she supposed to do? 7 diets, only one prevailed, a victorious week but the scales still failed. Yet a sliver lining was to be found at the bottom of the well, as thyroid gland was the culprit here causing fat to cling to her frame in fear. But still it did not go away, not for 6 whole months. And that dear friends is when the Junior now had finally had enough.

152

"Well if this is where I'm at it's not so bad, I've tried my best so I should really be glad. The bikini look won't ever be for me, I'll never be a model but both those things I don't want to be. I should simply accept me for me cause it's just a body and it's not the worst it could be." Finally the girl accepted her stomach for what it was, she still ate right and took her pills but now it was out of love. She stopped looking at the sizes and getting on the scales, she danced her little heart out and her insecurities stopped making her frail.

It took a year and she didn't even notice until a relative said "you're looking great" she stepped on the scale in disbelief as that 152 was now a 138.

I have *******, although I wish I could wrap them up. Make my size D a size A then I could wear all the trendy stuff. Then it wouldn't be too tight it wouldn't cling it would just hang. My shadow would be a rectangle and I could wear whatever I wanted without shame. Is it too low cut, is the graphic awkwardly placed am I drawing the wrong attention to myself if I don't cover every inch from my chest to my face? They say I'm too modest but they don't know what I've endured. 90% of my closet is t-shirts because I am tired of my body defining my worth.

You'll look at my ***, you'll look at my thighs, you'll look at my chest and stomach but never my eyes. You'll never know where the first sentence of my story lies because my figure is the only thing you idolize. And it doesn't bother me at all what I look like, but it boils my blood to no end that because I'm not showing off for you you think I'm a ****?

When I was 15 I wore basketball shorts and tshirts to school almost everyday, I dressed for comfort not to impress, this was high school not the Paris couture runway. Maybe it was because I didn't wear makeup or have my hair down or let my hips sway that they questioned my sexuality, I wasn't conforming to society's way.

I wore a dress on picture day and everyone was in shock, boys called me pretty for the first time but I didn't give a ****. I wore what I did for me, not so that they would be pleased. I was sickened that this change of scenery actually left them weak in the knees. When before they never even noticed me and they wouldn't ever again. Even when I was 18 and I had my first boyfriend , he said "are you sure you aren't a lesbian?" Because I wouldn't touch his **** and I didn't want to so that was the end.

Then I began to explore the notion that maybe I was all they said. I'd never thought about girls like that before but I had no ****** desire for men. I told this to you and you said you were experimenting too so you kissed me without my consent. You said it was just for fun but was it fun when the messages started to come, saying I was gay when I didn't even love you that way. In fact I hated you, I was used and abused and torn in two.

To this day people still ask me what I am I tell them I'm straight I just don't want ***. To which they reply the right **** will change your mind or maybe you're a lesbian because my desire for *** is how my gender is defined? I just want to be noticed like everybody else, to be loved by a boy not his **** or his wealth. And these stereotypes that everyone puts me in to is because *** sells so to the carnivorous media I say *******.

