I sipped candle wax
and was told I was a genius
As it hardened in my throat
And every cut and bruise
Is honored as glory and strength
When it's just a sign of my pathetic mortality
And every step I take into the ocean
On cracked feet and hot skin
Burned because I demanded it to
And 60 days of minimal sleep
Is a sign of dedication
To my waking hours
Rather than successful neurofunction

And for all these reasons,
They tell me I'm smart because
Intelligence is measured in longetivity
In the face of persistent self destruction
Because the sick are those who've truly got it right.

Nietzsche spoke of an inversion of values
Where weakness becomes our pride
And strength is deemed repulsive.

You see, modesty's a virtue
That it's easier to promote
With candlewax
hardening in your
cold,
dead,
throat.

There isn't a word for this slimy cold;
Weighted and dense.
******* heat.
Like smoking a menthol,
Chilling lungs as they're caked in black soot.
Heavy.

He asked me why I kept *******
(the soot).
He asked me why I kept working myself to death.
He asked me why I wouldn't use my words,
Only my body to shut his mouth.

And how could I tell him,
There isn't anything to say.
My words have been replaced with soot.
My voicebox is just an ashtray.

It's killed everything.
It's eaten everything.
The monster is back.
And more insidious than ever.

A chill goes down my spine as wind dances
Into the space between my ears and into my hollow chest,
Filling in the clean spaces between the ashen viscera.

I'm afraid I'm dead.
I'm so cold and hollow.
My eyes scream 'vacancy'
Because I can't contort my mouth
Into anything intelligible
Nor force audible syllables through my throat.

I'm sorry.

With days of solitude I score my skin,
Each tiny mark like a record of my days.
Condemned to an eternity in solitary confinement,
I tug on the clamp on my brain
Hoping not to wreck the soft, grey tissue.

Here in my cell I am barred from green grass and flowers;
Baby bunnies and cooing birds.
What a happy accident to have landed *** first
After hauling my *** out of a long sleep
And praying for an *** that may fill my jeans
Or carry me the **** out of here in hooves of bronze.

Where we're going, there isn't any ******* gold.

20 years and 9 days and teeny little etches for each.
I slap a watch on my wrist and I've got a more grown-up form of torment.
Oh that

TICK

Oh that

TOCK

Oh how it--

TICK

Oh how it--

TOCKs

To me when nothing else will.

There are 5 simple steps to repairing a humanoid vessel:

1) score it
2) don't wreck the soft tissues
3) get the right ***
4) accept the bronze
5) accept that ticks and tocks mean you'll be running on a full 3 hours if you're lucky

Rambling drunken thoughts at 7pm because

*******
For spending so much time trying to get me
Winning me
And abusing the prize

*******
For telling me I'm stupid
And mean
And steadily becoming less attractive

*******
For making me sick
For making every morning a terrible surprise
And every night so long and trying

*******
For making me feel like I could tell you anything
As I lick my wounds trying to limp away

*******
For ******* me
After expressing so much fear
That I would hurt you.

**** me
For falling for all those cliche ******* ******* lies
And stupidly laying on my back
While you tear out my entrails.

Oh how I love being this sopping wet piece
Of sludge sticking to these wood floors.
That dark, dry ****** color is sure to stick in your memory.
Is sure to stick to the bottom of your shoes.
Is sure to be that little piece of me you carry with you.

Trampling me forever.

It lived in the palm of my hand;
Small and heavy
Like a dense pebble,
Like the world's smallest boulder.

I held it out toward the sun,
So all the world could see
      this tiny little thing
Reaching for something more.

My arm grew tired.
My tricep started to quiver.
My bones started to chatter.
The boulder sat, bloated and bleached by sunlight.

50 years later
The boulder sits.
My arm has not moved.
It has grown strong.
It has grown still.
It has grown silent.

The boulder is bigger from dust.
It forged a dent in my palm,
Wearing its way through
Until it finally fell out the top of my hand.

And I strained my eyes to look through
     that round hole in my skin
With puckered skin and smooth edges,
And when I simply couldn't see it,
I resolved to lower my arm.

Down it went.
And with every move, pain accompanied.
The stiffness,
The ache,
The ****** of habit.

And this, my dear,
This boulder.
This is what we have become.

