Flowers are characterized by their petals,
A rose, however, is more than just it’s red petals.
Once the petals are removed from a rose,
destroying it’s outer shell,
the inside is visible to world
The rose is vulnerable,
But it is still beautiful
A new array of green and yellow colors
Thee only way to see what lies beneath is to destroy the petals.
The rose is much like a person
People put on masks
A person can become vulnerable and shed their mask. This sometimes destroys a person
Roses can’t grow their petals back once they have all been plucked off
A person can always recover
A rose cannot do anything but perish.
People are like roses, and roses are what people become if they don’t want to be built back up.

i have polaroid’s on my wall

of all the boys i used to kiss.

there are ***** dishes in the sink 
and i think this will be the year that

i pretend to love people just because

there’s nothing else to do.

i spend my time reading poems about girls

who have broken hearts and smoke cigarettes.

i spend my time reading poems about girls 

who rip their ribcage open just to find out

that there is nothing left inside except 
empty beer bottles.

i get drunk and slip into silk 
and realize that i am a combination of

1/3 love and 2/3 champagne bubbles

and i think to myself,

"maybe this is what it’s like to be 
the hurricane instead of the rain."

I'm absolutely terrified.
Petrified.
Mortified.
Of falling in love with you.

Love, you told me once that
Butterflies don’t lie
So I knew I was in love
The moment I met your eyes

Love, you told me once that
You can’t solve all my problems
But I knew you were fibbing because
Standing next to you, the hurt is forgotten

Love, you told me once that
You want my arms around you
But I knew you were just kidding because
You were gone before I could hold you

Love, you told me once that
You don’t always think when you talk
So I knew you didn’t want me,
Yet I still sold you my heart.

Love, I’ll tell you once that
I love you so **** much.
Love, I’ll tell you twice,
Three or four times if you want.

Beloved, while you’re out searching for your only,
I am here waiting, hurting, cowering, crying and lonely.
There’s a monster under my bed, a devil in my closet,
A goblin sending me through an obstacle course, promising
That if I do all they ask I will make it out alright.
Beloved, I know that they are only telling lies.

Beloved, they’re begging for my secrets,
They want to know why I fell for you so easily, so willingly,
When we all know it’s something so unlike me.
And while they crawled under my skin and broke my will down
Like a tower of blocks, all I longed for was you by my side.
Beloved, I’ve never been so frightened in my life.

Beloved, your shadow won’t do much good here,
But if it’s all I can have of you right now, then I’ll hold it here.
It won’t ward off the monsters, the devils, the demons, or the goblins
And their terrifying ways, but if I hold it close enough to me
I can feel your heartbeat, your breath and lips across my face and I’m okay.
Beloved, I will fight till the death and make myself okay.

Your heart is the same shape and size
as a fist
But don’t use it like one
because hearts
they aren’t metaphors like a fist
they cannot be healed with stitches and a band-aid
The ability to touch does not mean the ability to feel
and waiting for your heart to heal
it’s a hell of a lot more than antiseptic
My fury for you
I threw some punches
I tried to break open that prison that holds your heart captive
but I guess my voice just wasn’t the right frequency because it’s still in tact
and yes,
when the world went quiet for a moment
I could hear the gears of the universe turning inside of you and I loved the sound of it
but that’s my fault
You told me I was too young and I don’t see the way that the real world works
and that’s because I view the world in metaphors but life
is not poetry
I knew the woman at the beauty supply store had never had her heart broken
when she kicked me out of the hair isle for slathering shampoo on my chest
because I was hoping the suds would seep in through my skin and
find their way to my heart
The label on the bottle read anti-breakage
I just couldn’t resist to try
The librarian was confused when I returned the dictionary that smelled like peroxide and was covered in band-aids
Maybe she had never been hurt by words or maybe
life is not poetry
I told you that kissing you was like waking up right before seeing the sun rise
after the apocalypse
You didn’t understand
I told you that I wanted to string the stars from your bedroom ceiling so you would always have something to count on and again you didn’t understand
I told you my heart was a quilt of mixed-matched fabric with flaws and failures crudely sewn together with good intentions
You still didn’t understand even though our internal wounds are stitched up using the same thread
Because life is not poetry
Life is real and I am so **** good at letting people love me
it scared me to see my joy sitting in your hands
slipping through the creases of your fingers like sand
I stopped saying your name when it started sounding real to me
So I guess this is how it ends
With the realization that I could shatter and leave my broken pieces under your pillow
and you still would not dream of me
So don’t
use your heart like a fist
because life is not poetry
I am not a metaphor
I’m not a phrase
an expression or an exclamation
I’m not a simile and I’m certainly not a hyperbole
But I’d rather have ink on my hands than blood

You are too old for your looks, dear gentleman
Dear gentleman, you are much too spry
You jump like a wallaby, dear gentleman
And you run much faster than I

When I am snoozing, dear gentleman
You wake me up,
Because you’re hungry for food
Dear gentleman, I was sleeping
I find this, at times, very rude

Dear gentleman, you don’t go outdoors very much
You always stay inside
Watching the birds taunting you
This really must hurt your pride

When I leave the house, dear gentleman
You stay standing guard
Dear gentleman, I must praise you
For this job must be very hard

Dear gentleman, you don’t speak English
You speak some foreign tongue
I cannot understand you, dear gentleman
I can’t decode the songs you’ve sung

Dear gentleman, I must thank you
For you a such a good friend
You and I, dear gentleman
What a pleasant blend!