emptiness is a slow burning incense-
the forty five minutes left of your three hour class
that doesn't seem to go fast enough.
The longing for so much more than you get
that feeling in your chest after you see something
that physically makes you sick.
The pain in your stomach that comes when you're hungry.
Empty. Empty
and empty again.  
All I ever feel anymore is empty.
My mind is a hollow shell of absolutely nothing.
I do not feel anymore.
I am empty.
I am nothing.
I am forever fleeting.
I am trouble-
and only I have the solution.
So this is goodbye.

You-
you have a lot on your plate
and me-
I am just pushed in next to the others
that weigh you down while you're trying to carry
a thanksgiving meal of responsibility
and at the same time not be crushed by it-
You don't like it when your food touches.
So there I am waiting at the edge of all the chaos
trying not to step over boundaries or cross the line
I am just another thing thrown onto your plate
of responsibilities.
I am a shadow.
A walking disaster.
And I try to avoid all the things
that are so ferociously trying to bring you back down-
but all I do is end up making it worse
making all your **** end up touching
so it becomes a mountain upon your shoulders
that eventually turns into a chip upon it-
you have gone concave-
you became acute when you were once so obtuse
so full of life
so 180 degrees out of everyone else's ******* box
and I closed you in.
Made you realize what you needed to make yourself small
so you could eventually fit the plate just right on your shoulders.
I try to take the weight-
try to pick it all up myself and do something to help you get through
but I just end up touching everything-
You don't like it when your food touches.
You-
you are concave in my convex world
always looking inside yourself-
always hiding away inside of the parts of yourself
I will never see because I'm too busy looking outward
to find something I can do for you.
We are trigonometry-
which is the only type of math I was ever good at in school
but I can't seem to find the right angle anymore
you are too scalene and not enough isosceles
there's no symmetry in the way you look at me-
there's too many different sides to you.
I'd like to think I've seen them all
I'd like to think I've solved what degree
every angle you feed me turns out to be-
but it seems that the angles aren't what I should be finding.
You're just a circle-
I can find your radius
but I don't have enough of you anymore
to find your circumference.
We will always be abstract.

When I was young, I hid behind tree branches and tall fields of grass
and everywhere was like a jungle to me.
I made crowns out of weeds and painted my innocence with a hinge of green.
I climbed trees away from my issues and nothing could stop me when I was hiding behind pine needles and evergreens.
I grew up back when the dented silo was still the dented silo and not the mockery of human consumption.
When my favorite restaurants all lined the correct side of Tylersville
and Fazoli’s was still ******* around.
Then I moved to where the trees were all I saw and the places beneath my toes became enriched with soil on a daily basis.
I was queen of my own jungle again and I loved every minute of it.
Now when I drive down the road I look to my right and see the streets lined with week old plastic bottles and bags-
you can’t go a mile without seeing trash and I start to wonder when the world will end, when all the pavement will become enriched with cracks and the ground will start poking through again.
Our tax dollars are going towards reparation of potholes, strip malls and new houses most middle class Americans can’t even afford.
I’m tired of watching what the world built for itself, become destroyed for what we try to build for ourselves.  
Everything is destruction and one day Mother Nature will come back with a vengeance and we will be the ones who pay the price.
Look around you, the fields you once dreamed about when you were young are now just economic land-mines and the places you work were once just an empty field.
Just remember, we live and we die and we are sometimes reborn again based on what you believe in.
But no matter your religion, Mother Nature will always be something I can believe in; when all else fails nature will always be the best therapy for me.

Pull your hair out, pull your ******* hair out.
Punch yourself in the face you ******* deserve it.
Can't breathe again.
Weights pressing down on your chest.
**** not again, no not again.
Gonna say something you regret-
Don't ******* text him, don't do it.
******* did it.
Great, now your relationship will probably be over.
Everything feels over, everything is ending.
I want everything to end...