One of the hardest things I've ever had to learn

Is that giving up

Control

Could be as easy

As letting out a breath.

But instead I selfishly hold all this oxygen
In these lungs.

And god knows,
I'd be ****** to save some for you.

Never did I think that I'd miss the feeling
Of waking up on cold tile floors
With my face pressed against the sweaty floor
And nausea bubbling from my gut.

Never did I think I'd miss gagging on my own breath
Coated in last night's cigarettes
And too much bourbon
And someone else's mouth.

Never did I think I'd miss
Waking up next to someone
And not giving a **** who you were.

I’m writing here because my Twitter followers are going to get annoyed.

And this is 2013 and all my friends are digital.

Except for when I used to live near people.

Now I live near houses.

And every so often I think I reach out to find someone to live within

Because this young body is breaking down

And I can’t contain what’s inside.

It’s all about to burst out in an exploding flurry

And everyone is going to fall out of my life

Because I haven’t trimmed the fences

(That grow like vines; higher and higher)

In hopes that when my body dies

I’ll still be able to hold myself together.

But when you live within a poison

That eats through more than your body

And sleeps beside you

And touches you

And tells you you’re the poison

And you feel guilty for trying to understand his fences

And why his body is breaking too.


But you did what was right;

You criticized the arsenic for being what it was

And tossed it aside to save for when you were ready to go.

And that’s where I’ve blindly sat for four weeks and a couple days.

And searched the internet for answers as to why.

And told the internet that I’ve become a poison.

And cried because it’s 2013 and all my friends are digital.








And mourned the life I used to live
When I used to live near people.

Done with The Good Things.
Finished with Hypochondriasis.
Ending each sentence,
With a period.
For Heaven's sake,
finality is too elusive.
And I just want to muster the vocal power
To tell you
I need you gone.
I need you gone from my eyes,
Because you are too **** close.
And I can't stop running.

I've finished with The Good Things.
It's over.
I'm done.

The warm body in my bed
Proved to be no more
Than a memory in my head.

I'm packing my bags and moving back home
Never having told you
That maybe I cared more than I let on.

I'm back to my old game.
Crawling into bed with new friends
Who ask me why I leave so early in the morning.

I don't know if I can live this life
Without a drink in my hand.
Two weeks dry, two weeks too long.

I can barely keep hold my head up
And my clothes are hanging off my frame
And I have a new friend who wants me to share
The drudges of my world.

And all I want is to tell you I'm sorry I never told you
Because I knew that despite everything,
You could never feel the same.

So one day,
Beneath a bright blue, cloudless sky,
Embraced by the warmth of a loving sun,
Caressed by the smooth fingers of tall grasses,
You can find me.
Resting in mulch,
Still,
Peaceful,
Relieved,
                                                                                                                                          free

Stay in bed
Close the blinds
**** the lights
Listen to your breathing
Listen to a faint pulse
Listen to blood gushing through your ears
Listen to your head
The thoughts you can't describe
The blood in your ears
And try to breathe
But anxiety lays on you like a heavy blanket
And your chest heaves to no avail
Blood in your ears
Get up and move but there's no where to go
Limbs are too heavy
Blood in your ears
Pulse elevating
Suffocating under some invisible demon
Gasping, gasping
Blood
in
your
ears.

When you're on the hunt for your own blood,
You'll beg hypochondria to **** you.

We trade in those who love us for nights of melancholy that depreciate our value and **** the glimmer from our eyes.

We sell our bodies in search of love.

We sell our souls in search of self.

We trade in those who love us, because love is too much.

Love costs more than it’s worth,

So we pay nothing for nothing,

And think back on nights of somethingness,

Preceding the nothingful blur of today.




I never thought I could see nothing,

Until I let something walk away.

All my words fall out and scatter
Like dumping a box of puzzle pieces
on the grubby carpet.

So here, as I try to piece it all together,
Please hold your breath
(and possibly my hand)
While I ramble on to you,
My sweet, silent listener,
My own temporary love,
You gentle stranger.

Dragging my throat over brambles and thorns,
I've craned my neck to see over a barrier
That made itself known
Despite the roses and smooth lilies
That couldn't cover it enough.

