wet fingers
touch my face
all nervous and
unbalanced.

perception
rips out of my throat
so fast that it's sore when morning breaks.
I feel the rising and almost shake
it's time for another eighteen hour day.

red teeth creep into my thoughts
and the bottle in the cabinet begins to knock:
here I am, baby, drink me if you can.
if you've got the time, try not to lose your motivation.
plans can't cure this hesitation.
perspiration from more than just nervousness, what's this?
it's the eyeballs teaching you a lesson,
it's the heartbeat just wanting to leave a mess in
what you thought you could contain
in the muddied cave you call a brain,
it's the endless pits of despair you so often hear tales of.
thinking, "Oh, you silly people, pet the belly of the beast
and you'll be free."

kissing the *** of an evil spirit will leave you with less progress
than if you washed the feet of an angel with your tears.  

insides burning with lust for flesh, for a cool comfort
you can bury yourself in. if your expectations grace you with
their absence and your mind feels free enough to explore,
then share your thoughts with me this evening,
I'll give you my heart as an open door.

You are not your body.
You are not your scars.
You are not your relapses or wide-eyed fears.
You are more than the razor blade.
You are more than your bones.
You are more than your hunger and choked out tears.
You are a soul, a heart, and a light.
You are a friend, a lover, and hope.
So though I may not know you,
I will hold your hand and carry you.
You will win this fight.

So I did,
exactly what I told you not to do.
Except in a different way.
****.

And now that I want to go back,
what I really want to do is to go forward.
Because while people have taught me many things
I have taught myself that things will be okay

And its not okay that I'm looking for.  
But I guess it will work for now.

I'll bury that part.
In a chest, in a dungeon, in an abandoned castle.
In an abandoned world.
Guarded by a patient dragon.

I'll hide the key to the chest in one part of my mind.
And a map to the castle in another.
Or maybe I will trick myself
and hide it in my heart instead.

I will never know what web of coincidences have brought me to this point.
I only know the decisions I have made.

I don't know these words,
are they even mine.

They were here before anyone was born.
That's all I remember.

you whisper against my skin and I look down at the cave that’s in my chest, gaping and dark and bottomless, shouts echoing off the walls. you never let me rest, tapping and tapping at the insides of my skull. an isolated night heaves up in front of me, motionless and quiet and all the while, tapping and tapping. I can’t eat for the sound, can’t sleep, but I listen and stare as shapes and seconds shift by and fog rolls into my eyes. tides rise and break in my stomach, swells crashing over my eyelids, threatening to escape my mouth.

And she wore
black eyes in her pockets
and when she cried
her jeans went red.
my baby speaks with the
tip of her tongue on the
back of her teeth.
and every time I hear her speak
her beauty
makes me weak
and I'm down on my knees.

I love you.
I hate you.
Leave.
Please don't go.
I am black.
I am white.
I am unbearable hunger
And excruciating fullness.
I am good and evil.
And in my mind, so are you.
Forever one or the other.
I walk the fence between happiness and self hatred.
Between life and death.
I love you.
I hate you.
Leave.
Please don't go.