they say to be suspicious
when a naked man offers you a shirt but

how does that apply
when I love you so much
but I am empty

when I love you so much
does it matter that I feel nothing
for myself

does it matter that all I ever wanna do
is go to bed or talk to you

do I love you less
because I hate myself?

it's funny because heroes die for love
I mean, the characters in novels
and stuff but if I were to die

for you, that would be nothing,
zero, nada, zip;
I am proving my love

through every breath
that I take, darling;
you are what keeps me alive

and  I will not die for you
because you do not want me to

i am free to be me;
i want to ride a bicycle,
so i will: kick the pedal,
ride out to sea
i will listen to the
sound of the waves
and i will take it with me
in my pocket, pink slips
of seashell, grooved like
the sand i will
lie down in.
i will float in the sea -
no rope tied around
my waist or my neck
or my wrists attached
to an anchor, no
there's nothing to hold me
down; there's nothing
to hold me at all

i'm going to **** myself soon
because of how badly breaking hurts
and how lonely 'broken' feels
but sixty percent because lately

my sadness
is forming echoes in my bones
such that my broken pieces hit other hearts
before reflecting back to cut against me
scratched people are not art
and I don't want to hurt anybody

thank you for listening to my stories
and for never spelling out
that I was not in fact 'okay' even if you knew
i'd been crossing out the days really quickly

it was just what I needed
to have my delusions persuaded
my fears remain seated

because how can people not have breaking
points when water has a boiling point
and we are three-fourths that
I am three-fourths not
good enough

the decision had
long ago been made for me
i had stopped being happy
and it's been some time since I've prayed
because what can you do to fight fate
when they confiscated your weapons
they never returned them

I want to be whole, alone, a poem -
anything but broken,
but I am broken.
I am dying,
I am dead

If it takes a fool to fall in love
What kind of fool would I require
And who would take me
When I've fallen
A thousand times over
For boys who've never known me

If there is to be anyone
He would have to take tea, with me
At three in the morning
For no reason at all
Except I wanted to be awake
To hear the silence

If there is to be anyone
He would have to put up with
The fact of my poems
He'd have to breathe
In the air of my sadness
And accept that I cry every other night
And would sometimes ask him
Not to hold me

If there is to be anyone
I do not know
But that would be foolish indeed
Sometimes I would tell him I love him
Sometimes I wouldn't

But I would always be
Humming with the melody
I associate with him,
And the stars
Would litter the sky
Like they glitter on his skin.

in words, I find my truth
in words, I take refuge

there are tales I have to spin
to keep myself in orbit
songs I have to sing
to bring myself back

and life is difficult
every day ends
with me and a pen
the healing process
tend to myself

in the end, I've collected enough evidence
that words can sound like choking too
in the end, I am a testament
to how little crying can fix
you just learn
to turn to other things

in the end, I hope to have
three friends:
in the stars
in the spaces between
letters
in myself

My mind is active, weighing words
Movements stilled by my fingers
No time to write of being tired
To describe the ache, instead of wish it away
What a waste
No one listens in the first place

Gold at my fingertips from all the time I've spent digging
But everyone always sees the mud first
Frustrations building up until
I'm stuck in avoidance mode

Vanishing into pillows and behind books
And fake smiles, it's so hard to be true
Not worth the effort too
When no one really cares about you

It turns out I can't commit
And I can't take stress
I'd like to pack up my bags and leave
Everything difficult behind

I want to hide under the bed and wait
For someone to take
My troubles away.

everybody else is in the ocean
forgetting how to breathe.

if you're looking to drown me,
tell me you love me,
and i'll follow you down.

or tell me about how the fishes
glow, invite me
to dive.

i'm trying to lose myself
and you, in the process.

everything is so blue now.

we could go deeper and revel
in inky blackness, around us.

to wrap ourselves in it
and disappear completely.

i don't need to hear this tale anymore
themed me versus some other girl
and all the ways in which I could be better

take a pill, take a breath, i'm not going to forget

my first crush pointed to a long-haired princess
and said she was beautiful

i cut two paper dolls
held us up to the light
saw she outshined me
a thousand times over

i am not enough
is what middle school
has taught me

when people laugh
it's not always a good thing

my mom should keep telling
my brothers
to be good boys

there aren't enough of them

and everybody's hiding a knife somewhere

there are people who could fill wells
with blood from the wounds they cause
and two more for all the **** tears

i get more biting comments
than plants get oxygen
maybe you don't understand
but I've got self-hate down to an art

