It wasn't the middle of the night
It wasn't wanted
Unsure if you'd let me cross your threshold
But I thought you might

I'm always on my Last One
And you're always out to get some
If only I could take those threads
Tie them in a knot
Make them work
Maybe now I wouldn't have none

Like a thin veil
It consumes me
And all the thoughts
Unwanted
In the middle of the night
Don't make any sense
Never work in my favor
Now they're all I have

There you are
A bird flying into the distance
And slowly I forget
If you were even real to begin with

Where did you go
Lines I recognize
Not as my own
How did I become this thing?
This white, solemn bone
Only wanting you to sing
Clearly
Through the haze
Through the black
And the white
There would never be darkness
Without the light.

Wheels turn over
Sand spinning
Spitting out the waves
Try to do it as yourself
But must have forgot
Alien
Because

it's typical

Impulse beats
Up, down
Hello. Greet.
Hands do what they do
What they need.
Heed greed far too often

Have I had good times?
A few
Have I made any good rhymes?
Maybe two
Do I believe in signs?
As long as you do

I wear her sunglasses
that I found on his table
I can see him
touching her
how I wish he would touch me
I hear her singing
paint the roses red
so I do

Bad decisions and drowning
Like knives and matches
It all catches
On the end of my leads.
My needs
And wants
They always feel the same.
An itch and pain.
A stitch of disdain
What's the difference between
Bad and good?
To be or not to be.
They all feel the same to me.

You're a dark magician
there I stand full of contrition
you doing
and undoing
on repeat
in all the people I meet
You teach me how to feel pain
there is nothing to attain

I died that day
even though they say
"sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me"
I died under the sea
because I was never me.

I could begin climbing a tree
To attach a swing for you
And me
I'd build it to only seat two
But I am stuck inside
A brown paper bag
Chopped up
Into pieces I can't describe.
I reach out to catch him
But miss by an inch,
A mile,
A day,
A year,
So
I wait right here.

I dig at old wounds
with screams
and pink champagne
pink pain running down
my arms
down
my thoughts
through and through
I loved you
You could accept these lions
except their claws are sharp

Fear radiates lackluster
And holds my hand
Instead of you
You - damage,
A heatwave.
Ravage
Your bones. A feather.
Kind and savage
A severed tether.

His finger tips
and more
demagnetize me.
Now, I don't work anymore.

In my mind
you are a fire dancer
brightly, I find
a world without cancer
a world where he chooses me
a world where I can clearly see
what is right in from of me
In my mind,
things are different than they really are.
rare overlaps of 'I love your scar'
'find safety in pain'
like rain,
it doesn't run.

Reptilian madness
Turns over in a second
Wash them off
As if it never happened
As I never happened
Sit underneath
An obese sadness
Sharp teeth
Reptilian madness
My world turns

And yearns
Always in the wake

Sometimes I wish dad
had hit me instead.
When he was mad
he threw words that led
to bruises unseen
beneath the skin
ripe and mean.
Just stick some sort of pin
and you'll see me bleed
if that is what you need
Because then at least I can watch that heal.

Put on more layers
Until no one knows what came first
The chicken or the egg
Neither, last time I checked.

And if you aren't careful
With that bomb you hold in your heart
It'll destroy you slowly
From anticipation.

Precipitation runs down
The cheeks of this town
And no where feels like home.

They say things never stay
But I think they're wrong
Your heart strings extend
Into the encapsulating abyss
Never are they amiss
Their love, a list
Of reasons why
You and I
Will never say goodbye

Gray dust
And I
Have left you behind.

You:
The only thing I've ever wanted to know
You: the blood and the blade.
You: the only gold to have stayed.

I sail into the moon
Was it ever too soon
To take your hand

I'm trying to fix you.
You stupid girl
You sloppy girl
You glass girl
Knocked from the table edge.
You broken girl
Now just pieces
Getting smaller
Ground down under his boot
Soot
Blow
In his nose
Through his veins
Then
Into his brain.
How can I fix you now?

Missed these trains
Watch them go by
Counting the cars
Caged
Slide through these bars
To you - showing me
The devastation of joy
And happiness too
Not really understanding love
Before I met you

Fall into it now
A wanting fever
Insane
With you I
Now board the train.

Step closer
An inch away
Wanting to die
And wanting to stay
I can choose to love
Or to lie

I waver as a flag
Flat and colorless

Here take my shoes
Run away, you got nothin' to lose
Run away, I got nothin' for you to use
Run away, gave you no reason not to
"Fun to play with you,"
but just for a second
he and she say
and it may
just be a little easier to understand scabs
than tears.
Fears pile up like bullets in your gun
at least they don't run
but here, take my shoes,
you got nothin' to lose.

Found a way in
Out through all the weeds
No path left
Wanting particles on
The tip of my tongue
Words teetering
Action metering
Rules I can't quite place
Describing love
As the moment before pain

The only thing that grows
is the space between.
You don't want what this body knows

questions pile up evermore
What does this mean?
Why don't you want me anymore?

On and on
this suffering plays
my heart is its song

I ask, "how long?"
it doesn't respond.

I took this withered body:
Wilted under the pressure of the moon,
A simple shard of glass
Transparent in the carpet.
And I saw it in a new light
Of a graceful waterfall
That doesn’t know the difference
Between what I used to be
And the way I stand here now
Wash away my
Wash away my
Wash away my
Emerge a butterfly

Bite my nails
Just in case.
I carve out this space
Where they cannot hurt me

Now I see
That you belonged
Crammed and curled and far away
Bone to breast
With all the rest
Where you couldn't hurt me.