The tears stream down my face
the lungs I use to breathe are the only things holding me back
these hands I use to write are gripping the pavement again
because I don't think I've ever felt so low.
But just yesterday I was on such an endorphin high
I was running in the rain until my socks were
just puddles below my feet
the sky was just an outline of the child I used to be
and now everything feels so ******* temporary-
you can't catch your breath long enough to tell yourself
everything will be okay and somehow earlier today
you were doing just fine.
But these hand clutch your skull again
as you pull your hair-
hoping you are ripped to shreds
because you are trapped inside yourself
a prisoner of your own body and it will never leave
everyday you fight harder to survive
but it seems like each ******* episode gets worse.
Every mistake makes you feel worse-
every mis-autocorrected word on your phone is like
someone punching you in the throat
and you somehow let that control you and you breakdown-
throw your phone and it crashes at the wall again.
You hate yourself for these things you can't control.
Everyday is a battle you can't win
and everything falls to the ground again-
including yourself.
There is a city upon your shoulders now
and it seems your mind is only building it even higher-
you wished you could throw it off but it's getting too heavy now.
All you can do is sit and wait for it to crush you from the inside out-
slowing breaking you down one missed phone call
and un-replied text message at a time
you are breaking down.
All the help you once searched for has gone out of business
and the man on the inside ran away because it was too much to handle-
you've always been to much to handle.
But those days when everything seems wonderful come-
those days when the hands you possess seem like shooting stars
making your every wish come true again-
you are invincible.
Nights spent laughing at four walls encased with your sense of humor
and indulging yourself because everything seems so good again.
But you remember this won't last too long and your back-
back to agitation inside your bones and the war inside your head,
city on your shoulders you are crushed under the weight.

Some days it feels as if all I need is myself to make me happy-
some days it's this same self that brings me so much misery.
Other days I'm just myself, getting by like everyone else.
Then on the worst days, they all hold hands and become friends
they all form a clique and I become a target for misplaced aggression.
My manic depression is a bully, 6pm traffic jams-
and spills on your new t-shirt.
My manic depression is a sugar high, 3pm mid day naps
and waking up just in time for McDonald's breakfast.  
My manic depressions is nirvana and insanity
it holds my hand across busy streets-
but will also never let go of me.

Framing the worlds lullaby on a string of soliloquies
I made the magic happen again-
Volume up and everything inside of my
Eardrums became the strength I needed to smile again.

Sin became salvation and I wished
Every single second could be that much longer but
Cynicism doesn't come with every verse inside a song-
Only with the need comes strength of finally realizing
Nothing makes you happier than
Disregarding the demands of your former self-
Summer comes along again but you start to miss the winter winds.

Only you can feed your need to go on-
Front row of your insecurities making a mockery of this show.

Someone cast your lines and rehearsed your verse all wrong-
Unsung heroes became undone and you broke yourself again.
Muttering the words under your breath you need to save yourself-
Momentary lapse of judgment you finally caught your breath
Eventually the chorus played out and your script was finally finished
Revolutionizing the scene that surrounds, you're finally home again.

It takes more than just words, more than just endless apologize to reason with my nature. These hands have held more things dear to me than you and honey don't think for a second I'm not special. These universes inside these lines painted me a picture a long time ago of the person I would hope to be and the sails are setting in the bay again and I am the windstorm they are getting ready for. I am no last place or home base. I do not fight to win or lose to show pity. I do what's best for myself. These eyes have seen death slowly creep it's way into the picture frame one day, four years at a time. They have seen what it's like to remember blank pages of your history somehow finally filled. The ending to this novel that is me is complicated and messy already and I wish you knew what it felt like. How the wind beneath my feet felt more like a hurricane than a boost from the ground I kept weeping on. How these tears fueled these fingers to write for days on end and how things just don't seem to feel good enough for me anymore. I am a garden constantly trying to water myself with the nutrients I need but somehow never seeing any growth. These hands have made mistakes and these eyes have seen better days but all in all I am a force of nature that will turn your world upside down and put it right back where it came from. I am the *** of gold at the end of the rainbow, but I am also the storm that got it there in the first place.