Your hands in mine
Your lips on my neck
Your breath heavy, your eyes begging
Too much begging

Too far

You're gone now
I can't find my clothes
I can't find my dignity
I lost myself

Too far

You yearn for someone to care
about you so much that it hurts,
for someone that listens more
than they give their opinion.

You dream of a boy that is
capable of keeping you together,
even though you know you
are the only one responsible.

You've never known love,
raised by a man that taught
you to fear touch and quick
movement and stale breath.

You've known hatred though,
your mother passed down
self-loathing and you've
become a professional by now.

Is it still possible to turn a
self-loathing person
into a
self-loving person?

You've missed your chance
to get help, and now you
self medicate just to
numb yourself.

But numb is terrible.
You're still alive
when you're numb.

I've lived for 1,485 days
without hearing your laugh,
and now I find it hard to
smile even once a day.

It's been 2,138,400 minutes since
I've had insignificant conversation
with you, and I struggle to
make small talk lately.

I've gone 128,304,000 seconds without
a shared glance across the room
and I don't remember the last time
I looked someone in the eyes.

It's been one hundred and twenty two days since you died.
Some people prefer to say passed away,
or went to a better place,
but I'm still having a hard time believing you're
gone so I guess I'm trying to convince myself.

It's been one hundred and twenty two days since you died.
That was the longest week of my life,
watching you but unable to talk with you.
I remember holding your hand knowing
that I was going to wish I could do the same
in one hundred and twenty two days.
I was right.

It's been one hundred and twenty two days since you died.
We cleaned out some of your apartment today,
but it took us 10 hours to get through your closet
because we didn't want to let go of any piece of you.
But we did, we gave away 15 bags and 2 boxes of you.

It's been one hundred and twenty two days since you died.
I found two pennies while we were working,
I know you were there watching.
But even if I believe that with my entire heart, it doesn't
take away the ache that has grown within me since you died.

It's been one hundred and twenty two days since you died.
You brought happiness to every single person you talked to,
and I know you would want everyone to do the same.
I'm trying to let my sadness go, but it isn't easy.

It's been one hundred and twenty two days since you died.
I didn't think I would make it one hour without you,
but you held my hand through it all.

Imagine a building falling on top of you,
first it crushes your bones
then it spreads your brain a couple blocks over
and leaves pieces of you scattered
so far apart and in such tiny fragments
that they can't tell if that is part of your
finger or trash that someone was too
careless to throw away.

Now imagine floating on a cloud
so light that you think your breath
is heavier than your body, and
every thought is so happy it makes
you want to cry because you never
knew life could be that good.

Combine the two and you enter
a perpetual state of confusion, of
too many emotions in the wrong
time and the wrong place.

Combine the two and prepare
to see your life falling apart
and coming together and prepare
to lose everything that you aren't
even sure you care about.

I sit here tonight with raw eyes, no not
from tears like the night you betrayed
us, but from never-ending thoughts
circling around and around, begging
me for answers to the question: why?

Why would she stay when every muscle,
every instinct, every ounce of her being,
is screaming to run?

Why would she ever think that she
could fix you; a monster with a heart
that only beats for yourself.

How could you hurt a family that
had no support? How could you make
all of those ******* decisions that are
going to **** her?

I hate you for making her so sad,
for taking the light from her eyes.
I hate you because now her only
comfort is her loneliness and I
hear her cry at night.

When will it all finally come to an end?
Will it be when my throat runs dry and I
can't yell for help any longer? Or maybe when
blood stops flowing through my veins
because there's no longer a heart to pump it.

I've come to the point where I don't
care how it happens, I just want
an end.

Fall in love with the comfortable
silences shared in the car ride home

Fall in love with the hint of a smile
on her face when she recognizes a song

Fall in love with the way the hair on the
right side of her face is always out of place
because she's forever twirling it around her finger

Fall in love with the way she talks about the
birds outside, as if they are the most enchanting
things on earth (besides you of course)

Fall in love with how she is constantly
writing, and you know it's about you

Fall in love with the way she has a playlist
for falling asleep, yet it always finishes
before she's even closed her eyes

Fall in love with the way
she falls asleep

Fall in love with a writer
and you will discover new
things about yourself to love

Your best friend is laying down
in the casket before you
and it's all wrong.

She's wearing a dress, yet
everyone knew that
the only time she wore
one was to mock those
who "colored inside the lines."

Her hair is up, but she
always had it down
to cover her flaws and
the distant look in her eyes.