and i don't need to hear that tale
anymore
when it's the one i know by heart

i cannot dream big
i dream backwards
and forwards
and dream myself out
of situations, into coffee shops
with strangers

i cannot dream big
if and when things happen,
so they shall
and i want the constants in my life
to be the following:

sunsets
flowers
laughter
and your hand in mine

there's always a reason to be happy
like meeting up with you
in the dead of the night
sparkling eyes
in dreams

every part of me
wants to get away from me
every part of me knows
I don't like me
and every part of me
wants something else to hold

life does this thing
in which it leaves you little gifts
like in exchange for the sting
its palms bring
when they hit your face -
first this side, then the other,
as if it could cover up the redness

far from comfort, consolation,
soothing - it exhausts and exasperates
like being stepped on
and ground with the heel, you break
into little pieces
before shattering completely

frustrated sobs leave you gasping for air
you believe there's hope when
there's nothing there
what am I going to do when I'm scared
that every next step
will be the one that falls through,
come crashing and have no one
to help me up or hold my hand

life is like the father,
who will end up leaving you,
how when he threw you in the air
his arms were outstretched,
but you never quite knew,
whether or not he'd actually catch you

I tried making a poem
with internal rhyme and
ended up with a masterpiece
of spacebars and enter keys

I'm done forcing poems out of me
strings of words tied in bows don't
flow, if I must bleed words, self-inflict
a few choice cuts that will change things

contained in the walls of a room called mediocrity
I will wallpaper them with truth and
learn inspiration, like
a second language
or the better half of me

a wall is a solid and sounds are vibrations
and my heart beats strong enough to shake foundations
neurons pass messages around in my head
it says: in second grade
we learned sound travels fastest
in solids and

I know I will be heard

why don't you like me
when i'm twisting myself this way and that
and running to catch your wandering gaze

why don't you like me
when I obviously like you
and I'd pretend not to know the homework,
the lamest excuse, steal a few minutes of your time
and talk to you

i'm not letting my heart bleed
when you're not even around to see
but give me your word
and i'll squeeze it empty
to make room for you

I am not ready for love
but i'd paint you in my dreams
tie a string around my pinky
write your name along
my palm lines,
on the backs of my eyelids.

tell me
that every breath is a breath for you
and every step,
a step with you,
so I don't forget
and leave everything behind

I will keep your heart in mine


maybe you'll keep me
alive

my math teacher has flared nostrils as extended proof
that he inhales nonsense and exhales logic
in matters of seconds
and there is a boy who aces his tests
ribcage rattling with numbers
bloodstream rushing with answers

and during math class, i am the dull girl
with the blank face
you can't furrow your brows because
the teacher will stare at you
and i'm thinking about
brilliance and my lack of it, you know
sometimes i have poetry floating
through my brain

but i'm not going to get good grades for that
there are cookie crumbs falling on my lap
and the boy is staring at me

i know your eyes are tired
your exhale sounds tired
too, here's what i want you to do
start breathing out the tears
my dear
start breathing out the tears

don't catch bullets with an
open mouth, and
a pained smile is not a smile
so stop smiling
when you're dying
inside

close your eyes
close your ears
open your heart
i know there are monsters
but listen
feel for the light

don't be surprised you'll
find it's inside you
my dear
it's inside
you

maybe words come out better on paper

it's been a while and I haven't figured out
what to say
and how exactly to say it

but maybe words would come out better
when gates are unlocked
and your heart left open

for whispers and quiet little songs
to come in

maybe if you let the words stain your skin

maybe if you stop hiding the tears
and look up at me
into my eyes

maybe when I tell you I love you
you'll believe me

a quiet kind of sadness
laying a carpet out
on the floor of your stomach,
getting settled in

when it raps on the walls,
you think,
it's your heartbeat
echoing through your body
the emptiness making it easy

when it yawns,
you feel hella tired
curling the length of you into
a ball, on the floor
never wanting to get up because
you've forgotten you're alive

alive?
it's the sadness I hear
breathing satisfied little breaths
it doesn't want to die

it sits there, calm,
having claimed that spot
at the center of your life,
sapping what's left of its worth,
calm,
while making you think ****
about yourself,
and it doesn't want to die
but you do,
I do

I am going to write you a poem that rhymes
I'm not sure how I'll get it out of me but I will
I just hope it's not as bad as an oilspill
Or that haircut you got last Christmas
The time you almost punched the glass
And I was laughing

I am going to tell you about how I dream
Of a big brown house, kids going "Mommy, Mommy"
And a border collie, and a handsome man
And you'd be living next door all alone
I'd be laughing

