you were a beautiful hero
and i fell in love
with safety.
you were home and heart and pulse
  beating
     beating
        beating.
you were golden and shining and charm
and i wore you
around my finger
  hoping
     hoping
        hoping.

i was electricity
destructive and
elusive.
i was a villain
worse than any
toothache.
i was twisted
caught up in
my tragedy.
i was your catastrophe
and darkness and nightmare.

you are good // i am bad

always
always
always

*(a.m.c.)

there were great lakes
pooling in the vibrations
of your voice
lake superior begged me
to love you
lake eerie screamed
and cried
and lake michigan lied
to my face.
they were too massive to overcome
and too swellingly deep to swim
i wanted to cross the lakes
from america to canada
and run across solid ground.
but a tide washed over me
and now i'm lost at sea
i didn't think you could ever
forget how to swim
but my muscles are weak
and the water so cold
and dreams so peaceful
that i think i'll just
let go.

*(a.m.c.)

you told me there were
enough words in my head
to build skyscrapers
and mountains so high
that they touched God

i told you that your
lightning bolt hands
electrocuted my foggy sleep
and ever since that day
i've been an insomniac

i tried to put lipstick
on the cuts of my mouth
but they left acid burns
so hot they felt baked
so now nobody will kiss them

ever since you left
i've been trying to learn german
so that maybe i'll have more barriers
and add language to distance and time
i'll never speak an english word again.

*(a.m.c.)

didn't you call me a dandelion?
even when i left you on the cold ocean floor
tell me about your travels
did you map out your coordinates?
so that i'll know which corner of the world
i'm restricted from seeing.
do dandelions grow where you are?
or have you changed your favorite flower
to lilies.

*(a.m.c.)

i write poetry in fifty seconds or less
sometimes the words taste like salt
and sometimes like maraschino cherries

i wonder if my blood is red or if it's purple
because pain no longer feels like the color red,
it feels like numbness, cold unsaturated color.
red is diamond and fire and volcano
and it doesn't seem fair to call myself eruption.
it would be more accurate to say that i'm sand dune
and flood
and hurricane,
something that doesn't burn painfully
but slowly sinks into your skin
like water
until you breathe in what you thought was air,
but really it's not oxygen anymore,
it's me.

this one tasted like salt.

*(a.m.c.)

quit holding up signs
in saltwater lakes
i'm trying to drown
can't you tell?
there are reasons behind
the holes in my oxygen tank
and you're ten of them.
so call it quits
or get a grip,
grab your lavender flame
and melt out of my hands.
i can tell the future
and your selfishness has
no room in this home anymore.
i'll miss you
but i'm not sorry.

*(a.m.c.)

i tied knots in your chest
with my old shoelaces so
why didn't you ever call me back?
there are rose-shaped bruises
on my lips from where i
****** the blood out of your
heart and i wanted to tell
you that it tasted like
cinnamon but i
can't anymore
because someone
else is putting new
bandaids on your
cuts. i thought you
said you liked
my pain? and that
you wanted my
sledgehammer
to keep driving
through your
wood-paneled walls
but i think you
lied to me and
i wish you wouldn't
have because i never
would've become so
destructive if you
hadn't told me that
hurt makes you feel alive
and that i remind
you of tornadoes and
bulletproof vests.

*(a.m.c.)