Her lips are in a straight line,
but she was known as
the girl who would be laughing
at her own funeral, and here
she was, tightlipped.

Looking at her body that
would soon only leave
bones behind, it was
obvious that nobody ever
looked past the skin deep
features, nobody took notice
of a girl who strove to
blend in, and succeeded.

Loud voices.

Hurried walks.

Too much talking,
not enough listening.

Why shouldn't
I
simply
d
   e
       t
           a
                c
                      h

myself completely?

Our first date was innocent and perfect and slow.
We talked for hours and I committed the way your hands felt to memory.
We kissed and I was nervous and you didn't push me.

The dates in between were a blur.
Casual hang outs we both knew were more.
I was truly happy.

But our fifth date was different.
It felt rushed and the look in your eyes was off.
We talked for hours again but this time you hit me.
We got into the back of my car and the next
morning I woke up feeling ***** and bruised.

By this point I knew you were not what I wanted.
I was no longer happy with you but you had an
unexplainable grip on me and I was practically
on my knees begging you to love me.

I did not like you, I did not like what you did to me.
You made me feel childish and insecure even
when I could see how you were simply using me.
But we were temporary, so I stayed.

On our last night, you told me you couldn't figure me
out and you never called me after that.
I guess in trying to protect myself I became a
mystery so complex you didn't want to bother.

And somehow, despite all the pain you put me through,
you leaving out of nowhere is what hurt me the most.

She painted him
sunsets and mountains
and love, to try to take
the grief away.

She wrote words of
inspiration and hope
and complexity
to show him how simple
happiness could be.

But she failed to see
how deep his sorrow went,
and she couldn't draw a
rope long enough to rescue
him and every escape she tried
to write for him led to a dead
end, and he was left to
sit there and be consumed
by every malicious thought
ever to exist.

I am strong now.
My voice doesn't shake when I talk
and I smile more than I frown.
I've changed, but that's inevitable
when you're living on the brink of death.
My sense of humor has gotten darker
but I'm learning to refine it, to refine myself.
I know now that I will be working on myself
my entire life and will always be rediscovering who I am.
I find that kind of comforting:
the bad parts of me now will eventually fade,
and maybe they'll be replaced with worse but
there's still the chance that they'll be replaced with better.
And that's what I'm striving for: better.
Day by day I become more sure of myself,
every second brings with it a new lesson.
I am ready to finally be happy.

Being broken isn't fun, it's not beautiful, and
it won't make people love you.

Pushing people away doesn't somehow
make everyone care like you think it will,
it only hurts them when you never seem to make time for them.

Denying your problems isn't a sign of being strong,
it's being so weak that you can't even look yourself in the mirror.

And that. Not being able to look yourself in the
mirror doesn't make you tragically beautiful,
it tears you apart and destroys everyone around you.

You make excuse after excuse but one day people
are going to start giving up on you,
and it will be your own **** fault.

But you won't be able to see that you caused
all of this, because you're too busy trying to be
hopelessly broken.

You only seem to care for me when I'm happy,
with one hint of a frown I know you'll be gone.
I thought this would be good for me, that
I would learn to be happy and full of smiles.
But I can't make my thoughts disappear and you
don't seem to understand that smiling no longer
means happiness for me anymore.

Smiling means convincing you that I'm okay
when that's the last thing I am.

Smiling means being normal when you want me
to be and not letting you see that I can't breathe.

**Smiling means suffocating.

Hey God, am I allowed to break down now?
Is this a convenient time for me to fall to
pieces or do I need to make an appointment?
Can I cry now, God? Has this test ever
been passed? It sure feels like you just
gave up on me and sent me to Hell early.

Am I still alive, God?        Do I even want that answer?

I know I've sinned a lot and I'm sorry but
it's truthfully a miracle that I'm still breathing.
She's not. Breathing, that is. You stopped that
in November. I remember that, God: her cold hand
in mine and the overpowering sound of oxygen.

Are you sorry, God?

Because I think you took the wrong person.
I think you meant to take me--I swear I heard
you calling my name and I was ready and
then you ******* took her away.

Did you make a mistake, God?