I tried so hard to tear it down,
I wanted to get over it,
Get to you,
And let myself be with you.

I let my nails cake with blood,
As I climbed my way over,
Skinning my legs,
Puncturing my arms.
But never mind the tears,
They pull me over,
Push me to you.

And it's ok.

But as I finally fall over,
Making the final descent over the barrier,
I see you in the distance.

Surrounded by your own barrier;
Your own fortress.

Please let me in.

You never think it's gonna be you.

"Those problems are for the other, they're not mine.
I am young and I am resilient and I shall never grow old
And illness will never mar my body
And these cigarettes will never **** me
And a headache is just a headache
And a cold is just a cold."

But then it gets someone you know.
And then it gets someone you love.

And then it gets you.

When I was sixteen
I picked up my life
And moved across state lines
To a town full of strangers
And emptiness

And though the emptiness seems cliche
There is nothing as full and rich as your home town
With its familiar faces
And places
And ways.

And so that first summer there
I floundered
I slept too much
And I ate too little
And I ached for a home that didn't even want me
Or so I thought

But it's not that I abandoned it
It's that I was taken from my home
And told to replant and cultivate roots in impossible soil
But my roots have not cracked the surface of this new "home"
But when I go back to my real home
I go to visit my roots
Where I could have grown strong and sturdy
And maybe not lost the boy I loved
And the family I'd cultivated
And the memories I missed.

If absence makes the heart grow fonder,
Then maybe I've fallen too hard for my home.

But love is love is love is love
And I love and miss my home.

Little pink pills,
Like a chemical life support,
Stick to the walls of my esophagus
And refuse to budge
And become the lump in my throat
That I carry around
Throughout my day
When the man harasses me on the street
When the stranger compliments my shoes
When my friends' eyes burn.

Little pink pills
Can't even save a small girl
From that big voice
Creeping up from her cerebellum
Into her temporal lobe
And whispering into her ear
And taunting
And laughing
And then screaming.

Little pink pills,
to delay the inevitable.

Little pink pills,
to deter final peace.

I didn't want to talk about forever.
Though forever only spans one life,
I hope to have more than just this one.

I kicked the tobacco, the fried foods,
The binging on anything.
And I don't taste like bitter liquor anymore.

My hair is brushed,
Teeth whitened,
Tongue pink,
Skin clear.

So boring.
I'm so dull.

If you could promise me another life,
You'd never see me again.

My fear of being alone
Is what keeps me coming back for
more.

Again.

And again.

O, God please let me create something
Anything.
I'm bogged down with numbers and chemicals.
I'm coated in formulas and structures.

Dissections.

I've become a pro at tearing things apart.

O please O please let me create something beautiful.
Or ugly.
Let me create something new.
Let me contribute.

Or else, how can I leave my mark?

I poured myself a bowl of stale cereal
To satiate a hunger that was real
And biological
And a product of
Constantly forgetting to eat
Now that I have too many other things
Not to worry about.
Because time passes so quickly
When you stare at a white wall for
Five hours a day
And wonder when
The phone will ring
To break the monotonous routine.

But the phone always rings.
And someone is always pulling
At the hem of my non existent skirt
Trying to get me to feel the same things
They do.

And I do.
But I can't cry when I'm sad
And I don't always laugh when I'm happy.
But you and I are the same.

Someone once told me "you just don't want to accept that you're normal."
But maybe I'm just crippled from embarrassment by my unwavering normalcy.

1:30am
Early night
To turn in
And surrender to sleep.

If I sleep,
I miss 6 hours of
my life
...if I'm lucky.
But an hour wasted
Is an hour lost.
And days are numbered.
All days.

If I stay awake...

Shakespeare dropped his words
On paper
With such precision and thought
And innuendo  
And irony and
All fit in his pieces
Like magnificent puzzles
That would forever transcend
The cruelty of time.

I dropped my thoughts before my words could speak them
Before I could create art
Before I could explain to you
The pieces in my missing puzzle
That I've let sit out
And be weathered
And beaten
And ruined by every tik and every tok.

And every time I open my mouth
And slide my tongue onto my lips,
Just to keep them from drying,
I can't say what I want.
And every smile,
And every kind gesture
Is all I can show.

