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.)

i swallowed the sunset like a pill;
and drowned it with a bottle of nyquil;
so my dreams involve stars instead of your hands;
and my brain contains gradients in place of your arms.
i clawed my own eyeballs out, mistaking them for yours;
and what i thought was your skeleton i rammed with my car;
was actually just a mailbox.
i’ve screamed at the top of my lungs;
but you are still jammed in my throat.
i’ve opened up my skin;
but your poison is stuck to me like a sunburn.

*(a.m.c.)

i’m sorry your love does not fit into my junk mail
and that i will not become a hoarder for you
you say you’re disgusting
but i think you’ve rubbed yourself raw against my skin
until your bones have become protruding branches from your body
the blood that used to circulate through me
has now turned into sand
you punctured my lungs and i started leaking beaches
there are no sandcastles, just chunks of broken seaglass
just pebbles and bugs and dirt
you can’t shield me from the sun, i’ve already been burnt
so now when people step on me
i burn back

*(a.m.c.)

i'm wondering about you wondering about me
i'm killing myself just to remain interesting
cutting my skin to have a story to tell
smoking cigarettes so maybe i'll forget about the blood
maybe tomorrow night i'll leak oceans out of my eyes
and **** time instead of the people i love

i'm wondering about god wondering about me
praying prayers i know won't be answered
whispering lies to myself on the floor of my shower
naked and alone and afraid and beyond everything
i'm smiling at my friends while the voice in my head screams
shivering in the heat and sweating in the cold

i'm wondering about me wondering about you
why weren't you there when i took too many pills?
it tore out my insides and lit flames down my throat
do you ever think about what it would be like to be happy?
maybe like floating or like the sound of laughing children
maybe not like white noise and static

*(a.m.c.)

when i think back to the first punch
the nail and sting and two-week bruise
i don't think about the pain
or the sound of your fist against my ribs
i think of your face as you swung your arm
twisted and red but that was only layer one
layer two was remembering when you coached me in softball
layer three was my nine-year-old embrace
layer four was whispering, "she's your little girl."
layer five was your confusion as i grew up and became quiet
layer six hated yourself in that moment
as well as layers seven and eight
layer nine was your anger again, which caused you to hit
but layer ten was your apology
i forgave you one thousand and sixty eight times
will you ever forgive yourself?

*(a.m.c.)

i tried to **** some time
with my cut-throat vaseline clues
and quarters and lollipop bruises
my headaches turned into pleasure-seeking
narcissistic blues and bass guitars behind me
i'm done whispering nightmares
in other people's ears
and i'm done watching clocks
begging them to stop
begging me to stop
begging it to stop

*(a.m.c.)

you, my dear, are absolutely insane
dreadfully bold and clicking your heels,
waltzing through struggle and skating on water.
your madness is alluring,
your strength terrifying.
you taste like wine and smell like thunder
i think you most certainly grew wings
last summer
         because
                you're
                      soaring.

*(a.m.c.)

i wasn't a full moon when you met me
and there's nothing to howl at here
i was in the midst of waxing away,
ready to disappear from the sky
and stop the ocean's gears from turning.
you could've fit me on the tip of your thumb nail
small enough for the change in your wallet
spent on dollar cone icecreams and donut shops
i was easy to miss if you just glanced over me
but for some reason your eyes stopped.
you fit me in the palm of your hand and kissed me
making my ***** mouth flourish into something big
i'm starting to fit into my twin-sized bed a little better
and because you stopped and looked at me
you've made me into a full moon.

*(a.m.c.)

they say that everything nice
ends up killing you
and i think it's true
because i am a cigarette
slowly filling your lungs
and blackening them with my breath
i am a sedative to your anxieties
i am deadly and dangerous
but lovely
i am a nicotine kiss on your lips with fire
i am your bad habit and your addiction
i'll drag you out of bed
in the middle of the night
and i wanted to believe in god
but i couldn't pray with tobacco-stained lips
and a bottle of whiskey in my hand

*(a.m.c.)

there was a playful sound
calling on the other side
of the wall called life.
i asked for more soul
but no one responded,
even after i screamed for
someone to hear me,

give me soul or give me death

i don't care if i drown anymore

*(a.m.c.)

to me you are just a photograph
a five-by-seven rectangle
of glossy paper
pinned on my white wall
with a thumbtack.
all of you is crammed into that space,
a box that contains your smile,
two-dimensional and impersonal,
false.
there's a rip on one corner
where part of your forehead dangles
ready to be completely perforated,
because you have no control
over where i store you
whether it's in my arms
or just on my walls.

