When I was younger I believed
whole heartedly I was worthy and
deserving of love,
and these days I just seem to  
take what I can get.

I keep starting tiny fires
to keep me warm
if only momentarily,
they only leave me colder
when they burn out

sometimes when I'm lonely
I like to glamorize past
failed relationships and
imagine that
that they loved me better,
or I them.

You are still a good person when you wake up naked
next to a man you don't remember
you are still a good person when you have to find out his name
by digging through the mail sitting on his kitchen table.

You are a good person when you call your brother's girlfriend
that word that she often acts like.

You are a good person when you take free drinks from men at bars
without returning a favor.

You are still a good person when you choose to let go of your parent's religion.

Don't let the ghosts of guilt dance outside of your windows,
like flames,
they will engulf you.

Don't pray for forgiveness,
forgive yourself.

Don't be cocky,
don't get walked upon,
you are worth not more than them, but you are worth just as much.

Cool it a little on the ***, Cheech and Chong,
it makes you inarticulate
and your dad will find your stash one day,
and flush it  all down the toilet.

Say thank you more often and be more sincere.
People will not always be kind,
know that it is special when they are.

Stay in one spot, even after you **** everything up,
let it breath, you'll see it's not so bad.
Know that the ugly sits in all of us regardless if we
stay long enough to let anyone else see it or not.

When counting friends, count them on one hand,
bigger numbers will never mean "less alone."
Choose quality over quantity every time.

Let people finish their sentences,
don't pretend to know what they are going to say;
You do not now, and will never... know it all.

When the first boy you love treats you like something that is
disposable or easily replaced,
don't cheat on him.
LEAVE, GO, Don't look back!
Relationships are not jail sentences,
you don't owe them time.
Besides, his forgiveness
will never mean you can forgive yourself.

When that one other boyfriend introduces
you to his friends as his roomatte,
don't later follow him to bed.
Demand that he treats you like you would like
your future daughter to be treated.
Because you are somebody's daughter,
and your mother, she loves you a **** of a lot!

Don't be afraid to run home when your heart hurts.
Your mother's house will be clean and
it will smell like fresh coffee early in the mornings.
Drink your coffee by the kitchen window
watch the sunlight saturate the fruit trees.
let your mother kiss your forehead, then say goodbye.
Remember, there was a reason you left.

One last thing…
When that one terrible thing happens
that you don't often talk about
Don't blame yourself for hiding, and crying.
Don't shake in crowded rooms,
don't need ***** to talk to strangers.
Please, don't question why it didn't mess her up
like it messed you up.
You saw her scars that could be easily seen
but you will never see the ones she hides beneath her skin.

I bet you want to know if things get better
Um, I'm not sure they do.
Things do get different
and somehow,
when you get to that point, different will be enough for you.

The distance between us
is so wide that it can't
be scaled in inches, feet, days, or years;
it can only be measured in life times.

The version I knew of you,  
if I knew you at all,  
is only a shadow in my memory
left over from a previous life.

There are few things I can remember clearly
that have not been softened by time,
or cumbered by loneliness.

Those are:
One,
the small shape of your eyes
when sunlight broke, violent,
like a stone through windows
as particles danced
above us in slow motion.

Two,
the roughness of your rug
against our bodies
as we awoke
on your living room floor.

Three,
the way you offered me your long arms,
like ribbons, I wrapped them around myself,

and finally I felt like a gift.

All words
have been replayed
and rewritten so many times.
Like a photocopy of a photocopy
they have begun to wane.

Everything I have ever written
reads like a piece to the bridge
I am building to get back to you,
to remember who I was
when I was unscathed.

Everything I have ever written
is an ode to a past life,
an ode to reincarnation.
You have made a spiritual being
out of someone as cynical as me.

You would laugh, if you read the last sentence.

But there is no other way to explain
how I can feel such an anchor
for a practical stranger,
whose only familiar feature
that years have not taken
is a first and last name.

I still don't see
the point
of the daily foulness
maybe it gauges inside me
deeper and deeper
so I can afterwards fill it
with wonders
love
each time making a larger hole
and each time finding ways
for me to fill it


Love can do that sometimes
slowly changing.
what once was happiness
soon becomes sand
weighting on your chest
more and more
until you can't breathe
until you don't want to
breathe.

some loves can make you
not want to love again .


But it's not important.
No matter how fragile I am and if
my drowning kills me
I will rise again
Here I am , I am standing
and again I reach
for someone's sleeve of a jacket
again, willingly
again
with a rapid pounding of my heart

I
again
Live.

There's this girl I know
She thirsts for knowledge and endless seas.
She hides beneath the shade
Never really revealing who she is.

She cares more about other people's happiness
Than she ever will about her own.
When she loves, god, when she loves..
She will shower you in a sea of warmth.

As much as she will love you, she will have a cold side too.
She has the tundra in her,
She has the sun in her,
But she also has this world stopping hurricane.

She will feel every emotion, but magnified.
She will love with every fiber she has.
When she hurts it will tear her apart.
So if you ever get a chance to love her, you have to really love her.

She has the power to move mountains,
But she also has the power to put everything in ruins.
It is in ruins now,
She is out of reach.

Erin is me.

I've always been told I overreact,
so now I underreact.
I could have been mugged,
and I'll tell myself that others
have had worse times
being mugged.

I tell myself my problems are small,
because I know there are worse ones out there.
I don't have it that bad.

I could have been stabbed in the ribs,
and think, People have had worse,
I'm no big deal.

I've been assaulted and abused,
but I know people who've had worse,
so I don't make a big deal about them…

…at least not out loud.