we loved so much
until we were all gods
an extension of everything
bleeding out over seasons
over years that cannot be covered.
the way summer lit up your eyes
in the late afternoon
you were born from gold and
there you'll lay for the last time.
i loved you more than anything.

the trees were greenest the day you left.
i can't speak for you,
sometimes i can't speak at all.

eight floors up, i'm thinking of you again.

my body is a temple. --
but not for god or for you.
the hair it grows,
the winters it has spent shaking
the lies it tells me. --
all of this is mine.
your hands may touch my hands,
but they are not yours.
my body is a war. --
filled with roads for which i have no map,
and rivers that drown me again and again.

how are you sitting so lonely
on the other end of town

the trees sway in the spring breeze
constellations blotted out by the tower lights

we met and walked apart
two left feet and nowhere to go
combing beaches, sand in our hair and hands

i am the dirt beneath your nails you can't get out
the lie, the pool of red in the corner of your eyes
from spending too many nights awake

mother earth,
we have stolen so much from you- too much.
we have taken your trees, your mountain tops,
your moss covered rocks, your rivers and streams.
i know the tears you shed- i shed them too (for my home),
i know how desperate you are to repair- to rebuild,
and i wish that i could lay my hands upon you.
i wish that i could heal you all by myself.

you are like the great wild wood
holding secrets in the darkest corners
arms outstretched, this is where you pretend
you're as tall as the sky
promises never kept build up
you lay down one thing just to carry another
a beautiful girl, a million different pieces
glowing and bleeding and wishing
the stars will never burn as bright as you.

i would burn the whole sky to keep you.
capture the moon and cage it
using the light as a torch to find your eyes
glowing like stars in the black days that surround you.

the earth sways in winds
to which i have lost my mind and
all of my possessions
tides pull me from my sleep and
i can think of nothing else.
a dream of you carries me somewhere else.
to a place where the sun rises and never falls,
where my eyes never need rest,
the dark never captures me again.

all of the parts of her that i can never be
my karma. sealed fate. i did this to myself. planted seeds i couldn't dig up. you say you love me but

things will never be the same now. five years rewound. fingers chasing after the old me. grasping in the dark for who i was before you. and you. and you.

"now i cannot lie in that bed."

tired of comparing myself to
your past lovers
my friends
or girls on the street.
she always has what i never will
a younger face
a brighter smile
hair that curls perfectly
falling down past her shoulders
where she carries every little thing
so delicately, in perfect balance
while i am here
hiding from the world
wrapped in blankets and regret.

can you tell me now if i lied about the messes i make
of lives and homes and whole worlds trapped in hearts.
i don't know what i am now
the things i do are stitched upon my soul.
i can pull them out.
but the scars remain until the blood pools up
and fills them up again.

i was dying and you gave and you gave. i don't want to remember.

how does it feel
when someone loves every
little
piece
of you?
even the broken parts.

there are parts you don't see
the slow dying
the stores i tell myself
the holding my breath
the inevitable stillness of winter
i know her face well
eight stories tall, i will meet her there
wind in my hair, the cold stinging my eyes
i can hear your voice but barely.

i hollowed out your bones. drained the blood from your veins. you were my best kept secret. hid you away inside of this glass house. between four walls where the sun couldn't reach your eyes.
hello, beautiful. winter is coming and you're going to a place where summer can't save you. the years fly by and i can't forget your name. the stain left behind by what we once were. what we can never be again. sometimes i hear your voice and feel nothing but

sometimes i see your face and it changes everything.
how many times you've killed me. how many times you've saved me.
and i know my heart can't lie down there. nothing can stay.

the morning falls on her
like feathers pulled from my back
soft light and shadows frame her face
i cover her eyes to let her sleep-
she is unaware of me
but
i love her just the same.

the sun is out but i'm afraid again.
afraid of who i've been.
my past plays in my ear like a broken record
stuck on one note, then moving on
and back around again.

i carried you in my heart.
tucked away in the darkest corner.
i kept you there
even after i broke you,
i collected your pieces
and pushed them into my skin
so that i would never forget.

how can my fingertips retrace my dreams?
i want to be someone different now
someone brave, glowing gold but dark as midnight
a girl hidden away, an impenetrable soul

no one can touch me now. no one can hurt me now.

the fire, the burn that won't heal
the rain pouring down so hard it stings
the weight of a mistake that felt right in the moment
the first time we touched
the last time you saw me cry
the one thing you want but can't keep
the summer that never ends.