*(a.m.c.)

this swirling romance of life
caught me up in its tendrils
and what did i become
but fire,
an energy that consumes
that destroys from nothing,
from a moment caught on spark
and ash.
warmth loves all that is living
the sun is far too close for us to be cold,
to live something frantic and brittle
and broken
we are too alive for salvation,
for heartache and bruise,
we are consumed in ourselves
and in our flame.
we are humans too beautiful
for destruction
too alive for loving
too loving to live.
call yourselves kings and queens
sons and daughters
royalty
pick up your gemstones
call it electricity
and rule.

*(a.m.c.)

you blew a hole through my chest
with your shotgun smile
as i sipped from a cup
of ruin and destruction.
maybe that's how i contracted pneumonia
on the seventeenth of september
and maybe that's why my lungs are corroding
and my voice is gone.
because there's a hole in my chest
the size of you
and it's drafty today
as the wind whistles through me
singing a song
that sounds like crying.

*(a.m.c.)

i equated you with love
monstrous, monstrous love.
you were calloused hands
and beating hearts,
teardrop stains
and broken words.
i made you into gold
you were metal
and calcium
and tornado,
screaming into my ear
howling my name
and whistling into nothing.

will you laugh into my mouth?
my throat is too red for laughter

will you drink me up until there's nothing left?
you are too much ocean to swallow

i asked you too many questions
until i myself
was a question mark,
punctuation that cut me open.
where are my answers?
where are my answers?
where are my answers?

*(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.)

it was a pleasure to burn
with ***** stained lips
and a cigarette between my cold fingers
i stopped eating to become a symphony,
swirling and elegant
with a game of tic tac toe played with a blade
across my angular wrists
when people ask me about the straight scars
i say they are tally marks
counting every bit of destruction
inside of my body.

*(a.m.c.)

i wrapped myself in caution tape
but you didn't listen to my warning
you're dying on the side of the road
and i'm flying to space in my rocketship for one
if you could die by hypothermia or drowning,
which would you choose?
the blue hair dye staining my fingers is proof
that i don't have to explain myself
i filled my bathtub with scalding water
and pretended to feel something
all i have left are burn marks on my thighs
and a puddle on the floor

*(a.m.c.)

when boys with rotten souls
tell you that they love you over a text message
five different times
you're going to feel used
and you're going to realize
you were only a drug to them,
something else to give them a toxic high.
become toxic to them,
do everything you can to distance yourself;
scratch, claw, bite, and chew yourself
out of their lasso around your neck
and do not look back
at their watery grave they dug for themselves
in the ocean among your lungs.
the saltwater behind your eyes
doesn't need to fall for broken love
and it doesn't need to fall for broken bones,
only let your tears escape
when you see a sunrise
because it's so beautiful that words
can't even express the emotions you feel
and the nostalgia of the time you watched the sun rise
with your best friend and a bottle of *****
in your hand.

*(a.m.c.)

your breath tasted like the cigarettes
that your mom used to smoke in her mercedes
i could've sworn you quit trying to **** yourself
three years ago
but it turns out you just got better at hiding it.

remember that time i took you to church
and as we walked out you started crying
because you didn't think that the god
everyone was worshipping
would love you more than you hated yourself?

i tried to take you out
i tried to fix you
but it tore me up inside
because broken things sometimes can't be mended
and you were shattered glass that made my hands bleed too.

*(a.m.c.)

remember
a girl with a bloodstream filled with her brother's laugh
with seaside sand and bottled up ships on the shore
wind and rain, puddles for rainboots to stomp in
her tears taste like family vacations and disney movies
like memories not quite lost but fading
tree roots dig into her mother's backyard, saplings from an earlier life
leaves changing color, brain synapses disconnecting
the months will still move on through years, but time gets smaller
calendars move, people move, feelings move
life feels lonely and her paperbacks are ripping
all she wants is a glimpse of the past and to keep moving into the future
knitted scarves and mittens, snowdrifts and car crashes
piano scores and swimming pools and banana pudding
move through her system, let her remember, let her heal
talking trees and lord of the rings
mermaid tails and dog kisses
fairy wings and sunburn
baseball bats and runny noses
remember

*(a.m.c.)