My words are not pieces of something greater;
They're wrong and raw and destructive
And unkept and
Anything
But
Static.

Please give me the strength to close my mouth,
And close my eyes.
And wait until time decides to heal again
Because I don't want to ruin
The most beautiful thing I had ever had.

because when I was fourteen,
I'd put on my angsty coat
With its burlap pockets
And its itchy collar
And its ill-fit
And I'd go out with my middle fingers
Toasting the world
Blaming every stranger on the street
For every night I couldn't sleep.

And sick was a cold
Sick was a fever.
Sick was the shakes from not eating.
Because I'm a girl.
And my value does not stem
Past my appearance.

When I was sixteen
I rimmed my eyes in charcoal black
And donned a matching outfit
That would bring out
The feigned vacancy in my prying eyes
As the ambivalence of wanting to eat the world
And wanting to hide from it
Weighed on my narrow shoulders.
And a boy thought I was a Satanist.
And he avoided me.
And I loved it.

Now I'm older --
But still just a kid.
And I wear real clothes
That make me look like I'm twelve.
But at least I'm happy.
And sick has a different meaning.

It's reaches past the physiological nausea that accompanies
And into the aches and pains of waking up every day
And through the cold, cold labyrinth in which I've been lost
For seven years
And the sickness is laughing my *** off
In a room full of beautiful people
That I love
That I would do (almost) anything for
And trying to decide whether or not tonight is the night
With absolute glee I ponder
Is tonight the night
When I can cut the crap
And finally get a good ******* night's sleep
And not feel the obligation
And not deal with the fact my ******* body
Is crapping the **** out on me
At nineteen.
And that whatever the **** this is
Is only enough to make me miserable
And not enough to **** me
Because most days, the curiosity keeps me going
And going
And ******* going
And then I'm in pain.
And I laugh,
Because I take myself way too seriously.
And life is a **** beautiful gift after all
right?
And I've got the whole world at my feet.
Who cares about a little pain?

I need to be awake in seven hours
And tonight I don't feel destructive.
I want to apologize to my mother for being so cold
Even when I try not to be.
And I want to buy her a nice house and all the clothes she wants
So she can feel comfortable going to work.
So she sees that she's beautiful.
Even if it's superficial.
And I can't fix anything
And I can't turn my brain off
And this isn't even art anymore.
This is..
It's...

Because who the **** doesn't love being sick.

"Love me baby, love me."
Oh that's it!
A little to the right.
Oh you've got it!

******* I wish you didn't put the chocolate so ******* high.
Sometimes a girl needs her sweets, you know?
Never mind my expanding waistline.
I have no one to impress, right baby?
Wow I'm so glad I have someone as big and strong as you to reach these things off the high shelves.

Now finish up so I can put some clothes on. I've got errands to run.

Puffing on my third menthol of the night, he looks at me and says "you know, these apparently crystallize your lungs." He's got one between his lips too. But they'll only crystallize my lungs. So I look over to the nearly finished bottle of wine to my left, proud of my handiwork. But as I slip into drunkenness, I know I haven't taken my last puff of the night, so I try to keep my breathing a little shallower, but I end up inhaling even deeper, trying to feel those tiny organs harden.

I talked about myself all night.
Tuned out everyone else's worlds. I've stopped being able to listen. I've become self absorbed, in my cigarettes, in my drinking, in being nineteen and stupid. But the night was warm and heavy, even when the breeze whipped around my dark hair, momentarily obstructing my vision. I was surrounded by people who I perceived to love me. As for me, virtually all love I receive is unrequited.  So every work borne from me is about me, is part of me, is all me, because how could I possibly broaden my mental scope when I spend so much of my time alone falling in love with my own decaying reflection.
She really is beautiful though. Those huge, deep hazel eyes. The dark, dark hair juxtaposed to that pale skin. And the accenting dark circles under her eyes from running on four hours of sleep a night for thirty plus days. Self indulgence.

Self hatred.

Inhale deeper and feel my lungs dying.
Giggling at how I still talk like a thirteen year old child.
Laughing at my philosophy that if this teen angst continues into your twenties and beyond, you  just become Hemingway.
It's all very funny, really. I truly am a caricature of a real person. I am completely devoid of all authenticity and every ounce of me is contrived.