the reason to write again
the reminder that every single thing
that you had never intended
will fall in your lap and cling to you
until you tremble for days and start losing sleep.

how blind you are in the beginning,
how much you wish, and want, and ache for their hands.

i saw you shine
a world away, beyond every dead star
blood in your teeth
biting on words you wish you'd never spoken
cutting into that part of you that's hidden

your eyes punished me for dreaming
every door slammed in my face
every phone shattered against the wall
is that how you want to be remembered?
can i write about who you really were now?
about the glass on the floor
and the hands around my neck
about the summer rain we drowned in
the flowers blooming from your throat
choking on love spilling off your tongue,
this is who we really were
saving smiles for when the door closed.

you were so bright,
so bright i couldn't see
but so dark i couldn't breathe
you took the light and dark from me
you mixed them up until i couldn't choose.
your hands moved so fast
hiding the pieces i needed
"left or right?"
frantically, i tried to remember
but you lifted both hands and there was nothing.

sleepy hollow's ophelia
sliding down easy into that dark water
living in light is easy but
loving in hell is hard.
you hold the devil's eyes,
bind his hands behind his back.
righteous queen of night
your whispers shake apart
the entire universe inside of me.

it's almost 2am.
these pictures are helping me remember
the bitter cold,
the snow in west virginia.
the scarves you made,
the silver necklaces you wore.

the heart i left.
and the wings i broke.

how young we were then.
what little we knew then
about living, about loving.
most of all about letting go.

you are the rain that falls in january. soft at first--
then chaining me to the bed.
your hands, a message from jupiter
swirling around inside my head
and i'm lost in your thunder.
at 4am i hear you call
you ask where i've gone again--
if i will return this time.

when you lied i thought i never loved you.
silver fills the cracks in my fingers
and i've spent one more year under your open sky.

i keep imagining what it would be like to photograph you.'
you with your dented wings. your banged up heart.

i laid awake last night
telling you why i'm afraid of the sun.
afraid that one day it's going to implode and **** all of us,
or worse,
leave me burning in a nightmare that i never believed in
clawing and crying to find a way out
but there isn't one.

i thought that i was brave.
standing as tall as the sky
arms going up and up
for what felt like forever.
my whole life laid out
everything that i ever wanted
close enough to see but not reach
and in the blink of an eye
it's all gone
smoke and ashes filling my lungs
my eyes dripping blood
bones breaking and burning away

god came and i looked away.
i hope you take his hand.

how can my glass ever be half full when my brain keeps making me pour all the liquid out?

some days i feel this overwhelming urge to run.
run run run run run run because i'm afraid of something, of everything, of nothing.
run as far away as i can. until my legs break. until the engine blows. until my brain bleeds and i fall. all of me spilling out all over the ground.
run until i am nothing.
run to a place where it isn't just dark.

everything i feel is wrong. there is nothing but darkness in my head.
like being locked in a room with a voice calling you out, but you can't see anything and you keep stumbling around, your hands feeling for shadows and faces that you can only see in your mind.

i forget what is real. i forget who i was. they told me that i'm sick.
they said that all these parts of my personality are symptoms.

i think i will be the death of me.

all those girls with the long red hair don't mean a thing.
i see behind their painted faces.
he may fall but i won't.

my earthly goddess. hold me even when i cannot reach you.
remember who you really are. who you were to me. the longest day in december. midnight eyes and worlds colliding. exploding into stars that i captured and kept for years.
i'm still holding on.

But we do look back
Don’t we?
I miss the ache I felt then
Nothing like the ache I feel now.
Can you replace my bones with scars?

a robin came to bring spring but i stole her away.
i kept her locked inside of a cage with one small hole
and every day i sang to her.
the songs were all about you,
young and new and sweet as nectarines.

we both breathed the same air but i sneezed at her affections.

one day i laid her soft by the open window
winter's breeze fading into something new
the light caught her eyes,
and i wept as she crawled back into her cage.

winter is slowly killing me.

summer, bring my heart back in one piece.

i see her face
there are lines now-
i am missing years.
i know her hands, her hair
her knees and teeth
but she is not me.

days fall from the calendar and i am
stuck here
waiting, watching for her
wondering if she will resurface

i wrap my hands around my own wrists
but they are not mine
i bend with the same knees
but they are not mine
i eat with the same mouth
but it is not mine.

can you find her?
i think the red painted over her-
the searing hot pain in her gut
swallowed her whole.

a nice companion,
the queen of forgetting.

the earth bruised your fragile heart.
i know you mean well but
waking this part of me
will destroy us both.

