where it starts
1. your girlfriend will have a miscarriage
for the second time
and you, you'll start using needles
THERE WILL BE NO DIRECT CORRELATION BETWEEN THESE TWO THINGS
but you tell yourself
a daughter is what would make life worth living
and subsequently what it takes to get you sober

2. you lose your job
because you're always in the bathroom missing veins
loss of job will inevitably spiral into an
"intolerable depression"
or
"extended sadness"
or
"whatever version of this is easiest to swallow"

3. you get to spend every holiday from your birthday until The Day She Dies sitting next to your mother's hospital bed
(except for when you're always in the bathroom, missing veiins)

LATER
your sister reassures you that mom didn't know the way you also choked back guilt with all the bile and unpleasant things in your trips to the restroom
but for now you will hate yourself
hate the sticky needles
and hate the way your girlfriend leaves all her ghosts behind when she leaves you

4. you find that bathroom floors are your new home
splayed out after your 8th overdose
jail cells are just a normal tuesday
and you keep waking up to razor blades left neatly on your pillow

where it ends

5. giving up ****** is like pulling teeth
messy and painful but typically necessary
and so hard to do alone

Maybe because I'm honest with her

Told her how your fists were sculpted by your father's drug addiction
And the way your mother left him

I tell her about the nights my fingers wrap around the softer parts of you
The way in which I reminded you of the boy who ***** you
So it's no surprise when you finally started fighting back

I tell her what your blood looks like running down the crook of your arm
Or the inside of your thighs

I tell her you could never really love me except from a distance
Because I have always been made from razor blades and ****** needles
Too sharp to touch
Never soft enough to hold

What's it like falling asleep beside a ghost?

I can't sleep
Everytime I remember your words
They snap and recoil
And hurt me awake
Next time when someone
Promises me forever
I'll just smile
Look them in the eyes and ask
How long is forever to you.

She is not folded in the crooks
of crooked grins
or enveloped in the yuks
that follow poorly executed jokes.
She pays no mind
as she singes the edges
of those brave enough
to approach her.
She spits on empathy
and disregards
the “what ifs” or “why nots.”
Rarely spoken aloud,
she is deafening
when confined to quiet corners,
and will lurk there,
unmentioned and unforgotten.

When permitted to surface,
she looks nothing like you’d expect—
badly disguised and undeniably
                        ugly,
with unforgiving features
that have been bent and twisted—
coated with
a sticky sugary sheen.
She demands to be considered,
as she slides, jagged and bitter,
off of the tongue
and into the light.

She’s always there,
regardless of any acknowledgement—
closer than we desired,
bigger than we imagined,
wiser than we hoped.
She, the *****
that we are forced
to shake hands with.

3 am
you are responding slowly. i say i love you. you do not respond.

5 am
i say have a nice day you say you too.

7 am
i write you a poem of words i barely knew before google and thesauri i tell you you are beautiful. read at 7 17

11 am
i am in class biting my fingers you have not said a word i have sent you fifteen messages all left unread i am worried

2 pm
you have said nothing my head is shaking my hands are spinning you usually respond so quickly

3 pm
i saw that you were typing as i exited my messages. i never got a message.

5 pm
i sent a simple hi and was sent an automatic response that you had been offline for too long my message would be delivered when you came back online

7 pm
i sent you messages to see when you came back. you didnt come back.

1 month
its been 31 days youre still offline

2 months
i got a message today and i saw your name and my stomach flipped you said only hi and i said hello back. you did not reply.

1 year
i do not think of you, you left.

2 years
i saw you on the street you looked like a new person. i waved but you assumed i was acknowledging someone else. you walked away.

2.5 years
i got a message from an unsaved number that you killed yourself today and my number was in your phone and i might like to be informed. i didnt reply.

[A prose poem]

I need to tell you about someone you should know.

She never uses her index finger.
          Well, that's not true anymore. She gave up on the quirk, and now uses the fullness of her thin fingers. They're wounded though. You have to know her hands.
        She picks the skin on the borders of her nails, as if the lack of red were mediocre. She needs passion, she does. And roses. They cascade on the right wall of her room.
        See, there's something about people who tape roses on their walls. I can see her scarred little fingers, pushing adhesive on the flowers.

There is a girl who walks with seleves down to arms.
She covers her arms in ink with the words she isn't bold enough to say to anyone until the words overlap into a blurred mass.
She hides her arms because she doesn't want anyone to be uncomfortable.
There is another girl who walks with her seleves down to her arms.
She covers her arms with slits and stab marks when she isn't bold enough to say other's words hurt her.
She hides her arms because she is scared to let anyone see what she does so that she can deny needing help.
There is another who used to cover arms.
She follows both them around in a haunting manor because she wasn't able to stop them from destroying themselves. She wanders what happened to her best friends and how they left themselves inwardly and outwardly die because of something they couldn't stop.
She hides her arms so she doesn't see the slit marks left from her cut vains.