how do you stop your throat from burning
from salty tear-stained gulps and gasps
for oxygen that is no longer there?
there is too much carbon dioxide in the air now
and i want to fast forward into a world
where i can breathe in sweet helium
and ask for it to stop.
because there are times
when it's impossible to breathe
and when my puffy red eyes
can't open more than a millimeter
because you have glued them shut
with your accusations.
i didn't want to be gas station concrete any longer
i didn't want dirtiness to be my middle name
i only wanted to cleanse myself of you and your fists,
you and your laughter
you and your hatred.
i wanted to be clean.

*(a.m.c.)

my elbows are all tangled up and jagged
and i am not gentle,
but sandpaper, rough and coarse
eroding your skin until there is nothing left
i am sharp edges and serrated knives,
cutting myself open bone to bone
i am not pleasant or a summer's eve
but frigidity and mocking stares
whenever you walk
i am the concrete beneath your feet
with holes and cracks that break your mother's back
with no colors, just grey and monotonous black and white
i am a harsh line on soft paper
all diagonals and wrong turns
right angles and cut in two

*(a.m.c.)

i want to be a great poem on the book of this world and i want seaside and sunshine and less of this melancholy because the earth is spinning way too fast and i'm starting to feel it in my brain, my brain is the sun and it's burning through and now i'm on fire and the fire will eat me alive

like you ate me alive in the shadow of your house on that cold winter day, you swallowed me up like a shark in the ocean and your hands were cold and your lips were cold and my body was cold it was all so cold because winter was coming from inside of me and it wasn't a season it was just me

being a season can change you, and since i wasn't summer i wasn't loved by children or school kids, i was death and i was snowdrifts and 9 am phone calls of car crashes from ice, i was wet that chilled your bones and put all of your fires out and i was there in the frost and windchill of 60 miles per hour

you drove me in your car to the hospital faster than 60 miles per hour that one day when i took too many pills and i asked you if it was okay for me to die and you said absolutely not because i was the reason behind your heartache and you didn't want it to be dull pain for the rest of your life

*(a.m.c.)

sometimes it's okay to wrap yourself
in the night sky and spin a web out of rain
you hold mystery in your palms
and i feel it's swallowed me whole
there will be times when it's hard
when heaviness overtakes your wet hair
and the sweaty nervousness doesn't stop
and dirt will get into your pores,
you will feel it down to your very core
and sometimes it's rocky
and there will be storms
but rain won't stop just because you're screaming
go outside and let it pour

*(a.m.c.)

i think my black coffee self
has started to rot away
and i've become coffee with cream
a little softer with less sharp edges
a little smoother to touch
warm like summer air
the war zone inside my head
has made itself childproof
and i've furnished the place
with pillows and chapsticks
i want you to be comfortable with me
because i am most certainly not

*(a.m.c.)

when i was fifteen i was a lion-hearted girl
with strong bones and love for myself that crossed seas
i carried myself with sunshine and a smile too big
played melodies on the piano and loved people too much

when i was fifteen i was an ashtray
my warmth was used for kindling and my love to put out fires
my skin started turning black and my heart breaking into pieces
i was still wild-eyed and good

when i was fifteen i was a punching bag
fists touched my ribs most days and fingernails scraped away
chipping at my exterior and tearing my seams to bits
i became cold and unbearing and ruthless, with teeth like a tiger

when i was fifteen i became nothing
buried into soil and left not to grow but to be scavenged
bones broken and unmended, parched lips and stony feet
underground, beaten and crying, dead

*(a.m.c.)

we dumped our names into the ocean
and laughed about our futures
because wind carries farther than we know
so who else can hear the chirping?
they say laughter is the best medicine
but i believe it is your smile in front of a sunrise
and my cold hands feel a little bit warmer
whenever i'm near you
i could think of a thousand cliches
and silly metaphors
to describe your heart and mind
but i think i'll just put it this way
you are warm golden hues on this concrete world
with blue-streaked sky and starry eyes
and i believe van gogh would paint you
in front of his famous yellow backgrounds
and he would laugh

*(a.m.c.)