Okay I swear I am going to stop joking

The truth is
a) Your smile is like the candy cane
A kid would **** to ease some ache somewhere
Or like the cake the fat person is eating to
Cheer herself up (on a separate note,
The fat person is me)

b) Your voice is like ocean waves
Pulling, crashing, rushing,
Tripping; beautiful and brave
And your voice is like birdsong and ambulances
Yes, that much of a mess

c) Your company is the floater I'd grab
Before jumping off a boat
Your company is the lifesaver.
I'd get tossed by the waves while the thunder
Roars to state that life is unkind,
You're still keeping me from sinking

And d) you're the prettiest boy I've ever met
And I'd be in love with you except
You make me laugh 'til I'm crying and my vision blurs

So instead I just love you
I hope you love me too

distance in miles and daylight
is absolutely nothing, tell them that.

some people were never
even meant to speak.
even breathing the same air
every day, she's not there,
at least not to his eyes. it's
distance

distance in hearts and minds
and the important part of fingertips
that is the distance that cannot be bridged
let them know that.

but there are people
living three thousand miles apart
still keeping the other's laughter in their hearts
and every breath is a search and a sigh
and the whisper that says, 'far'
the conviction that says,
with a palm over the left breast,
'here'


even when we touch
he is looking elsewhere
but I've seen his eyes and he is marked with oceans

I don't know how to feel about you but mostly
I like how you pointed out to me
that grass looks lovely lit by approaching
headlights of gleaming silver
cars, when you're sitting on gravel and dirt
and a garden grows in hearts
of people who like to hold hands
and you told me that forget-me-nots were your favorite
but you never told me why
you said maybe if we ride rollercoasters
together you'll show me how there are stars
in the day and how leaves can shine gold
like veins and you smiled
saying, yours and mine

i.
I live too close to the ground to want to fall
on the front porch steps of reality,
there isn't much jumping
just as well
you pull me up on my tiptoes
and I feel like I'm teetering
forgetting the distinction
between your heartbeat and mine

ii.
please come down
your voice is soft
and mine is loud but
I can't hear you from the clouds

iii.
I should have known better than
to love the boy who towered over me
your life is dancing on rooftops
and climbing up staircases
and

iv.
I was the ground you barely even walked on

some people are loved so deeply
some people hear those words
everyday
some people know they're never alone

how did god decide
the division of souls
and destinies, and which hearts
were to break, and which hearts
were to shatter

some people have broken families
some people know
everyone's too busy to wipe away these tears
too busy to care
to be there
some people feel so small

how did god decide some of us
would have to find comfort in the stars'
tiny lights, some of us
are hugged as if they'd never be
let go
and some of us aren't

and I know, I know
that everyone cries
but not everyone cries every
night

and why isn't everyone loved?
****
why isn't everyone loved?

nothing's fine
I am physically sick.
add that to how tired I am
of glaring into this laptop screen.
sick.
I've been blowing my
brains out
onto tissue paper
it's amazing how many rolls I've gone through
for someone so dumb.
the rain outside
is bringing mud water all over the news
drilling holes into my skull
the deluge of raindrops,
bullets,
sick.
maybe if I keep screaming,
the pounding,
my mom is ranting,
maybe everything will cancel out.

"love? I don't
believe in love"
I say this a hundred times,
hoping it gets stuck like
the stain on your favorite shirt
you just can't remove
you eventually learn to look good
in it, to wear it
like it could only belong to you

that people would believe that.
that you could just leave
old selves behind.
that the moon and the stars will
be rocks and fire and gases
instead of a promise
instead of a dream
and a life built on a dream
and a whispered "it's okay"
the stars say "what is a stain on a shirt,
when love is love?"

"love? I don't
believe in love"
I say this a thousand times
because I need
more convincing

*"pain, pain, pain."

having breathed secondhand
smoke all my life, and
having never taken
a liking to veggies,
I can hardly be blamed
for being a bit
dull, a bit of a numbskull.
and having seen
too much greatness in others
having known
too little in myself, I can't help
but cut myself up
trying to be better.

if I could go to somewhere,
somewhere no one
knows my name, I would cry out
exclamations about loving you
if I could go to somewhere,
somewhere i'd be
lost like a wildflower in a sea
of wildflowers, I would
close my eyes and
dance. and if i
could go to
somewhere
anywhere at all
that would mean forgetting
that would be freedom
laughing
and a chance at life,

but in this town
surrounded
by these people
I just
want to disappear

if your heart is filling up
like cherry blossoms would
litter up streets,
if you're smiling so wide
and laughing so big,
don't do it

if you're floating and flying and
cartwheeling through
days in a daze,
if you're grinning at the mirror
while putting your hair in place,
don't do it

if the stars are shining for you and
your love,
if your heart is a song and
the breeze is filled with
melodies, wait

wait for all of it to settle down and
well, don't do it
(when I told him I liked
him, we never spoke again)

