i listen to your words
watch your eyes move with each new line you drop

i wish you didn't love me
you'd be so much better off that way

i'm sorry
i can't hold your gaze

i want to
i swear

i beg you, please
believe my promises

i haven't let you down yet
have i?

just let me inside please
all i want is to see
your china cabinet of my memories

im bigger than i was before
none of you can hurt me
anymore

gun to my head id still choose drugs over you
knife to my neck id still choose scars over you

im as stable as ive ever been and my rage will destroy you soon

Blood strange to mine, I could get ready to stay dead
I would hate my father for ever having planted me
A tall bird hunched in cold weather
Wild out of the darkness, I knew that living was terrible
The reason for living was to get ready to stay dead
Fear was invented by someone who had never had the fear
Pride, who never had the pride
Love, he called it
My aloneness had been violated
Words are no good;
Just a shape to fill the lack;
Words don’t ever fit.

slumped against distress,
she moaned.

heavy-hearted comfort
disappeared.

upset,
           the stone
                           skips across
                                                   w  a  t  e  r

           f o r g o t t e n.

lead-colored
mother of heaven

we are drifting
             without charts
                              our sky is
                                              un k n o w n
w e a r e  d  r  i  f  t  i  n  g

the stars
heavy with despair,
strangers
brought to rest,

"lower sails
drop anchor"
as children.

the pendulum of a recovering darkness

some hope of rescue
                            maybe

        help
                      maybe                  maybe

                                     maybe-


clatter of anchor chains

the new sick