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he only wants you in the way that means
he can wrap himself around you like a cocoon to help you
change you'll be
a butterfly
something different from what you are which is
flawed so flawed i don't want to touch you don't want
to talk to you just
write poems about the way your hands fist in the pockets of your jacket
i hope you'll go with him because
no matter how many poems i write about the way you
hurt and hate and hope in helpless hollows i know
it'll still burn
like a rope you tried to catch when you fell but
it just caught the skin of your palms
[please don't ever open my notebook you
look at it sometimes when i'm writing i
don't ever want you to see the way
i romanticize
your pain it's not
beautiful or poetic it's just sad
i wish you were happy but i just keep
writing poems about
your misery
and when you surface when you emerge from your cocoon i will
write odes dedicated to the selfishness
that would keep you hurting so i could
feel something when i look at you]
he only wants you in the way that
stitches want an open wound and
i know you want to be mended but no,
no,
nobody can fix you but you and they,
they will try but just
stitch embroidery
into your back
you are the seamstress and the shredded quilt:
you can stitch yourself together you just need to find the thread
and love is no substitute
for a sharp needle.
don't unclench your fists for
any lover who promises to
fix you
don't shotgun old wounds like thick smoke
if they promise anything more
than to hold them
in their
lungs
until the pain eases
just a little.
he will cocoon you
and let you out confused
and hurt
and hating yourself because you didn't change
you are
not
a butterfly
you will not wake up beautiful:
just learn to be full because the end of the word
is all that matters
and the last words of a relationship
are the most honest.

when you stitch yourself together
i will wear the rope that caught your palms like
a silk collar
pour your perfume like lighter fluid
and burn my notebook
and hope that no one writes ballads
to your clenching fists
again
Am I the only one to notice;
That you crack your knuckles when you are nervous
That your timid smile never reaches your eyes
That you pretend to be confident around your fake friends
That you are in a maze of lies
These are the things I will never say

Will you ever notice;
That I understand you are scarred in more ways than one
That I want to be the one to help you mend
That I love your spider legs and tousled curls
That your shadow is not your only friend
These are the things I will never say

Please notice my screaming silence;
For these are the things I long to say
Cold now.
Close to the edge. Almost
unbearable. Clouds
bunch up and boil down
from the north of the white bear.
This tree-splitting morning
I dream of his fat tracks,
the lifesaving suet.

I think of summer with its luminous fruit,
blossoms rounding to berries, leaves,
handfuls of grain.

Maybe what cold is, is the time
we measure the love we have always had, secretly,
for our own bones, the hard knife-edged love
for the warm river of the I, beyond all else; maybe

that is what it means the beauty
of the blue shark cruising toward the tumbling seals.

In the season of snow,
in the immeasurable cold,
we grow cruel but honest; we keep
ourselves alive,
if we can, taking one after another
the necessary bodies of others, the many
crushed red flowers.
A smothering indistinctness of agony
Once we drank the innocent
Virginal and bloodless
But your thirst disintegrated
In a horrific cloud of bitterness
Follows bones to contradict the animosity
Love ground to a dust  
In a torrent of hate
Fevered lips
Hungered hips
My swollen teeth eat your *******
Your bones lay upon me
As you ******* milk
Humid thighs that know my secrets
Distended belly
That continues to crave
You and I
A shallow man
will only date a model,
but at least he's
honest.

A ****
will date anyone,
but only make the models feel
beautiful.

A decent guy
will date an average girl,
say he doesn't look at size,
but his actions say otherwise.

A nice guy
will date a fat girl,
but marry
a skinny one.

A good guy
will marry a fat girl,
but wish,
every day,
that she was thinner--
and she
will always know.

A rare guy
will date a fat girl
and not realize
that she's fat.
She will feel
beautiful
and think
she's a model.

But he's a
minority,
and non-model girls are a
majority.

There's a solution:
Starve
until the fat
disappears.
Until every guy
that has ever preferred a skinny girl
over you;
over a girl that looks like you
-- or worse --
is even smaller than you,
but not small
enough,
would finally
consider you
worthy.
Starve.

But don't get too thin.
Guys complain about that too.
Now you're not pretty enough,
again.

Starve until you're
just right --
they'll tell you how great you look;
ask how you did it.

You'll lie,
yet again,
to maintain
the facade.

They'll think
you're disciplined --
but they don't know
just how much.

You can starve so they're happy;
put on a smile
to make them think you are too. Because you never will be --

they've destroyed your mind
with their standards;
you've destroyed it
with striving to live up to them.

You'll marry a guy
who tells you
you're beautiful,
but your eyes are broken;
an ugly,
obese girl
relentlessly
stares back.

She tells you
your husband
lies.

She tells you
food is bad,
purging is good.

She tells you
he prefers someone skinnier,
someone better.

You'll never be enough --
all because some
teenage boy
hung up a poster of a
photoshopped
model on his wall --
decided that she
is the ultimate goal,

and, thus,
your destiny emerged.
2020:  yeah. I’m just really gay. That’s all. Hope you let out a good chuckle or one of those nose air puffs that indicate something was amusing.
i'll teach you what it's like to be a ghost
how to move from space to space unnoticed
how to blow through rooms on fire
without wincing.
how to be nimble
but paralyzing
and poignant.
i'll teach you what it's like to cut a noose
with a dull knife
and not bring down the whole house
i'll teach you how to take weight in your arms
without falling
and how you can get them to look you in the eyes
when they can't see through their tears
i'll prove to you
you can remove a heart
without breaking it
if you carry it in your throat
if i could impart to you
how to take a portion of their pain
without wearing it like a cloak
or exchanging it for guilt
i will show you.
i'll teach you what it's like to be a ghost.
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