But this too shall pass.

Alone at night
I find myself wide-eyed
Clutching sheets with white knuckles
Peering out from under the covers
Hiding like a child
Keeping myself
Holding myself together
Under these sheets
Under the weight of cotton
So I don't fly away.

Stealing my breath tight in my chest I count to ten
With cheeks turning red
And five fingers reaching into the darkness
Stretching themselves into nothingness
Until they spring back
To hold my cotton fortress steadfast
Against the tyranny of night.

The grumbling and groaning of the house
Churns my stomach
And I sink into these sheets
With my breath coming back at me
As I hide beneath covers
And sing a song that makes me happy
But it sounds all wrong
And as a last resort
I reach over to the other side of this big bed
And put my hand on your warm skin
And instead of complaining;

You stretch out your arm
And pull me into you
And in that moment, I know.

Little pink pills
To help lie about the swiftness of my temper
To inhibit the churning mind
To change what I was born to be.

Little pink pills
That I can't justify taking
Because I don't want to live a lie
Forcibly pretending I'm someone mellow and simple
When there was a storm raging underneath

It climbed out from under the bed,
Into my sleeping mouth,
And down my throat.

It stretched its arms into my own;
Its legs reaching down to my feet.
It caused me to stir.
It blinked my eyes.

It whispered to no one.

I tried to **** it.
Red droplets.
Pink pills.
Bitter drinks.
Open legs.

Open ends.

And with this slow death,
Came a slow decay.
And a greasy rot corrupting my insides.

This dead weight;
This dead thing;
I never named it.

I never called it anything.

I just carried her around.
Let her sit within me.

Mourned.

I can't even remember what I was mourning.

Ten years ago,
You laid limp on the bed
In the room with the palm tree print
All over the bed spread and walls.
With your chin tilted up,
And your mouth slightly parted
And no one knew if you were asleep
Or not.

But in that room with the palm trees.
In that "paradise"
With the window that perfectly framed the lagoon-style pool
And untouched nature just behind it
And a whole world that kept turning.

No one could explain why such a tragedy
Would befall such a wonderful human.
I don't know if you ever saw yourself as wonderful.
I don't know if you believed you were allowed to be human.
But the world owed you more than all it took.

The nine year old watching you decline,
Waited for you to get up and say you were feeling better.
So when her parents came to tell her you were gone,
She never bought it.

But that tinge of guilt and regret,
Can't keep the grown child from the pills and the *****
And the will to lay limp in the room with the palm trees
And wait for the inevitable.

The life of a teenage girl
Is tumultuous.
She lives thirty lives in 7 short years
Combs her hair with a shaky hand
That turns still and calloused as time goes by.
Every year colored with
Black tears from too much mascara
And lipstick on teeth from untamed laughter
And dark circles under eyes from too many late nights
And scars from everything beautiful and ugly that ever touched her.

Her hands are so full
From every boy who ever intertwined his fingers with hers
And left behind whatever he did when he was finally gone.

And the ventricles of her heart; so swollen
She feels as though she may collapse under the weight of her heart.

And written in every vein,
Every capillary,
Every lobe,
Every nerve,
Are all the consuming ways in which she loves all that she loves.

And her stomach is scarred from that churning feeling;
That nauseating, stinging, consuming feeling.
That speeds in and out when she's enveloped by fear,
Or love,
Or hatred,
Or heartache.

And on her skin,
The scent of her family;
The ones bound by blood, and the ones bound by destiny.
The ones who made her strong and taught her to love.

So here's to family:
That chaotic wake up call
That didn't show its light until she realized just how bright it truly shines.

I have an affinity for ice cream.
I can eat bowls upon bowls at a time.
I impress myself.