the day
i raised her
in sunlight and shadow
colors mixing on her lips

you reach out your hands
scooping up the sand from this
burial mound
falling slowly from the cracks
between your fingers,
my former life piled high around your ankles.

i built a boat to sail us out to sea.
made of broken parts of you and me.
the flowers i collect each spring.
the rusty keys i can't part with.
twigs and bones from all my homes.
stones from the lake in the woods.

we paddled out with our hands
and our great big dreams
i watched you sleeping every morning,
the light inching closer and closer to your eyes
you shone so bright that i could see nothing else.
a girl wrapped in a halo,
her innocence spilling out into the sea.

one morning i awoke
i laid beside you, and awaited the light but it never found you
the darkness had swallowed you.
you were filled with shadows and sad things,
the kind of things that make you cry even on the good days.
that day i stopped paddling.

i sat with you. i held your hand. you were suddenly so afraid of the water. you said there were voices in your mind
and you weren't sure ******* them.

i fell asleep with my hands in the water.
when i woke up my skin was salt soaked, shriveled fingertips
i turned to reach for you
but you were already gone.

place your stones inside of my eyes.
so that i can feel.
green from the ferns that grow outside of my window
yellow from the sun that never shows her face
bark from the trees, and blue from the sea.

some silent part of me
thinks by winter i'll be dead
lying still with all the leaves that summer left.
what i can't stand is the colder weather
soaking deep into my bones
stealing all the light i've saved.

i'll place the blame on me for wasting all of it.
every sunlit ocean morning. every crashing wave.
because i was too afraid to dance.
because i was too afraid to breathe
..too afraid of you loving (losing) you.

i missed the falling stars. the bare skin. the walking home.
the pavement hot as hell in late june.
i believed in the infinite heat. the sun never setting.
the world never forgetting. and giving up on me.

blessed are those who inherit the earth.--

your black eyes put the fear of gods in me.
i've lost fingertips trying to rip you out.
you stand so tall like the moon, your light-- borrowed
from the sun.
i'm saving my breath for that day. the stars say to run.
you pull shadows behind you, longer than the love
i've had for you.
my bones ache and crack.
you took everything.
my body can never be mine again.

blessed are those who lie with their lungs and love through their teeth.

i suffer through
these last cold nights-
winter's final stand.
she stretches her icy fingers
toward the trees,
the wind blows
as they bid her farewell.
"you have no power here."

I am not ashamed.
I have survived the long, slow torment,
the only hell that is real,
the one that hijacks your mind,
steals away every thing that you love
and magnifies all of your fears innumerably.
I will not lie or hide myself away to appease you.
But instead, while you are judging me, too afraid to acknowledge your own darkness
I will have the courage to try again tomorrow.

that late afternoon feeling
sweet smell in the air
strands of honeysuckle braided into your hair
humming a bluegrass song that reminds you of home.
flowers stretching upward like soldiers
your skin glowing soft in the sun
hands turning up stones, summer knows your name.

being pulled in every direction. pushing back but getting nowhere.
the thought of you comes softly now. like an old friend, a lover that i never loved.
one kiss spanning across five years. melting down and taking residence in every part of me.
who i was when i let go, in that moment - i am not her.
i am not wild like her. i do not let the winds command my heart.
instead, i am me. waiting, watching.
"how we get older, how we forget about each other."
only i can't.

she reads the pages of my pain
aloud
over and over and over
until it's 4am and there is nothing left but the dark.
desperate to recall
pictures of her like words scrambled together in books
lost over time.
she was beautiful, she was everything.
her blue lace hands and sweet, hot marigold summers
the stories of that winter, snow falling over rotted leaves
washing all of it clean.
she reads
until the sun breaks open the stone blue iris,
and the birds recall her voice
her hair soaked from the first spring rain.
she reads
to remember, to forget, to heal
to break her heart wide open
to feel
and stand on the ledge but remain.

i have battled many things-
men
my thoughts
other people’s words
i have walked down flooded streets
water rushing to my knees
i have had my heart broken
by him, her, you
there was nothing so big that i felt frozen
until these six years
crushing me - ******* out every piece
until there is nothing left

how do i learn to love me now.

love death as if he were the most beautiful creature
stone shaped eyes stained blue and lips like sand.
his starlit body washing up on the shore.

love him as if he will never return.

when the world fell dark, i shuttered because i knew.
i waited for days by the sea. i wished foolishly for the sun's return,
for the warmth of your eyes.