Its easier to tell people I've just been staying up too late.
That I lost track of time in a book or a show or a song.
It's easier to say that I've been writing a lot or it was an accident,
the time, when I looked at the clock
But the waves I've been told are in my eyes, see no shore in sight. They crash against themselves restless and relentless begging for some substance, some rescue from their depth.
Its easier to say anything than to admit I am depressed.
My mouth offers those fragile words like a poor orphan lifts its trembling hands. And the cold bite these impoverished muscles have sustained beg for the warmth of rest.
But when I say I am depressed and I have thoughts, greedy scheming cackling and cunning figures that torment me yet are children of my anatomy. And I cannot stop them for they are chemical beings. The guards of my vaults turned to dust running rampid through my neurological waves transmitting.
It is easier to lie than say these things kept me up all night. Than to say I have a better friend in my ceiling and in my bed then I do with sad cathartic feelings in my head.
It is silent and I stare.
There is a lamp in the distance and it's glow feeds hope thin as a spiderweb to my conscious constant despair. As the hours pass and I become vengeful my fight between becoming more and less aware.
The unified splits and divides it pulls and separates, hemispheres left and right creating two alternative sides of me. There's one militant that says get up and one that just says no.
No because it is afraid, no because it is sorry, no because it has obeyed the skewed perception that it is guilty. She is scared, she is stained with ideas that do not match her character but she clings to them because they have clung to her and truth is a steady companion but her truth was not right.
The other half is the anger yelling "why the hell are you like this?" and " Life gets so much better, think of all the things you're going to miss." Or accusing her of being meek and frail for attention, slapping her face, pressing knuckles into her heart, she is strong with her air of condescension. Yet she is the little self love her mass can contain. Her motivation is harsh but it holds the other as it sobs cooing and assuring "it's okay".
It's easier to sleep all day and not deal with any of this than have to explain it to you when you ask. Majority of the time I am met with knives not of verbal speech but of ignorance, inept hands and averted eyes.
It's easier to put on a face and say it was just one time than have you walk past my tear stained cheeks refusing to offer comfort as I anticipate the night. You know yet you do nothing so I would rather keep you unaware.
Than tell you I'm depressed so when you let me down the blame is mine to bear.

The serum made from
Venomous leaves dripping poison
Fire smoke that puffs ectasy
And the flesh that needs it so desperately.
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
It's the chemicals on my lips and in my brain
Steady inhale
Shaking exhale
I am not the same
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
It was the cigarette, or it was the rock
It was the alcohol, it was **** on my laptop
Sweet euphoric self destruction
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
I didn't know the first time would lead to this. An ******* sensation sealed with deaths kiss.
Like morphine in my veins oh god oh god what a thrill
As the stress leaves my body
I bind my name to addictions will
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
I drank that serum fast
Toxic infection with intent to last.
But I was unaware
Of the intense hard grip metal could bear
As it bites at my flesh, fangs fully exposed to tear, leaving my porcelain canvas to wear, a shade of red stitched with despair.
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
The dagger cuts, shallow and deep
It leaves me numb as my emotions rush to feast
on that flavor of being leaked
Out of the open wounds that cry freedom from me.
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
Rust knows nothing of me, for my heart and mind are still beating as wild chaotic company. And I feel overwhelmed, circumstances have driven me to
Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat.
My one faithful friend
Giving me strength and peace of mind.
While threatening my life all at the same time.
Everyday for 3 years I kept this glutton healthy and by my side
Releasing me of anxiety
Relieving me of strife
Ruining my chances of ever being alright and leaves ridges in the soft spots of my arms and thighs.
Repeat repeat repeat all day and all night, drink the serum at your own risk you're signing away the last sane piece of your mind.
It was the cigarette , it was the rock
It was alcohol, it was **** on my laptop.
For me it was a blade that I happily obeyed.
Lines on my body was the price that would be paid.
I don't do it anymore but the glutton still knows my name
Saying Release. Relief. Ruin. Repeat. Is an offer that can't be beat.
But like the scalding lungs and nostrils of addicts using who'd had enough.  I furiously tell you there's a way, the exit sign illuminates above a door labeled "self love"

This quiet dainty floral being
With crystal eyes and a delicate frame
Her lips are the fruit shimmering in the light
Her mind is alive like the stars that shoot in the night
Her hair is colored silk flowing to compliment her face
Her skin the softest petal plucked on the very first day
Of Spring, of joy, of love, of life, when you remembered breathing isn't a labor as long her fragrance is what your lungs are filled with.
You've never seen her smile but if you did your sure it would be the sun
You've never heard her voice but you're   sure it would be the gentle stream, running water which you want to drink of.
As cracks in a wall allow a little gold to slip through is broken parts
Anticipation to see the radiance locked behind the crack in her mouth is what caused my business of thieving to start.
I am a thief for I steal glances all the time, but there is no lust of flesh so it is not a crime.
And there must be something in me, nearly as bright as she
For her body is a window and all that reflects back is vivid color concerning me.
This is the wanderlust girl which every boy wants
And as I watch him watch her I know it is something I will never become.

