I have never heard a more beautiful sound,
than the song she sang as I fell asleep.
It illuminated every star in the sky,
and captured my every dream.

It sounded like the brush strokes that paint the sunset,
and winter icicles melting.
I heard the sound of tears rolling down stained cheeks,
and the ghostly wail of wind through the trees.

That haunting music followed me into sleep,
and I was blinded by what I couldn’t see,
but the soundscape was ethereal, pulsing with every heartbeat.
It was the sound of her heart and she had given it to me.

I heard every high, every low, and every sad silence.
The sound of her soul was greater than any symphony.
Somehow the notes became me, they changed me,
and I could finally hear my own quiet.

I have never sang a more beautiful song,
than the song I sang as she fell asleep.
I had never scrawled the contours of my soul into composition,
but I did it for her, because she brings beauty.

When I walk down the halls,
I feel the stares that I know aren't there
but I feel them all the same.  

Every eye, every mind, but this isn’t vanity,
because every glance is a burning pain,
a picture of the thousand words that I don't want to hear.  

So pill after pill,
until empty bottles cover my floors,
and steel locks bolt my doors.  

There is no overdose to present me with a midnight rose,
because who knows what would happen. I don't.  
So I stay here where I can see because blinding light paints away every shadow.

The windows are always shuttered to keep out the dark,
the growing, bulging, draining fear that I can't even keep out of my head,
the shady figure waiting around every street corner.  

You think that I don't know? It doesn't have to make sense to be real for me.
They say I have nothing to fear but fear itself,
but why do that when fear is my constant company?

I missed you before you even left.
Now that you’re gone I can feel your absence in every step.
I can’t escape the shadows of this tangible emptiness.
Strangely, it’s easier to feel than presence.

You left so soon, there was no farewell.
I don't know where you’ve gone or why,
but when you become a ghost,
come back and haunt me.

You’ll always be in my heart,
and you’ll always be my daydreams,
but I need you in my reality,
even if you’re only real to me.

Come back like those faded photographs,
with our school books, young love, and backpacks.
We were never high school sweethearts, never really sweet.
We were guitars, and singing, and poetry.

We were like a summer storm,
blowing away everything in our path.
Thunder always let lightning go first,
and I guess old habits die hard.

But I was never meant to be alone,
missing your harmony to my melody.
It’s harming me and I can't find the right note,
to capture your goodbye and to capture your soul.

So, I know they say people only become ghosts if they have a reason to stay,
but can't I be your reason? I need you for my rainy days,
because you can't have thunder without lightning,
Only storming skies and raining eyes and ghostly goodbyes.

Maybe you should leave me here
this building will collapse one day
the trees and the earth will cover my bones
until the sun embraces them and takes them home

Maybe you never should have come
I was alone, not lonely, just ghostly
there was no emptiness until you created it with your presence
and ignorance is a bliss I can’t get back

Maybe I shouldn’t have come
I withdrew from the world because, like a shattered mirror
it didn’t reflect dreams, just distorted reality
and I never learned to believe unless I could see

Maybe we should both stay here
love could come live with us in our cage
we write write poetry and the birds might teach us how to sing
you could make this hiding place a home

I need you to fill my hollow bones
I want to curl up with you on a rainy day
So neither of us will have to cry alone
And neither of us will be out in the cold

I need this so I may build a ribcage
Around a heart that actually beats
We can rebuild our skeletons together
So we can finally stand on our own, but not alone

I need a mouth to wrap around mine
To taste the words I can't bring myself to speak
And I won't mind if your lips are rough from screaming
As long as your lips will echo me

I need you so that my heart doesn't fade from lack of use
But I have my own storm clouds too
So I need you to need me back
To need someone just as broken as you

I’ve always thought I was a lot like the sun,
burning, exploding, colliding inside.
My nuclear fusion radiating light,
but people mistake it for a twinkle in my eye.

I live in this black void of space,
my life has never been a coloring book page,
like those pictures children draw of the sun,
round and yellow with crooked rays and even a smiley face.

But then that kid grows up and goes to school.
He thinks space is cool so he gets a telescope,
then a certificate of cosmology, now he really knows me,
and the childhood smiley face is erased.

My astronomy simply isn’t a crayola color.
I don’t fit in that little box, I’m light years away.
No one can hear me from so far in the galaxy,
and the planets circle just out of reach.

The sun is such a lonely star,
since the others only come out at night, once he’s left.
His lunar love always has to leave too soon,
because the earth can’t stop spinning for the sun and the moon.

So he floats on the horizon alone,
warming our world and lighting the sky.
People forget that he’s there, the thing they couldn't live without.
Ancient tribes used to worship him, but those people died out.

And people seem to think the sun controls the weather.
Whether its hot or cold, rain or snow,
but its never enough or always too much,
because I can never get it right.

For five billion years I have watched worlds rise and fall.
For billions more I will watch from afar.
Nobody’s ever managed to survive out here with me,
I always tear them apart with my gravity.

So yes, I have skeletons in my closet,
but when I put them there, they were more than shadows.
I guess their rocket ship broke,
because now they’re just charred bones.

But when you’re the sun, its not your fault,
that people who get too close go up in flames,
because its hard not to burn every bridge,
when burning is how you live.

Finally, I broke...

I picked up the sharpener
and put down the pencil
took out the blade
let my pain become a stencil
for ruby tattoos
to tally mark broken hearts
how much blood will it take
to hide the scars?

The ends of my veins
are tied off with guitar strings
to keep the sad song inside of me
but I still worry that my blood will stop flowing
because did you know
that the ocean only moves because of the moon
and my constellations are fading
these waves are waning
it is only a matter of time
before the push and pull of these tides
stops like a kid too heavy for the seesaw of truth or dare

I dare you
to tell me that feeling nothing is better than feeling pain
because the heart
is nothing more than a muscle
bench pressing suicides
trying not to flatline
playing a marching band of panic attack drum rolls
and skip-a-beat silence
It has to feel something

and I can see it in your eyes
the truth found you
I can see it in the way you hold yourself
as if your bones have been hollowed
and are as thin as eggshells
I can hear the pain in your breathing
tell me where it hurts
and I will build you a ribcage out of my scars
because they have always been more solid than my bones
in the same way that I never believed in god
but I have always known about the monsters under my bed