It's funny how the things you love grow from the things you never questioned;
Never appreciated;
Never even noticed.
Jumping out of the car the last day of school.
It was hot.
But it was California.
And it was home.
And my dog waited in the backyard.
Happy we were home.
And I stared at our pool and I wanted to jump in;
But I didn't have the courage
       Because I didn't want it enough.
And the refrigerator would be full of Drumsticks.
      (chocolate on mint)
And I would eat one or two a day.
And sometimes the ice cream man would come.
      (he was terrifying, but he had ice cream)
And I would stand outside and eat my ice cream because we weren't allowed to eat it in the house.
And my brother would finish quickly and go inside and play video games.
      (or run down the street to see his friends)
And I would try to be a cliche
      (just like in the movies)
And put on the roller skates I rarely used and try not to lose control as I shuffled down my driveway.
But I never had anything of value to do over the summers.
I never went to camp.
There weren't any summer traditions.
I had ice cream and board games and my dog and the pool I was afraid of.
I counted down the years I still had left at home
      (petrified of what would happen after)
And I didn't understand why mom wasn't as scared as I was.
      (1,2,3,4,5 years left at home; 1,2,3,4.....4 years left at home)
They never taught me how to ride a bike
And I never learned to love the water
And my skin never browned
And I had to stay inside
Except for when there was ice cream.
I could always go outside for ice cream.

Nineteen years of life.
My mother hates ice cream.
She tells me I'm just like my father.
My temper, my moods, my impatience.
Sometimes she says I get his savvy;
His ambition;
His humor.
Sometimes.
My father loves ice cream.
      (I love both my parents)
      (I think they love each other too)
So I took my father's ambition and ran across the country
Where I'm hopefully learning to be a good doctor
And I met these people that I love
      (that I call my family)
And we like ice cream.
We like ice cream and pie.
And going to the beach when the weather is nice.
And ice skating.
And coming home to each other.

I'd say I have an affinity for love;
I'd say I have an affinity for life
But you can't eat love and you can't hold life
Because both are fleeting
      (but so is ice cream).

Ice cream is the summer before 8th grade
When I spent all my time with a girl I loved and learned to hate.
Because we fought over boys.
Because that was middle school.
And 8th grade was horrible.
And I never ate ice cream.
And I never tried to roller skate.
And California became too hot.

So if I were to develop my own ice cream flavor,
And call 31 and tell them what it would taste like,
It would taste like a pensive child
It would taste like mint
It would taste like chocolate
It would taste like missing my friends
It would taste like missing my parents
And I would call it nostalgia.
And I would laugh while I ate nostalgia
Because the thought is absolutely absurd.

In the moments between the moments I owe to other people,
I have found a home in the chaos of my own thoughts;
Within the folds and electrical pulses;
Within the blood and the bone.

i tried
so hard
for all of you to see
that i had lived my life
and i was done
because i couldn't take any more
and there was nothing more to give
and i was sick of barely sleeping
and waking up with headaches
and feeding a sour stomach
and nurturing a fictional soul.
i wanted you to just let me go.
and all our little problems would be solved.

but here i sit.

Light turns the inside of my eyelids red
As the sun rises.
And I can still taste last night's cigarettes.
And the room is too hot.
And it all comes back to me.
And my stomach churns.
But I still can't *****.

Months away from such joy
In hopes of finding something better
And in the end,
Addiction is just a love story
Between you and your oppressor

And now believing I can never be free
As willpower isn't enough,
Throwing in the towel
And rolling with the tide,
Is my best chance at freedom.

If to be loved
Feels like tugging on sinew
The way a lazy harpist plucks her strings.

If to be loved
Tastes like bitter wine and sweet dirt.

If to be loved
Is like holding a shard of glass between your teeth
While jumping on a tight rope,
Then I will not have it.

If to be loved
Means learning to love...

Then I publicly refuse this offer.
And I return to the life I used to lead.
Caked in grey and devoid of warmth

So unlike the unbearable heat of your skin
When you wake me with lips on a hot summer's night
And I cannot muster the strength to push you away.
So by your hair I pull you near
And that scream I feel from deep in my gut will
Not make its way to my vocal chords.

I refuse to love anyone again.
Especially one as impermanent as you.

The heat turns cold
Sweat dries
Tears dry
Passion becomes reluctant complacency
Becomes apathy
Becomes fear of you loosening your grip on my wrist.

And we dissolve into ***
Because there isn't anything left to say
When moaning is the only way to communicate.

This was never love.
But we gave it a chance.
But you hid the sunlight
And I drowned it.
So here we stand in this muddy swamp
In the eye of the final storm.

The wind picks up.
The moss shifts.
The willows sway.

And here we sink.