Do not stretch your fingers in my direction;
I am not your ******* or your heroine;
I am no drug to be addicted to.
My body is bruised and I am bent out of shape;
My ankles are all ninety degree angles;
And my knuckles are caked in golden hues.
The callouses on my heels are peeling;
And your spitfire attitude is exhausting.
"Simmer down, firecracker;
You lionhearted girl."
I'm flying at the speed of light;
I am going to crash, a beaten down piñata;
And nobody will pick up the pieces.

Simmer down, firecracker.
I'll simmer down when I'm dead.

*(a.m.c.)

do you think that astronauts get homesick and claustrophobic
or do they never miss their brick wall houses because home is always in sight
maybe they don't feel closed in because they are in the most open area
i am afraid to explore the galaxy
because i don't like to be put into a box
but isn't space travel breaking out of that box anyway

do you think that firefighters are afraid of fire
or do they breathe it in like oxygen
if they get so used to being warm
can they still survive the cold
maybe there's liquid fire in their veins
maybe they're unable to get burnt

do you think that the dreams we have as kids
are always ingrained in our spines
do we ever truly forget the things we wanted
when we were six years old
is there really any point
to our hopscotch romances
and fears of monsters under our beds
because even now
we still run to our sheets after the lights turn off

*(a.m.c.)

every day i'm a ray of sunshine
a bubble of energy, laughing with the birds
give me a little coffee and i'm dancing
in the clouds

every night i'm sleeping with ghosts
letting screaming symphonies drown my ears
curling my toes until my feet cramp
into twisted knots

*(a.m.c.)

do not call me a liar
when you're sailing your boat
into vinegar seas
because my knobby knees
crushed you with ease
and you cried "don't hurt me,
please, please, please."

i wanted you dead
for all the wrong reasons
i killed you with time
through the four seasons
there isn't anything more pleasing
than your cotton mouth teasing
my long hair breezing
and you were sick with the flu,
always sneezing, sneezing, sneezing.

*(a.m.c.)

you have
your nicotine fingers
running through my hair
and i have
frequencies reaching
ten thousand times my limit
because your eyes
are moons
and my mouth
is lavender
the flowers you picked me
are in a whiskey bottle
on my front porch
they haven't died yet
and neither have i
for i have been standing
somewhere between
salvation and corruption
and i don't know where to step

*(a.m.c.)

the day i stole thunder from the sky
was the day the lord snatched up my grace
and pried it from my fists.
because you can't rumble,
and rage,
and storm
with the power of ten thousand volts
without admitting that the power isn't yours.
i guess the grace i borrowed
was something i needed more
than thunder and lightning.
so i traded in my electric hands
and begged to receive his grace once again.
although i'm anything but worthy
and although i've wandered into the deepest waters,
he smiled at me
and said "i've been waiting all this time. come home."

i'll wander from home every day of my life
but i find myself sprinting back
and he welcomes me like i'm his prodigal daughter;
lost
but found.

*(a.m.c.)

i said,
"do i disgust you or am i
the reason you wake up
in the morning?"
with raincloud eyes
and bony,
   bony fists
you said,
"i want to circle the bruises
around your eyes and patch you up
in a styrofoam box
and lay you out to dry"
because you dream of me
building sandcastles on
the beaches of your heart and
making my home in the palms
   of your hands

"i want to sit on the sun but oh! it'll
burn me up."

*(a.m.c.)

you were nowhere on the weather forecast
a sudden storm that left me soaked
i loved the chill you sent through my bones
and the water cleansing my sadness.
i asked you three months ago if i was worth it
and you told me i make you feel dizzy
you were high but i know you meant it
and i think you're crazy for loving me.
all i want is you in my bones
and to feel the warmth of every one of your kisses
every single day of my life
you've turned me into something better.
there are still days when i can't get out of bed
and the thin lines on my wrists are a little more prominent
but you have become my home
where everything is sunkissed and light.