Everybody does.

a year ago i didn't know the turmoil i would go through
and i didn't know the kind of happiness i would experience.
a happiness so great i could never explain in words, and an
appreciation for everyday life that came out of nowhere but
what seemed like second nature to me, enveloping me
with every inhale and exhale.

i found friendship in places i least expected, i found
distraction when i needed it the most, and i learned that
i have to set my own standards or people can and will
walk all over me.

i learned that it's okay to want to be wanted, but
that i cannot let that define me or i will end up feeling
more lost than when i began.

i learned that it's okay to be lost, and it's okay to not
know how to seek help even when you're trying with
every fiber of your being; even when absolutely nothing
is working, the sheer will to keep going is enough to
keep you alive.

it's important to remember that breathing is involuntary and
so that's one less thing you have to try to do and your heart
pumps blood all by itself and so when you think you aren't
doing anything, your body will take over and let you do
nothing and you are still alive.

and when you look at life like that, any effort you put
in can only be a positive no matter the outcome because
you did more than was physically necessary to get by
and who cares if you ****** up for god's sake you're alive.

the sun will still come up tomorrow no matter what you did
and you may not see it because of the clouds or you may sleep
through it because you were up so late trying to fix what you
think you did wrong or you may be too busy looking down to
realize it but the sun will rise whether you do anything at all or not.

this past year I learned the importance of giving that extra
effort, and how much joy it can bring.
but more importantly, i learned the necessity of not doing
anything at all in order to stay afloat, and that everybody does
it sometimes and even if they don't, they do.

we weren't made perfect beings,
you can't expect yourself to become one.

help

They found it.

they found my words,

my feelings,

my raw destruction of everyone around me.

I can't face them.

I'm not the person they thought I was.

they found me.

it's funny how i kept going back to you.
i was told time and time again how you
didn't want anything more, and I tricked
myself into believing that I didn't either.
I truly believed that I was content with a
weekend romance mixed with friendly hello's.

But I was wrong.

I wanted you to ask me how I was doing and
I wanted to tell you that I'm falling apart.
I was drawn to your calm state of mind because
it seemed like everyone around me was moving
and I was standing still and I wanted to stand still
with you.
I wanted to have someone who felt the same and
I thought it could be you but I didn't realize that
I couldn't make you want that too.
You didn't want to be tied down by a girl overwhelmed
by her dreams and you didn't want to spend time
talking to someone who had the potential to ruin
the tranquility you had so carefully established.
And I understood that, but I couldn't accept it.

But I am finally accepting it.
I'm letting you go and I will be better for it.
And maybe if I keep telling myself that enough,
I'll believe it.

the circles under my eyes are growing
i'm running out of makeup
i'm running out of excuses

She
identifies
with the
fine china
that will
stay on
the same
shelf
until
it cracks
with
age.

She has infinite words
at her fingertips, but
she can't find the right
combination of letters and
balance of syllables to
describe the way her heart
aches every moment of the day.

i refuse to chase anyone anymore.
i used to think that it was brave to go
after what i wanted, that my confidence
would be taken in such a way that
would attract you even more;
but it just left me open and vulnerable
and alone when it turned out that
you never wanted me back.

but i'm not settling for your "sometimes".
your name doesn't make me smile anymore
and i'm making memories with other people:
better people.

I am not defined by your
inability to love me.
I will find someone who not only desires
me, but values me.
I'm not expecting someone to take away the bad,
I simply want someone to enjoy the good with.
I want to talk in whispers on a Tuesday afternoon
so we can hear the wind and laugh in the middle
of class because I remember something you said earlier.
I'm finally in a place where I can enjoy the world,
and I won't be held back by someone who can't enjoy me.

I fell for the way your words were
laced with hidden truths about myself.
But not in the good way--oh how I wish.
No, these truths revealed how guarded
I was and how you saw right through it.
You saw through my walls and
picked out my worst insecurities;
insults disguised as jokes outnumbered
any kind words coming from your lips.
You were toxic and your eyes
undressed me and all of my armor.
I kept coming back for more, begging you
to tell me something I didn't know about myself.
When you finally got tired of my story,
you were gone faster than you came and
I was left here questioning who I am.

I can't take a deep breath
I can't take a breath at all
teach me how
please help me I'm trying
but my lungs can't keep working
like this I can't keep working
like
this.

Holding hands is dangerous because at some point somebody has to let go.

I hope you see something every day that
reminds you of me and I hope it kills you.

I hope you can't breathe when you hear my
name and I hope you can't stop thinking
about my laugh and how well you knew
my tone of voice.

I want you to regret that you can't hear
me talking to you this very second.

I want you to remember how I sang along to
every song because I didn't know the lyrics
but wanted to prove you wrong.

I want you to miss how stubborn I was
and I want you to regret ever letting me go.

I hope you think about pushing me away
and I hope it tears you apart.

my writing is ****.

that's it.

I hate how my dreams about you are always good.
I hate waking up from them.
I hate waking up.