when he told me he was sorry to hear that the pain was worse again, i truly believed him. how many ibuprofen can one migraine consume before you implode? and later when he told me i didn’t have anything interesting to say i believed him again. how many words do you use in a day, miss in a day, little ‘hellos’ and ‘thanks yous,’ when your grief has brought you a year of mute mourning. i used to think paris was a pretty place, and there’d be starlight paths leading me to iron lattice towers, but instead the roses floating down a sinewy seine thick with juices from human consumption. how many times can i remember and repeat all the bad things you’ve ever said to me, remember and repeat, and why are they haunting me now? i thought i had finally kicked your face out with my old words, but like a ghastly cockroach you’re always around, observing me, when i can never see you.

it’s one or another,
between the smoke and the ink well.
i could see that you’ve had trouble sleeping.
and you’ll always be this way,
and things will never work out right,
and you’ll be caught in a loop of endless night.
in the end do you think all will be forgiven?
in the end do you think all shall be released?
i haven’t given up days
or nights in your soft embrace.

dawn, lady of the light
reveal my disguises
and let them set aside the fact
that i get addicted so quickly.
i’ve inscribed our names on driftwood
kissed and sent so far.
but the earth is a sphere
bringing everything back to the beginning.
and now we are like tow ghosts
lingering in hallways
instead of finding secrets in each other’s arms.

my mother named me after the tornadoes
that spin with such violence they’re venerated, not feared.
my, what violence has been brought these days
a scattering of cicada wings
and rose tinted smoke
and the blood that marks the spin of the moon,
the one celestial body you can love me under.

"and i’ve got a big fat ******* bone to pick, with you my darling. in case you haven’t heard, i’m sick, and tired of trying."

you should’ve stayed a stranger.

i check my skin in the mirror,
translucent,
i can see the green rivers curling around muscle,
carved caverns bleed when you remove the roots.
how fragile a thing.
how heavy a thing.
the burdens of our mother’s mothers,
their whip sharp tongues like barbed wires lash our backs.
the guilt lives through me,
i’ll pass it along to you, my darling child,
along with the bundles of nerves that reek with screams,
a dirge for the loss of blood.
it wasn’t until i learned how sticky blood was,
like sweat,
like lips,
like hands on hips,
and like my mother’s mothers i danced a whirling carousel.
the dirt is blinding and leaves me in a deadened fog of symbols and letters,
of words,
of words.

there’s an apricot moon
draped in blue robes
suspended in a cloud filled sky.
i don’t want to smell like you,
and i didn’t want to let you touch me.
my impulsive child heart let you in,
and you haven’t found a proper lodging yet though i doubt you ever will.
can’t i scrub myself clean of your touch?
the eau du cologne clogs my pores,
the tree makes my eyes water,
the friction of bodies makes the fog wrap the windows,
the sweat pours down
and i’ve automatically put my arms around you.
as you enter i think about all the other med i’d prefer you to be.

he hugged me too close our faces touched,
alcohol reddened cheeks kissing,
still filling me with the same warmth as if
you let me drink the alcohol from your tongue.
i tried it once, the taste inelegant, whole.
and once i bore it all,
the weight of a man's cannibalistic search for pleasure.
it consumed my soul,
left me to give birth to that which will destroy me in the end when the world is in ruins:
when the green fingers have clawed back their edifices
we'll dare bare feet in the summer heat
filling our bodies with the vibrations
that our ancestors praised in midsummer.
when they chanted to the ghosts of their gods, they could not fathom how quickly you'd become one to me:
   milky white apparitions that taste like smoke dance in the spaces between blinds when the sun finally says goodbye.
   golden like honey, like tanned skin, like syrup, like curls i can't help but twirl my finger around  in your hair

i.
i yelled my name from the mountaintops
and let it echo deep down to the depths
and reverberate back through my past lives.
grotesque and corrupted,
i slide through reincarnation like a flip-book,
letting the pages run together
as i carry the same vices from generation to generation.
if we are doomed to repeat our mistakes,
how many must it take until we finally heal?
if we are doomed to learn nothing from history,
how many stories must we pass down,
mouth-to-mouth,
that show us that the gaping maw of crimes
eventually digests us all?

ii.
i want to live again,
in a cave, dipped in silver, i inhale the smoke of the earth and preach the future.
in the ocean, new colored scales reflecting off sunlight strewn waters.
in a forest, roots running strong through the good earth, fingers reaching up to immortal stars.
in a house, a repeat of yesterday and a repeat of tomorrow, always waking for the same reasons and escaping at night to the same places.

iii.
when the cycle closes,
she’ll come for me.
she’ll sing my sins,
as i cease to be.
take away my breath,
let my skin fade.
put my bones on the scale,
let my soul be weighed.

october never starts this cold,
the slugs are out in droves.
and if the smoke mingles
and our brain chemistry is correct
then why can’t we meet as one?
you’re like ripping off adhesives,
slowly, more painfully, and quickly, you still sting.
you’re like muddy pots and samhain plots,
something once thought of and never again completed.

i’m stuck with a love that can’t compete
and isn’t for want of much,
but it drags its smooth breath over the silver sword
and cuts in deep
when you bring up someone else.

who,
are they to you but pawns?
you forgot to cherish me, your queen
who would release love into your eyelids at night
and take your scars and never once ask about the past.
i know i’ll care better than her, more powerful than her, more straight forward as her, more meaningful as her, more more intense as her…

get yourself up off the ground,
it’s time to stop mourning the life you once thought you’d live.