I'm just waiting for the day you tell me you love her.
The loss will creep in slowly but surely like an overdose
All the words will swell in my throat
An emotional ER where there is no hope.
Every mouth confessing "I told you so"

I'm just waiting for the day you tell me you've loved her for a while.
The picture I've been staring at starts to shift and breathe
Hanging artwork I once knew intricately I now I observe inquisitively
Watching the imagine slip to an empty frame in front of me

I'm just waiting for the day where you have stolen smiles and glances exchanged.
Oh sunflower, you are but a stalk without your sun,
Removed from you by the shade of autumn leaves
A withered sprout cut with the glass wielded by intimacy
Now dirt at the bottom of a ravine.

I'm just waiting for the giggles and the glee and the not thinking straight
A vast expansion of stars before my eyes, the itch of the grass on my spine and your hand conversing for hours with mine.
The pavement and the passenger seat
The songs that mean something and all their beats
The fruit that falls always tastes more sweet.

I'm just waiting for the loss, the change, the taking away.
A TV channel I can't skip or look away
In a darkened room the glow of chaotic static fills my brain
Numb and paralyzed, never in your sights,
Yet I think I hear that famous Shakespeare tale playing from behind.

I'm just waiting for the replacing, my heart aching and accepting it's too late.
Does a spiders legs get stuck in the dew of a rose?
and does it's poison change the fragrance of the petals that grow?
And once the dew melts does anybody know
If the spider leaves, or if the rose lets it go?

I'm just waiting, anticipating, the outside dot I am to be
For in the waiting, in the silence, I chose not to speak.

I saw a pillar of fire and I saw a cloud an Israelite marching to promised ground
And this fire in the night blazed a trail all the way to Jerusalem
a light in the dark consuming and drawing all of our attention as the savior entered in
but he wasn't savior then he was just the Jesus man
height of his fame
top of his game
crowds know his name
and "hosanna" they proclaim
nation wide status and popularity
but all I can offer is palm branches at his feet so his ride doesn't get *****

I saw a pillar of fire and I saw a cloud an Israelite confused in the desert walking around
and this cloud by day darkened my path with its shade and I followed it down to via DelaRosa the painful way where the Savior carried my cross to Golgotha to take away my sins
but he wasn't savior then he was still just the Jesus man
height of his fame
scorned and betrayed
by the ones he came to save
even God looked away
but the ones who really loved Him had tears in his eyes while everyone else shouted crucify

And I am in both crowds
so how did I get from point A to point B somehow I find myself in between these two roads marked with glory and shame

I am the disciple saying Jesus you don't really have to die
Filling up dry cupped hands looking for the relief of rain. Refreshing words to a parched soul but it is the temptation to get drunk off of sweet nothings
It is the tension between suffering and superiority
He cried
My flesh writhes with greed longing for the captives to build a kingdom based on the pleasure of praise
But I didn't come for me I came to set people free, give my daddy back the keys m, grabbing children off their knees, letting authority be restored, relationship born, and heaven an open door
Will I be led by love or emotion?

Do I really have to go through with this or not? Haven't I already given up enough?
Gethsemane and the overwhelming grief
Meanwhile I am Judas saying "this isn't what I thought it would be"
What happened to the man we called revolutionary?
So you can fill up my hands with those sweet nothings
and I will drink deep of the bitter heavy and cheap silver you placed there

I am Peter ready to defend but also to flee because I am too ashamed to be seen with this politically defined criminal even though he washed my bare feet
so when you asked I will deny I will deny I will deny
because I favor what people think of me rather than giving away everything

And the people change their mind simply because the position of magician on the payroll was denied Their wish list weren't getting checked off they were getting left behind
And all three are a lot like me
and once again I find myself in between these two roads marked with glory and shame
fame and mock
victory and flogging  
it's in Ascension full of dissension as I wait for someone else's reign
I was in both crowds
I was the worshiper and the condemnor the admirer and the accuser
And I Wrestle and I wrestle with the gravestones in me until I am sick
And Jesus Christ I know you wrestled too
So My God my god what did you choose
with the pushing and pulling of rising choice tension
I now stand in the crowd that cries out for resurrection

I have moments

I have episodes

Lapses in time when the insecurities rise.