*(a.m.c.)

i sold your love to a man in a white coat;
and i used the money to buy red lipstick, Kate Moss No. 113;
so now when i wear it i can remember the time I ripped out your heart and ate it whole;
because my man eating zombie heart cannot contain you;
and my man eating zombie mind cannot contain you;
i was tired of being a fugitive in your arms;
the closest we will ever be is 50 ft because of the restraining order i put on you last thursday afternoon;
50 ft is the distance of the stars to the moon;
50 ft is not far enough;
i was tired of feeling your love wrapped around my neck;
my lips turned blue from your suffocation;
you’re not going to die because i am no longer able to staple my hands to yours;
and you’re not going to die because your ears won’t hear my voice anymore;
because life is more than your false identification with love;
life is about breathing;
and you’re still breathing.

*(a.m.c.)

the day of love is tomorrow
but the only thing i love at the moment
is the sleepy blissful feeling i get
every night after i take my sleeping meds.
because something that can take away your pain
and make you forget about brokenness
and self-loathing and suicide
is something worth devoting yourself to.
even if it's a liquid that slides down your throat
and warms your insides until you want that
lava to burn you up,
try not to drink the whole bottle.
or maybe you should risk it
because the tidal wave will come crashing down
soon enough won't it?
something bad is bound to happen
so you might as well pull the trigger.

*(a.m.c.)

and when you're bleeding out,
becoming an addict and an insomniac,
the rain is a salve to your brokenness.
it will chill your bones and soothe you,
will become your tonic and your medicine,
it will sing you to sleep when there's no one else.

there's something about a wet road
and a dark sky
that puts you to peace, and takes the graveyard out of you.

there's something about lightning
and thunder that shakes your bones
that takes you out of hell and puts you back on earth.

with menace and terrifying power,
the sky yells at you,
not in the same way a person does,
but its yells and screams put a quiet in your soul,
to where you can whisper back to the sky,
          "it
           is
         well"

*(a.m.c.)

i'm tired of feeling dead inside
and having a heart
like scrambled eggs with toast.
when people start asking me,
"do you ever feel--"
i have to stop them there,
"no."
maybe i'm a black hole
swallowing itself into nothing,
or maybe a tornado
is taking me to the land of oz.

there's no place like home
there's no place like home
there's no place like home

every time i cross streets
i see lights coming at me
but everything is fuzzy
and then it's a dance,
a fun game of dare.
"hit me."

*(a.m.c.)

imitations of rose-red sonnets
sprung across your face.
the moon rises as you fall,
the tides still rise and crash on the shore.
planets are orbiting around my head,
brain spinning in a colossal daze.
the smell of salt is a cross-stitch embroidery pillow
in my hair,
your grandmother's words echoing
and dribbling inside your skull.
pause for the dead and remember their faces,
remember dirt rubbed into your brothers skin
and the butterfly wings painted
on your sisters face,
toothless smiles and calloused hands.
mothers and fathers rip open and scream,
flashing lights on the street,
sound of sirens,
"it's nothing, he'll be home soon."
he's in pieces on the road,
stop signs lingering in his conscious moments.
the last thing he remembered was
the girl with the long hair and crooked smile,
smoke entering his lungs
and inhaling with welcome.
your speedometer still twitches
even when you're static,
the stars still glow
even when you're gone.

*(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.)

today as i watched a movie about c.s. lewis
and his wife was dying
a thought raced across my mind,
death is weird

we live a certain number of years
in solid masses of skin and muscle
with something called a soul.
we feel more than animals,
some worship a God who created,
we love and we hate other people,
who are the exact same as us.

and then one day,
a different day
and a different way
for everyone,
we just
stop

today as i heard the news
that a four-month-old named zoe
died suddenly
a thought raced across my mind,
death is weird

*(a.m.c.)

like a spaceship through the cosmos
i am endlessly searching for myself
and being an astronaut in a new planet's oceans
i am drowning in the current
search my body and find me in the caves
with chipped teeth and three broken ribs
knocked out on the rocks of what i once was
my head is pounding and my dreams feel real
but i am not real
and this is not real
i stand on the precipice of who i am now
and who i used to be
and soon i'll be slipping on tumbleweeds and broken promises
soon to fall
soon to be falling
soon to be fallen

*(a.m.c.)

aren't we all a little bit hazy
a little bit destructible in the mornings?
after the battles we've fought,
our bones are heavy and we
feel the weariness weighing
down on our skin.
all we want is rest,
to sleep in a safe room
with the people we love.
to feel warmth on our faces once again,
to rejuvenate our tired eyes
so that we can get up again and tell our demons,
"i'm still here and i'm going to keep on fighting."

