Kids with guns
playing hostage outside
my kitchen window
trapping their sister in the chicken coop
behind the tenement house

Kids with funds
riding scholarships to Harvard
saying someday I’ll be the one
who pushes that little red button

Kids with needles
saying at the end of all this
I will wine and dine the devil
to persist my own mess
they go off so silently

we all turn to memory
and fade to the black flickering
insides of eyelids and run out film reels
the bottom of oceans and the bedrock of glaciers
the whole earth will hum for half a second
before the next bang hits

sometimes i just get so sick
of how fake everyone is to each other like
"Hey, how are you?! You look fantastic!"
i struggle everyday to stay alive and i am running on eight shots of espresso and no sleep
"I'm doing really well, thanks! Yeah, you look great too. I love your shoes where did you get them?"
"Oh thanks, I found them at a thrift store for ten dollars. But I love your lipstick! Where did you get it?"
You don't actually love my lipstick, you just need to return the compliment because you're probably at as much of a loss for words right now as I am
"Oh, thanks, um, some convenience store probably. I don't remember."
Moment of silence
"So how are things at home? How's school? I haven't seen you in a while... Well there was that time we had plans but you cancelled because you had to work or something. It's nice to finally see you."
Yeah I cancelled on purpose and lied about having to work because we have nothing to talk about anymore and you are somehow still so attached to this friendship that has disintegrated that you refuse to acknowledge
"Home is good, school is fine, and yeah sorry about that one time, you know how it is. Work can be pretty unpredictable sometimes! How are you though? How is your boyfriend and all that jazz?"
"Oh my gosh, so great. We're moving in a house together right now, his parents are helping out which is great because I cannot afford a mortgage right now! Hahahaha."
Right, because you're 21 and you have your **** together and I don't but I can't tell you that because you'd never understand and we don't relate on that level of realness wow what do we have in common i can't remember i'm trying to remember but i can't
"Wow, good for you! That's a big step. Well I hope that works out for you. I have to go catch my bus now, but I'm glad we got to catch up, love."
forced hug
"Yeah me too, you are so beautiful and wonderful and I really really miss you. Don't be such a stranger, okay?"
but we are strangers why can't you just admit it to yourself so we can move on
"Yeah! Sorry I just get so busy. Nice to see you too and I miss you lots too. Talk soon?"
"Definitely."
*not

I wish I could hurt you, and tell you not a thing you felt was real...
Not the salty sting of your tears on your freshly slapped skin,
Not the burning trail of warmth and moisture they leave on your bruised cheeks
Not the painful earthquake sent across your skull as your lip trembles and you begin to cry in anger, and in fear
Not the dull headache that will lull your shaken heart to sleep
Not the feeling like your ribs truly are a cage to you breath deprived lungs
Not the physical exhaustion of you giving up
Not the emotional defeat sinking you into prayer,
that maybe if you curl up tight enough, you will keep shrinking
into a dot
until you disappear.

None of it was real,
I'll never say it was,
because it wasn't.

"I'm so sorry, bartender?"

"Is this a fear and apathy on the rocks? Because I could've sworn I ordered a **** and confident blended?"

Gentle lady, do not sing
Sad songs about the end of love;
Lay aside sadness and sing
How love that passes is enough.

Sing about the long deep sleep
Of lovers that are dead, and how
In the grave all love shall sleep:
Love is aweary now.