Like a flipping of a switch I disappear and the circus comes to town a silent exposure of my doubts and fears.

It's around the same time everyday, as the sun sets they come out to play. Just for an hour maybe a half of one or 2. And It swallows me whole, I am numb, a lack luster blue.

They say these different things all the people outside my pity tent of invisibility. They wonder why the quiet smile left my face, Why I don't mutter a word, the culprit is my over sensitivity.

Sometimes they don't notice at all and it's a cold contentment not to be needed, like a bullet I take gladly, no one even heeded, how I shut myself up

in a cocoon I am curled, I ran away in my mind to a foreign inviting world. Just me and my thoughts I am alone and I'm to blame. They whisper my name in passing but at least they know it all the same. They grab my wrists hoping I'll trip

and even with the tightest of grip I do not fall for I am more than used to this. And I become the observer to the life my shell is living. Distant, my eyes a screen and behind them in a theatre I am sitting.

Why is there comfort in the silence, in the distant, and the doubt? It's not self hatred but a warm euphoria that covers me when I am down. Why am I like this and how did I build this world? Whose the ring master of this circus who leads this parade of emptiness that follows me around the world?

I feel it growing in my chest a pleasant nuisance, this hole custom just for me. I don't mind it I don't fight it for soon enough it will flee.

And do not think for an inkling of a moment that what I have described is insanity but rather the core of human nature, the desperation of wanting someone to notice me.

I'd ask you to lay me down in fields and flowers but the insects tear my flesh. So lay me down in pools of water and I'll float till my lungs run out of breath. Take my anxious heart and take my sweaty hand, it's the adrenaline rush of lust but it's nothing I can't stand.

See I've got this pretty little fantasy of me and some boy I've yet to meet, he's got a Polaroid in this hand and I've got joy in my heart. We capture each other's smiles, in cars and fields and houses. We build a fort out of sheets and watch our story till we fall asleep.

I've come to terms that my pulse is rare and a rhythm that connects they say is out there somewhere. But I'll be content even if it's just me, stars stand alone so I'll be the brightest you've seen.

I've been watching all my friends fall in love and I'm not jealous but it hurts they're leaving me. I'll try to keep in touch but they've got shifted priorities, I'm glad they've found the one but my human significance goes back to dust.

And if that's love maybe I don't want it, to have one soul attraction and leave my loyalties behind. While I know there's nothing like it that world of falling splendor, after the fall comes responsibility and my heart is restless and untethered.

Don't bruise your bones love, don't you know they're beautiful. The foundation of all the things that grow from within your sacred storehouse. They're thick and sweet like milk and honey. The rose of your body, a sight to behold but hard to pluck, everyone has thorns, it's the human condition not your bad luck. But it's your framework none the less however catastrophic it may be. And you can flail about all you want but tantrums only show your immaturity.

Don't bruise your bones love, for they always carry you, heavy and light through all the yes no's thank and **** yous. A fragile Skelton don't let it decay for what queen did rule over the bursted blood vessels and scars when flowers and constellations are the kingdom yielding to your hand everyday.

Don't bruise your bones love, whatever trigger comes your way, take the words like the hand of a ghost, slipping through you like translucent silk, don't harbor them with a hook in your heart, don't plunge it in deep to stick. You have mountains to climb and valleys to tread, the terrain is tough enough without sealing malice inside your head.

Don't bruise your bones love, for all the hope they give, they are strength to the fallen, they are the purest form of love in this life we live. And a beacon they will be, flawed but not by you, for the world has made your bones strong without them being bruised by you.