*(a.m.c.)

with rain soaked fingers
i ripped you apart
godzilla and sirens and all things nightmare
could take notes from me
i could write a handbook
about breaking people like breaking glass
it's simple when you stop caring about yourself
when your pearly white teeth rot and tear
when your shotgun heart and poison dart eyes
**** and break and destroy
you'll recognize my coffee-stained breath
hot on your neck
and next time you'll run
and run
and never look back

*(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.)

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.)

i told you in my dreams
that snowdrifts were breaking my bones
and northern winds were closing my throat.
as i sat underneath the iceberg melting
in the pacific ocean
i wondered if my claustrophobia would go away
if i just inhaled the water
and drifted downwards
until the sun could no longer reach my cold hands.

*(a.m.c.)

sadness makes poetry bleed out
from under your bitten-down fingernails
every single time

the bitterness you taste in your coffee
reminds you of past mistakes
and bruises that you caused

fragments of vocabulary
start spilling out of your mouth
like caustic bottles in a nuclear plant

and windblown smiles tug at your hair,
making it hard to open your tired eyes
at the arsenic whiteness of fakeness
and casualties of war

the nation you grew up in
broke into pieces
and you shredded your memories into fine slivers

because each one is a detonator
under pressure in your lungs
and each breath is a death wish
choking your windpipe with salty kisses.

*(a.m.c.)

people romanticize the pain they haven't felt
i could write about how you pinched
crescent moons into my skin
and how your fists turned my arms into
a canvas of blue and purple and brown;
blood bursting into a waterfall
but there's nothing romantic
about nightmares that make you sweat
there's nothing beautifully tragic
about abuse and mental disorders
the thing is,
pain is a wave that crashes over you
and a box that your elbows can't cram into
pain is flame and my wax skin is melting

*(a.m.c.)

things will start to get better for you
when you unhook yourself from your machines
lie on the floor and let saltwater drip from your eyes
let your insides melt away into your coffee mug
stained with orange lipstick and whiskey morning breath
you cannot simply contain all of your sadness
in the box inside your chest, even when your initials
are engraved on the lid in gold and coated in velvet
that is no place for weaknesses to hide
they should appear as ghosts in your crooked smiles
and racing heartbeat, shaky limbs and cold fingers
don’t lock them up with a brass key
but let them dance around on your windowsill
when the evening light casts shadows on the walls
they might make people laugh
with yesterday’s jokes and heartfelt kisses
don’t swallow them whole and keep them to yourself,
accept the wrongs and the rights
walk with them in the moonlight
and let them be seen

*(a.m.c.)

i was wind
and you were rain;

we destroyed ourselves.

*(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.)

sometimes if i listen hard enough
i can hear the sound of my bones
cracking under the weight of myself.
it feels too heavy to bring so much luggage
around with me to airports
always searching for a plane
to take me somewhere new.
i want to drop my bags and forget myself
i want oceans
i want to soak up waves and waves
of salt.
i'm taking too many pills now
that i am forgetting that i'm a person
and not a drone, that my steps
are conscious and that i can stop
when i want i can stop.
but i have to keep stepping
because what else is there to do?
what else besides walking
what else because if i stop
if i fall down i will never get up
i swear i am an airplane and
i am flying up in high altitudes
and i'm losing oxygen but i can't come down
because if i do i will crash and
nobody will pick up my wreckage.
i will be amelia earhart
i will be a mystery
i will be lost forever.

*(a.m.c.)

i kind of want to die
but i know that there are no
gold-tipped sunrises
in the basement of the dead.
mostly i dream in colors
that aren't black and white
because my head is full of spectrum
a copy of a copy of a color.
the only thing that keeps
my eyelids from drooping
is words on the pages
of the endless stack of books
in the corner of my room.
sometimes i think that
each letter is a person
and their figures join together
to form large crowds
that fill the spacious voids
around me.
my friends spill out of my mouth
and move around in my brain,
they are words,
not lifeless
but constantly moving.

*(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.)

you have set me ablaze
in the most beautiful, red and gold way
i've never burnt this much
for so long
usually i'm just a mixture
of a living room fire on christmas eve
and the flame on your kitchen stove
but ever since i met you
i have become a forest fire,
dangerously close to home
bright and burning and warm
all you do is pour more gasoline
and fan the flames
until i'm destroying cities and buildings
with all my glittering sunlight

*(a.m.c.)