Pull up all my silk,
All my buckets , and lies.
Retreat. Retract into a cave.
Wait for the moon to rise.

Running low on steam
And dreams
Seams tear apart,
I keep repeating.
Meeting a meaning halfway
Untouched and blasé

Raked across the coals
burning never gets old
Bold brains once fresh
Now rot in wires
Tied knot
Sets fire
Fried the ends of this friendship
As a tragic paintbrush
Hits the road

Stop sign
Blink red and gone
Speed past. All in
The heat of a song
Balanced. Calling,
am I blind
Or is this good?
Stop sign
Is the mood.

Drown with silence
Evaporate with salt
I'll repeat. I'll repeat:
It's not your fault.

Leaning into black
I'll watch you dance
You'll repeat. You'll repeat:
You missed this chance.

Reach for reasons
Branches too high
Sift with memories
He'll repeat. He'll repeat:
Your life is a lie.

I'm hungry but I can't even feel it
through all this thick sickness.
When it comes to anything, I'll steal it,
feel it, seal it with blue masking tape.
I gaze over at you: basking late
summer eve
and just before I leave,
I'll wrap your memory in bubbles
to myself I'll say, "Thanks for all the troubles."

I'll board a weather vane:
slim sword straight through this vein.
I shake the rein
and heave a heavy sigh.

He'll take me to the end of the universe.
Cursed love, gossip, bend and snap
whisking away like a dove at my stupid trap.
Send help.
Here, hold my white flag,
while I get off
and step into the stars.

The dead wash ashore
over and over
I ask for more
mercy
but there lies war
instead of a wild flower
that was somehow there before
amid the grass and stream
a wild flower
grown in my dream

A beg you to crush me
my only demand
and you never disappoint

Collect all the sticks
because they and I
don't mix
Collect a strand
of her hair
in my hand
but please
understand
these were never my words
please understand
this was never planned.

You implanted your
Finger tips.
Just barely
On the side of my cheek.
I search in the mirror
Just to get some peek
At your finger prints left there.

You implanted your
Lips.
Just barely
on the side of my cheek.
I search my memory
Just to seek
What I could do to get another
fix.

I ran into the ocean
One night.
The stars shot me with bullets
Of relief.
The waves licked my ankles
Knees
Thighs
Up my body, cold and gentle,
Finally sealing my lungs
With salt
And the memory
Of how you wouldn't lay next to me.

When you can't see clearly,
look harder
Through the pebbles and stones
Of sentences
Do you find nails and glass?

Are days all clones
Some simple
Sublime

Color

Here and there
this needs a scientific name,
a twist of tongue,
ribcage: gilded frame.

A song unsung
Like a zipper unzipped
Like a drink sipped too slow
Like a blink of stars
That have lost their glow.

How can you fell an emptiness?
Maybe that means
There is something to feel
Which makes it not emptiness
Anymore.

Five fingers pressed to my cheek
I feel them phantom
Random pulses of memory
Gripping onto an absence,
Like air molecules,
Cool to an unseen touch,
I feel a nothing.
Your body becomes a loaded gun.
Shiny and sparkling in the sun.

Is it ever hard to breath
in the fog,
or the starlight?

Is it ever hard to heave
this bundle off your back?

Is it ever hard to leave
fate behind;
to leave
all the paper
stamped and signed?

Is it easy to drop
the pencil?
To "make it pop"
or match the drapes?

Is it easy to stop
and see how hard it is to breath?

I seem to recall the details of emptiness
and the somethingness
defining it
the line where the nothing turns into something
the artery wall
the air and the ground
the spot where you found
the sadness in the joy
the pain in love
the pursuit of balance
the moment where details
don't matter anymore.

The car
was running.
The star
was shining
under a black spotlight.
The girl
was losing the fight
between simplicity
and clarity to see:
What life really is,
What life really means,
What life breaks.

I am still shedding the skin
That knew how to love.
They say it takes seven years
To be born again
No matter how much you burn
And
Peel
The cells that knew
Away
They are there
And you don’t have the power
Time has

I hold an umbrella
Turned inside out and filled with sand
Cradled somehow beneath my grip.
You take my other hand
So I let it slip

Split down the center
insides glow
on skin anew
away it all flew
that day
I saw a dove
making me believe
in love.

When skies are blue
The right shade
The right hue
things are made
extrapolation
compilation
Of time and pain
Of loss and gain
I listen but find no words
I look but nothing appears
And as the fog clears
And the light breaks
I find what makes
I find what takes
I find what fakes.

I have become the ghoul
In your faint nightmares
I have become the fool
In your dreams.
Give me pills and creams
To put where things went wrong
To make me into something strong
Long gone are the days
When I was wispy butterfly,
A struggling little cocoon.
I look for a way out

Nothing is too soon.

One word or two
I claw at the meaning of me and you
Two seconds or three
I know the you, but not the me
I know the window, but not the door.
Three drips to the floor
Tally up these wounds that heal
Rally up these moons to steal.

Signed on for the strong game
But under some different name
And with a mask on:
Looking like
The person you are in your dreams.

Oh such long nights
And fits and fights
Spitting sour lights
Into my eyes
So I can see more clearly.
I push away those whims
To hold you dearly
But I can still feel the heat of your hand
That I almost reached out for.

"Isn't poetry
unless it rhymes, with meter"
...guess he won't listen.

Mist and color
Sparkle
Mountains climbed
Slowly and then quickly
And it does remind
You to go but stay
Whispering still
Say everything again
You match the hills
Blood on your arm
It kills.

Cut things in half
Or at least I try
Do all math
Things add up
But you just get by