This is for the people who know how it feels to be at lost and thrown off balance.

For the people who know how it feels to plaster on a convincingly intoxicated facade so that they can drag their vacant yet burdensome bodies around without a doubt in mind.

The people who know that their world is beginning to slowly crumble around them while they try to hold onto the remaining pieces.

People who know and cease to believe that they have the ability and courage to let go of the dense obscurity in their chests to let in the weight lifting fluorescent.

Who know that they should give up but refuse to give in.

Those are the people who know.

And are not alone.

I THOUGHT I WAS OVER YOU BUT IT'S SO OBVIOUS THAT I'M NOT BECAUSE EVERY TIME I SEE YOUR FACE AND YOUR LIPS AND YOUR BEAUTIFUL EYES MY CHEST STARTS TO HURT AND I IMAGINE THAT I AM DROWNING IN MY OWN BLOOD, AND I BEGIN TO GET BUTTERFLIES BUT NOT THE ONES FROM FIRST GRADE WHEN LOVE WAS JUST AN ILLUSION, BECAUSE THESE BUTTERFLIES ARE TEARING MY HEART APART STRING BY STRING, YET I AM COMPLETELY FINE WITH IT BECAUSE IT'S ALL FOR YOU.

but i will.
i will write it and it may take me
five minutes
or it may take me fifty.
and neither of the two is an absurdly long amount of time,
unless you really think about it.
because five measly minutes
is just the same
as three hundred seconds.
and three hundred seconds
is just the same
as three hundred thousand milliseconds.

we've only just covered one-tenth of an entire fifty minutes,
yet already we have before us
three hundred thousand intricate units of time,
each lasting for the blink of an eye -- no, less --
then vanishing,
like the evanescent remains of a flame
that has been reduced
to first sparks,
then dull embers,
then ashes.

the funny part about it is that you never know
what each tiny little bubble of time might hold,
what might happen when it forms,
or when it pops.

a millisecond is incredibly short,
almost unfairly so.

but three hundred thousand milliseconds?

it can't be said what could happen as those fleeting fractions
slip away.

we may try to grab hold of them,
to catch them in our palms.

but time stops for no one.

so you may find yourself
with empty, bleeding palms,
as a reminder that time is harsh, cruel,
tyrannical.

and as you wrap bandages around your wounds
(or maybe not),
those fleeting milliseconds
will laugh with sudden bursts of cynicism,
like fireworks,
deafeningly silent.

they will laugh
at what a fool you were,
thinking you could catch time
in the palms of your hands.

(a.m.)

i can never really organize my thoughts,
so much to the point that
at one moment
i might be thinking that nothing could be worse
than it already is,
but at the next,
i might be admiring the beauty of life,
and how everything is grand,
and how i can almost see the sparkles that emerge from the stardust in your veins.

i can never really stick to one thing,
so much to the point that,
at one moment
i might be writing lines of poetry about veins brimming with stardust,
but at the next,
i may be considering what an utter cliché
that line is.

i can never really make up my mind,
so much to the point that,
at one moment
i might be intent on the idea that stardust as a whole
is a cliché, cliché, cliché,
but at the next,
i may not care at all.

who gives a ****?

it's not about what's cliché and what's not.

it's simply about the thoughts,
the words,
the beauty.

all at once.

but the problem with me is,
i can never really organize my thoughts,
so much to the point that
at one moment
i might be pouring my thoughts into this poem,
but at the next,
my mind might be frozen.
e m p t y .
bare.

sometimes my mind
doesn't like to cooperate.
but as of now,
it is.

and i've decided
that stardust
is a total cliché.

i do not doubt, though,
that it is one hell of a beautiful cliché,
perhaps much like my mind.

(a.m.)

i can't help but laugh at the fact
that you're wasting your life away
on something so
very terribly evanescent.

(a.m.)

i don't know if you remember it. those times when i was in love with you. maybe they're shoved in the back of your brain, in a cabinet marked 'useless.' you might never meet me, anyway. why should you care?
i don't know if you know that you broke me. but you did. i don't blame you, though. why would you want me, anyway?
i don't know if you still bring a blade to your precious skin because you think you're worthless. but you aren't. you're so incredible. your mind still amazes me. and i love you. i may not be in love with you, but i love you. and i want to be in love with you.
i don't know if you still think of me. i know you probably don't.
but, god, i hope you do.

dearly,
a.m.