If you don't want to be friends

anymore, just leave

Hopefully I'll stop

noticing you in the halls

Yes tell me when

you begin to want

to push me away

'cause it's completely okay, I know,

my laugh is annoying, (tell me when

you've began to find

i have bigger flaws than that), and
                                                                                        

Pretty boy, if you don't like me

(anymore)

it's alright

We should be getting on with our lives

I pull the pink flowers

From the mass of black hair

And they fall to my hands

As I release a breath



                                                                              

I shrug off your shining words

And the glow of your eyes

As I shut myself away

Again, the world

In the deadness of mine



                                                                                            

It's hard to believe in

Anything

When nothing and

No one ever stays

I am always left dark and gray

Or brown at the edges and

Fading, crushed



                                                                  

Like the flowers in the palm of my hands

a person is
his silhouette
crooked teeth
or not-
beautiful is beautiful

a man is the outer
edges of his soul
the crinkles around his
eyes
the corner of his
smile

a man is what lies
at the tips of his
fingers
what’s falling out
of his pockets
what extends into
where the eye cannot see-

the heart,
          is the man

the man,
          is the heart

it is what it is
        what we are

beautiful is beautiful

i want to quickly fade away like

the flowers or the butterfly,

something inside

me is too beautiful to remain

in the world for long

yearns it to be free and



                                                                                          

something inside me

is ugly

ugly ugly ugly

and I don’t want the cotton on my skin

your eyes on me

your fingers inches away--

keep away!

              

                                            

i want to fade

i'm trying to be my own hero

whispering "it's okay"

out to the cold night and in

to the chill

that seems to line my veins nowadays
                                                                          

"it's alright"                                                
                                                    

holding in the sighs

shying away from eyes

how many times have i

told myself "you'll be fine"
                                                                          

"it's okay to cry"                                                


but i drench my pillow every

night, and beyond the eighth-

floor window is a world

separate from

here (consider the fall)


"smile"

i do smile,

my own hero,

remember?


(well, only fairytales have

happy endings;

and twisted storylines

are beyond saving)

you gave yourself up to the video games

and nothing i do can draw you out now

and maybe you flaunt indifference
to mask the loneliness
maybe it’s eating you up-
but you refuse to be within reach

maybe when you’re over it all
you could find the time to smile at me
say hi when you pass by

maybe when i’m beautiful
you’d go and seek me out
and i would find the time to smile at you
and i could introduce you to
some boy, who wrote me a song
some boy you could never draw me away from

but in the scheme of things, i suppose i'll be fine

you don't have to be happy, you just have to survive.

once I lay in the field

and under gray skies

for once I did not cry

but as you lay there with me

I laughed



                                                                              

and I hope someone up there took

a photograph of that

and made it into a star

that every now and then

I might remember

that for once I forgot I'd grown up

and the world was made mine

again

like the lone flowerbush that stood beside trees

she is pretty but she is weak

and when everyone stops falling at her feet

her turn to fall and disappear

blueberry cheesecake

and the bitter

aftertaste of strange

wine


a song in my dreams

i woke up sweating

and hearing your name

gives me terrible goosebumps

and the slightest touch

at my wrist

has me twisting away

i hate

blueberry cheesecake

and i hope the kisses

i gave

you were poison

my mom wants me to take iron

'cause i've been staring into space alot

and i don't smile as much anymore

and i appear "lifeless"

she doesn't know i'm just growing up

and growing sad

A woman of 20

her heart was captured

as she shot photographs of

the sunrise that had the rainbow at its edges.

A girl of 15

wrote a poem and filed it away

to be passed around someday,

a piece of paper decorated with flowers.

A man of 30

to whom the world was a canvas

made note of the colors

how magnificent the blend.

And an elderly man

gave a sad smile:

How his wife would have loved to see this.



                                                                            

And it was beautiful

And it brought them together

In ways they knew not,

As the plane dipped,

the clouds danced,

and their thoughts sang.



                                                                      

                                                                          

                                                                                                                

A young girl at the back

Eleven going on twenty

considered how, as time passed

and they got closer to the ground,

the windows on one side

held water and clouds

and the other showcased

buildings and little shanties.

