i don't watch home movies
hate them
reason being because
when i was young
i was looking for a movie
my mother
had recorded for me
and accidentally
put one in the vcr
that i'm not sure
i was supposed to see
i know the obvious response
"uh oh, ****"
sorry to disappoint
they were only marked with dates
  1991
on live television
montel williams asks my father
"how can you just throw
your child away like a piece of trash?"
   1994
i spend so much time
in the emergency room
that my parents stop
penciling in growth marks
on the frame
of my bedroom door
i always thought
it was because they believed
i would never grow out
of this sickness
sometimes i believe
the reason that they
never bought me a dream catcher
was because they never thought
i'd live long enough
to see them come true
   1996
i am eliminated
from a spelling bee
because i didn't know
the 'dad' is silent in 'family'
   2013
before i got into poetry
i used to do standup
none of my jokes were funny
one of the other comics
tells me my skits are dry
sometimes sad
he says "why don't you joke
about something like your family?"
so i say
"i never wore any sunblock
because i didn't want anything
to keep me from my father"
i say "what do you call christmas
without lights or heat?"
before he has a chance
to answer
i say "1997. better yet
why don't you
make like a dad and
leave"
   2014
every time we drive
past the hospital
my mother reminds me
how much it cost to save my life
like she'd rather
have her money back
she doesn't have to say
that sometimes she wishes
it was me who had died
instead of my brother
i can hear it in the way
she says "love you"
sometimes i imagine
that if i were to die
that she
would pick out a casket for a child
because she never loved
the person i became
yesterday i told my father
how close i'd been
to suicide lately
and he said
"that's my boy,
livin on the edge.."
and i can't remember
if i laughed
or cried

Hell is loving you in my sleep and waking up alone

It was past midnight and emotions were on full blast,
sifting through every ounce of my body until it
amounted to a complete numbness.

Or perhaps it was the liquor that resided so comfortably
within my system.

Regardless, you cornered yourself in my heart merely nine
months ago, and though you banished without hesitation,
a part of you still sticks to me like glue.

I wonder if I'm ever a thought
that dashes across your mind.

I guess I wouldn't know now.

--


The over-used phrase "I love you" had never poisoned the air
between me and a boy I admired.
[not until you]
I would swallow the words
before I made the mistake to reveal my heart.

It gets tattered and stepped on that way, you know.

Of course you knew.

I was draped in innocence
with a go-lucky demeanor and
an optimistic soul.

Maybe you liked that about me;

I guess I wouldn't know now.

--

I had never had someone fall so quickly
into the palm of my hand.
I was astounded and thrown off guard,
because here was a beautiful blue-eyed damaged soul
who bargained that I save him.

Sure, I put on my cape and soared
through your darkest thoughts,
hoping to eliminate them with a quirky
smile or to hold you so tightly I could feel
you breathe.

But you set me on a pedestal so high off
the ground that reality wasn't something
I could grasp anymore.

"You're perfect, everything about you is perfect."

I cringed at the word,
because I knew I nowhere near resembled perfection.

But you drowned me in pretty words that
made my heart smile.

You showed me off in public because
you were that proud to call yourself mine.

I thought I was enough, you
thought I was
enough.


I wasn't.

But you "really care about me",
right?


I guess I wouldn't know now.

--

I feel so simple-minded because
we barely had a chance;

it's for the better, I know.

but maybe someday the thought of
you won't make my stomach hurt.

Maybe ultimately,
we will be able to hold a conversation,
face to face,
without falling apart.

Or maybe
I really did love you;

maybe some twisted part of you
really did love me.

I guess I wouldn't know now.

I miss you so badly that when I take a breath all I can breathe in is your last goodbye and the way you kissed me once upon a time and your favorite e-cigarette flavor ("because I don't want to be blowing smoke in your face all the time" you said when you bought them and the lady behind the counter laughed and tapped into the register with too-long nails and asked you to tell her if they worked well and you rubbed your thumb in tiny circles as you gripped my hand as though you would never hold it again.) When I blink all I see is your favorite color and when I lay awake at night haunted by the promises you made and the ones you never made, I hear that one song by The Black Keys playing again and again. I know that wherever you are, you're doing better things and thinking better thoughts than I am, but I can't help but grip to the idea that maybe when you lay in bed at night you remember my heavy breathing on the couch where we made love and the music that made me cry and how cold I was the night you left.

You ripped me open like a present on Christmas Day.

Cold hands in a warm bed on a dark night.

The Eskimos and butterflies taught me how to kiss you.

You smell like cinnamon and shampoo and too many tears.

Jumping rope and sticky grins and blacktop promises in chalk.

I would trade my sanity for another kiss with you.

Sharing music with you was like reading you my diary.

Soiled sheets tell stories I could never bear to share.

Sometimes I wonder if you really smoke to **** yourself.

You taste like sin and safety at the same time.

I remember holding your hand, never wanting to let go.

Kiss me like I am oxygen and you're on Mars.

The lines on your hands are rivers, whispering your past.

Good music and elephants and heartbreak remind me of you.

I'm going to throw up I'm going to faint I'm going to hit the floor and let the blood pound pound pound in my head like a ******* drum like the one that our good friend Chris plays.
And I'm going to cry and I'm going to scream and I'm going to tear out my skin and my eyes will burn red like a sunrise like the sunrise we watched that morning when I gave you everything.
I'm going to hit the wall with my fists and yell and yell until my throat is raw and "why did I fall so ******* deep oh my gosh HOW WAS I SO STUPID SO. *******. Stupid."
I can't even type because my hands are shaking and my head is pounding and my chest is heaving and I'm going to throw up. I'm going to throw up.

She kissed me
not because
she wanted to
but because
she could.

We fell in
love.
Not because
we could
but because
we wanted to.

We made
mistakes.
Not because
we wanted to
but because
we could.

We thought
we were
perfect.
Not because
we could
but because
we wanted to.

I vomited in
the bathroom
of a
Baltimore
7-11
because
sometimes
you cannot
hold it in
much
longer.

Her hands shook
as she held her
mirror
because
sometimes
your reflection
can only
tell you
so much.

My body shook.
Her body stiff.
And when
the bodies
move
the hearts
stop.

She lied some.
I drank words.
The veins
in hands
are maps
to imagined
consciousness.

Really,
it's just
a
*******
*****.

Music to
my ears.
Nervousness
between
blinks.
Noise to
my brain.

She said,
"I love you"
not because
she wanted to
but because
she could.

I said,
"I love you, too,"
not because
I could
but because
I wanted to.

If I could only sit still, I would write a million words about us, about you, about me at the bottom with my hands on that rock.
Scratching my fingernails against it so that I could go home and complain to you about how much my tiny hands hurt, and how I could not hold them in yours.
If I could hold my train of thought, I would type out a memoir about you and me and the time we decided to make love in a parking garage elevator late at night, my back against the glass. And who might’ve seen us while they walked home.
Their names and their faces, all those people that aren’t us. I would write about how when those doors opened, the world outside had changed and so had we.
If I could keep my fingers steady, I would dial your number on my telephone. I would cry your name into the speaker, and I would wait patiently for you to take me back.
I would be on hold forever.

You know you're growing older when there's no more comfort in sleeping in your mothers bed,
And everything is confusing and complicated and so, so loud inside your own head,
But you know you're growing stronger when you head into the dark alone and found
Yourself actually trying to find the volume button, and turn all the pounding, the screaming voices,
down