i'm always lost in these riptide battles of moral attrition,
they're ripping at the sinews,
at oxygen,
oxygen,
oxygen.

what a colorful faucet to pour into our broken pieces at waterfall pace-
and yet,
we harvest buried wells like vengeful widows-
we eat our own by closing our eyes and we let it erupt only in the lightest of shadows.

WE ARE GIANTS IN THE MOST MAGNIFICENT LANDSCAPE.
waning the barren night with cracked palms and open cabinets,
lighting matches to the sky-

finding light towards the meaning of ink on blind skin,
the fading crests of falling waves,
and the lining of hearts too terrified to belt the hymns of the broken days.

with cracking fingertips,
we will clasp the fleeting shore
with euphonious oceans of foliage in our periphery.

the bulk of the evidence:
the dust bunnies in the largest eyelid-corners,
the aching deltoids of the early mornings,
the limbic system of deteriorated thread and fragile glass-
suggest a verdict of dancing with customer services and inhaling the fumes of the daily commute,

rather than opening up hearts like delicate, antique quilts.

the discrepancy is not an evident ideology-
it's pulling the plug,
or attempting conversations on transgender rights with dad -

nothing is certain.

thus,
my cellophane heart will backflip,
my shins will swing and splint like
dull firecrackers-

patting backs of mothers who will not see their sons again,
pushing change while kicking up the sharp rocks,
running marathons i will never finish
because
my heart,
a skeleton with a rusted cape,
screeches my least favorite record on an endless loop.

do not stand there with a bloodied blade in palm and deny your tectonic collisions-
perpetually convergent.

the cracks in our palms not products of birth,
but of rebirth,
of whirlpool concussion,
of night-time demon chants-
our stomachs both steel and starch.

i sense no longings for statues in your ambivalent pupils-
only condolences for the outcasted gargoyles.

you've taught me this value of illumunation in the moonlight of nights where the yellow center-lines were pale-hued and tear-stained.

in these fearful beds of cotton and thorn,
you are the blood and gauze,
the bent mirror and the authentic starlight,
the unknown cave and the trusted headlamp.

your feet are muddy as hell and you're giving your favorite meals to our darkest parts.

my words aimed down the scope as heated blankets feel more like frostbite when hurriedly fired.

what if benevolence is not an adequate source of heat when the power lines topple?

when these ideas run rampant, they are an uncontrollable current-
a social trend picking at gnarled vines of dead skin,
a pair of open eyelids constantly looking at the only two pictures of you still saved on the cloud-
the remnants of your sapphire eyelids cutting my brick femurs like passive ash.

what if my words immortalized your fluttering agility-
a glass universally unbreakable?
what if the punctuation composted your faith like fresh coffee grounds in a drought-stricken garden?

would you aim once more,
or would the circuit breaker gather dust?

i'm warmly lost in the absence of that aspiring red light,
as your heartbeat is still a stabbing pain in the side of my gelatin femurs,
losing visions of the rigidity necessary to live this life of ambivalent autonomy.

--

steel strings and fibers of teeth eating this flesh like a false promise of love,
i am a windowsill covered by a nebulous, translucent shade,
clothespins existing simply to taper my eyes from the pain.

the stars take no mention of this cynical cycle of self-doubt,
for they're lighting our hearts long after they've burnt out.

and your hazel kitchen recipes are hanging over the paint-chipped railing,
giving meaning to this heart,
a blood-stained peach in constant mourning.

break this furtive glass,
there is no light pointing home,
**directionless map

the space we each hold as the single brick missing from the tattered foundation is neither an enthusiastic lightbulb, nor a wounded elk, rotting to the sound of the birds.

it's my favorite portion of dinner,
the determined phone cords wrapped around my weightless ankles, and the child in my head skipping stones on a purple, moonlit lake

we are uncomfortably wet grand-masters of the sandpaper landscape,
making sense of that nameless, empty space.

i'm losing myself in your hazel portal.

--------------------

fingernails, the endless target of fear, blunting the intensity of your golden-gate conscious,
bear enough of this weight to mortalize Atlas.

the pathetic, monotone static in my head is a train barreling towards an unfinished bridge,
my cynicism a pew destroyed by debris,
my outstretched hand a burning bible.

in my back-alley existence,
you are an ocean-wide coral reef of altruism and hope,
beaming with enough passionate hue to feed the starving.

i am twiddling my sprained, charcoal thumbs out of rhythm,
selfishly consuming your complexion like a leech