She watched as huge pink clouds

rested on the pale blue surface;

she looked upon

the fishermen and boats.



                                                                              

And she felt

the world was a big world

bigger than she'd ever know.

I got to see the sunrise from the skies

As in the company

of rolling clouds

I floated over sea

And the colors spoke to me

                                                                                                                  

                                                                                                                

Red at the bottom

for the love,

that was never missing after all;

a rather murky olive green-

the uncertain future;

right above yellow

which says we'll be okay;

with the blue

all around

because hope can be found

at the outer edges of the soul



                                                                                                              

because at 4 am

the dark surrounded the light

but at 5 am

the dark never existed

She tried to copy the messy buns

but the style

doesn’t go with her broken smile

And she could draw pretty dolls on paper

But she’d been made of flesh

And pencil, brain, and heart are powerless

She could do a lot of things

Actually

Gifted, they called her,

But she had

the kanji character for beauty

As the background of her computer,

And she’d dip her brush in black paint

And write it on her white walls

That maybe one night while she slept

It would seep into her skin

and settle there

i glance out of car windows

sometimes into people’s eyes

don’t we all?

stares that were felt but left unreturned

words heard

answered with a smile and left behind

in the wake of quick fading footsteps

and often I wonder

if I’ve missed what I’m looking for

or if something else worth finding

was ignored

and with every bad decision

that i seem to have made

i pray for my soul

i don’t want to be alone

and sometimes the air feels different

and i look around

i look around

i look around

she had a lot of things to say

but no one to say them to



so she kept them in paper stars

in rolled-up pieces of paper

in notebooks with pressed flowers



she planted them with every tree she touched

the songs she sung that the wind stole



once she even scribbled on a wall



she wrote on herself

in ballpoint pen

in razor blades or scissors

            

no one heard her words

like

no one heard her tears

and

no one heard her fall

Hide me from the light; it hurts

Open up your heart and keep me there

Make your eyes my only mirror

And my soul, repair

And one night, she watched as her little cousin played with toy trains -- and she thought of this, and all the things she would miss, the regrets that would come after death if they could.

Her foot lands wobbly; shook before the last step. One tear fell, as she looked ahead, into blackness... And that tear was everything she ever loved, all the voices that told her to stop, all the reasons why she couldn't.

Then she fell, and was gone.

It's hard to be good at life, even if we try. Sometimes, the ladder you're standing on falls, and sometimes, you're not only fallen but broken. When you scream in pain and find you're alone. Life does that. Even if we try.

Too often people whose eyes and hearts and souls are vacant try to empty us likewise.

We look out the window to find we missed the sunset. And instead, gray skies unfold sadly, sad but screaming of coming rain.

When screaming causes you pain yet still the volume is turned up. Your shoulders keep getting bumped. When you're in a slump, you get kicks instead of a lift. And fall down Alice's rabbithole. Or not. Where you land is no wonderland.

See. Even if we try, and the only bad we do is cry, the only harm we cause is to ourselves, it seems there are more lessons for us to learn, more ways we can get burned. It seems, we haven't been thoroughly hurt.

I'm still looking for reasons; though in me is all the evidence, that the world has a grudge against humans. What is so wrong about us...?

That girl who smiles, taking the hand of the old lady beside her, they are both dying -- she, of cancer. A man with a woman with cheekbones and crudely cut hair, towing three laughing kids in a wheeled wooden cart. The young lady who only wanted to go after her dreams -- who was full of potential, is now just full of unshed tears and broken pieces, the faded light that was hope; who should have been a star, prays to burn in hell or whatever's waiting.

But I know that she is beautiful. I know that his heart is as big as the world. I know that she cares, that she dares, that she's brave.

I used to think we were made of the galaxy, but it is cold, unrelenting, and, we couldn't be farther from that. We are suffering. But our tears are diamonds, our sweat – liquid gold, our blood - something greater than the universe. And our hearts our hearts our hearts! It is the mother of everything for which there are no words.

And while I question practically everything (the beauty of life, the wisdom of kings), I have never doubted the pure wonder of the human soul. While I don't know that it gets better, I know that we deserve better. Let's make it so that prayers work again, that there are such things as friends. No more backbites or fistfights, no more rejection, insecurity, glossy eyes that hold back waterfalls. May the rainbows be hope instead of lies. And when you're down, a helping hand instead of a kick to the side. Let's do what we can, so that no one might ever again so truthfully wish their life to end. Care. Help. Love. You shouldn't wait to enter heaven if you haven't tried to bring it down to earth.