on the third day, i found you washed up, your wings stitched together with golden fleece.
your eyes were bruised, lifeless, and your hair, covered in sand.
i carried your salt soaked body onto the shore.
your hands were scorched, flesh falling from the bone.

i gathered stones from the water and sharpened one upon the others,
and cut a hole into your chest.
i pierced both my hands and pressed them against you.
my head fell and i closed my eyes.
i felt everything from years away. all that you had lived,
the days you carried the light with you,
and the burden that it was.

you awoke to the skies calling your name.
your eyes burned as hot as the sun you once held. your hands, aching, but healed. i brushed the sand from your hair with my fingers.

i asked you how it had happened but you didn't remember. you cried so long, until i didn't know what were tears or tides.
you took my hand just before your horses came to claim you
and then you whispered,

"here i'll stay, gold.
forever gold."

i grew a part of you

a piece i can't take back

i saw your face wrapped up tight

in a hall with blue walls and doors

left there alone

forgetting winter and all of your

bad habits

what i tried so hard to but

could never propagate

the sense of being here and being

enough

ten stones for ten years



"we'll meet again"

the sun keeps shining

on the days when i'm sure

that all of the blood in me

could never keep this going

and

spring's new leaves

have blown away



i remember

the forest i've built with what was left

the holes in my bones filled up with sand

and glass and stones

the very ones i placed so carefully

in your hands

every time i asked

please

don't let

go.

six years
we kissed there for the first time

how could you, how could i
a story rewritten
over and over and over.
blue skies spread out over our hands
and i see how you have carried me
three years
the weight of that, clouds so thick
i held my breath to make it through.
where is the sun on the other side
the warmth on my skin,
crying like summer rain
come and gone and bright again.
why was there no music played for us.

six years
i felt everything one hundred miles away
can you remember still
the green in my eyes
the snow that mixed the colors
that came later in the fall
before the cold

how can i, how can you
i dreamt of you tracing my scars
that you would never leave
and i would always stay
the hope of a life well lived-
i hear you laugh and it is everything.

"how we get older, how we forget about each other
entwined within the sadder of days."

once you said "don't worry."
but i did. and i do, and i probably always will.

all taller than me, but not in spirit.
they taught me that not all beasts have long, sharp teeth.
the long night is not to be feared, but instead the reach
of their arms, holding me, smothering me.

i have been many women. all for them.
red hair and purple lips.
black hair and hip bones.
yellow dresses and curls.
each one removing a piece of my spine
chipping away at my bones
til i am nothing.

the world grew up around me
and suddenly i realized i had not grown with it.
still as a dead bird, i watched the seasons pass.
my veins filled with salt,
my mind burns now like an open wound--
i can never forget the sound of their voices
telling me who to be, how to hold my body.
always ringing in my ears.

let me be free. will i ever be free?

the stars whirled and rose up to meet her. created galaxies for her. constellations holding hostage the clouds.
all her life mapped out among oceans and the whales carry horns on their noses to write her name in the sand.

but she is dangerously human.

born into a world that feels. with trees that breathe. wild oak and birch filled with bees and knotted leaves. a forest imagined. left to become.

the child forever still. motionless beneath the white moon. his tears formed the seas. otherworldly, spinning thread around the smallest finger. winding and winding, silver linings break apart. pieces of a life fall to the ground. cradled by the wind. carried over the earth and into the skies.

"you have always stood here, dreaming my whole world. i've sent word on the backs of sparrows. the lord of lonely, all you have written i would have erased.
born from dust and pushed to earth, i remember the stars like it were only yesterday.

can you help me make it home?"

the feeling you get
when the high becomes low.
like someone is stealing the air from your lungs
and your chest caves in.
no love, no hope.

where is my resurrection?

and just like the evergreen in winter,
i will droop and slump down into myself
waiting for winter to go.
i will remain among the living,
barely in bloom
so many of my leaves scattered at my feet
but enough remaining
to keep me breathing,
my eyes ever watching, waiting
for the first sign of spring.

god is dead and i'm still breathing.
you lied and i stole.
the world was not what i imagined. you painted pictures and i fell for everything.
young, wide-eyed, afraid,
you preached about green eyes and love that wasn't
yours to give, but you
gave it anyway.

the same songs still ring in my ears.

once whole, you split me into
something i cannot recognize.

the demons are real.
and they're back again.
who will help me hide this time?

if i never left my bed again
could they still find me there
could i pull the covers over my head
close my eyes tight
and sleep
to escape them

would they still make me feel like this