I'm not ashamed to say
that today,
my ***** look impeccable.
They do—
and that makes me beam
in every possible way.
See,
we're rounding a long winter,
and it's cloudy outside.
I'm smart enough to know
that most days—
you have to make
your own god ****** sunshine.

Listen,
I've got guilt choking all of my good juju.

I’m sorry I told you we’d hang out
just so I could come over
to watch Breaking Bad.
You know I need that
weekly crystalbluepersuasion.

I’m sorry I didn't sit on the porch steps
with you afterward
while you had your evening cigarette.
(I could have done that at least.)

I imagined you
sitting there
watching me
drive down the street &
out of your sight—
a lit cigarette hung limply from your lips.

I felt your disappointment &
I cursed my mother for teaching me
to have such a sharp sense of empathy.

I know I’ll never be badass enough
not to care.
I realize I was born to give
one too many *****.
I've learned to accept it
as my incessant character flaw.

(It could be worse.)

Although,
I have to be honest,
I get my kicks
entertaining the notion
that for one evening
I was
the one that got away.

I have lost my place
between your warmth and your chill.
I think I'll stay lost.

Truth: damaged people
tend to do damage themselves.
Keep your eyes open.

***** girl problems.
Any text on a t-shirt?
Highlighter for ****.

Hushed, like a morning before sunrise, 
grace floods in without threat.
A sudden flutter of piano keys cues
a story to unravel onto something
so much more interesting
than pages of paper.
To eerie tunes and haunting hums,
she brushes, feather-like, across my eyes—
a pinnacle of innocence
that humbles me to the warmest tears.
She does not speak but tells me everything.
So beautifully, with pointed toes
and arms as weightless as summer clouds,
my imagination falls to her tiny mercy.
The little girl in the light blue dress,
who became
my favorite storyteller.

You’re a lot like that
five bucks I just found in my
winter coat pocket.

You swear you’re not much,
But to me? Killer jackpot—
and smiles for days.

Dear, hold your heart close.
Avoid bulls in china shops;
their thrill is short-lived.

Tell me a story.
Fingers, tongue, lips, eyes, gasps, grins.
No words required.

I don’t much care for
this summer heat anymore.
No one likes to touch.

I much prefer fall—
its chilled breezes and need for
some warm, close contact.

Tighter hugs, stronger
drinks, shorter days, and longer
nights with encouraged

cuddling, cuddl—
ing, cuddling, cuddling,
cuddling— you dig?

My heart beats with dissonance—
the kind of clash that grits teeth
and twists pretty faces.
Still, she pulses, unforgiving,
to her own imbalance,
aware of her existence;
aware that the definition of music
is infinite,
and her song will never beg
to be understood.

This I resolute
Salads can't create ****.
More bounce to the ounce.

Today I learned that
red lipstick makes me a fox.
Foxier, that is.

Three jobs, seven cats,
crooked glasses, and wet hair.
*(I know you want me.)

Clear, simple blue skies.
Unnerving negative space.
A girl decorates.

She stitches and glues.
Flying machines of all kinds.
A girl must create.

Colors shade sunlight.
Wind gifts them the breath to dance.
A girl must hold on.

She pulls a heart string,
Knots this to her creations,
A girl unravels.

To the skies, she goes
Free in flight, she whips and spins.
A girl, so rootless.

Push off of the cool cement.
Gravity eases his grip on me.
Suspended in air,
I swallow mouthfuls of the night sky.
With stars in my lungs,
I course their light through my veins.
Between me and the moon,
my small world is drenched
in a hushed, wavering silvery glow.
The still, black surface
breaks into a thousand glittering pieces.
I’m told those little diamonds make
the most melodic tinks and pings,
but I don’t ever hear them.
By then, I’m fathoms below—
where I’m enveloped in quietude,
where time is an extinct notion,
where even the heaviest heart
can beat
                    for whatever she chooses
without
burden.

I’m not religious,
but you've got a tongue that can
make me see Jesus.

Let me be frank.
For once this poem is not about you.
It's about me.  

I was born nine days late
& I've been trying to make up for lost time ever since.
But I've never felt the need to rush
anything
or anywhere—or anyone.
I went through more band-aids than Barbies growing up
& I used to love to climb trees—
until I fell out of one.
I've got about seventeen different favorite colors
including cerulean, yellow ochre, & ******’s green—
They all exist, I swear.
I used to stock oil paints in the college bookstore.
I think I told you that before, right?

Crap.
Me.
This poem is about me.

I knew I wanted to write every since my
stubby, five-year old fingers
punched the keys on my mom’s old college typewriter.
I would take naps beside it, listening to the hums & whirrs
of that beautiful blue machine.
I think I've been in a dreamy state of mind ever since.
I’m almost positive it's stunted my growth.
I've never been taller than 5’3”—
but I like that my feet never touch the floor
when we sit in restaurant booths.
& I like that my head falls on your heart
whenever I hug you.
I try so hard to hear your heart murmur—
though I can never seem to find it.

****.

Swedish Fish are my kryptonite,
& love sinking my teeth into fresh cantaloupe.
I enjoy slowly peeling the labels off of my beer bottles.
Some say that means I’m sexually frustrated.
I don’t really buy it.
I say I just like to constantly be doing something
with my little hands.
I’m happiest when I’m in the water & when I’m singing—
which makes my shower one of my favorite places
in the world.

I used to be a sucker for drummers,
before I was a sucker for guitarists.
Now I’m just a sucker for anything
with a sense of humor & good high five.
I’m good at picking out people’s quirks
& putting them into words.
I observe more than I speak—
& sometimes, I think that bothers you.
You know me— you can tell
that I’m not divulging the entirety of my thoughts.

**** it.

I have to see the ocean every year
& marvel its size—
if only to remind me how small my problems really are.
It's painstakingly obvious that I'm a Scorpio
& I don't necessarily think that's a good thing,
but I try to own it as best as I can.
I love the smell of extinguished candles, warm lighting,
& adding the “and many more” every time I sing “Happy Birthday.”

I like a lot of things.
I am a lot of things.
I can do a lot of things—
like sing all fifty states in alphabetical order,
make roses out of paper napkins,
& play “Oh Susanna” flawlessly on my harmonica.

But one thing I can't do lately—
one thing I have clearly failed to do on the whole
is write anything
without a piece of you in it.

Don't tell me
to get used to disappointment—
that my hopes should always
stay close to the ground.
Because defeat
doesn't complement my complexion.
But if you insist upon saying it,
pass me my lipstick.
Just like Ms. Molly Ringwald,
I'll apply that **** with no hands—
a wet, slick shade of red that reads
with confidence and promise.
And just before I slow kiss
the half-empties from your lips,
I'll slip something half full
into your pocket.
Neatly folded, on lined paper,
it will read:

*You see, hope is like having a ****.
What’s the point in even having it
if you can't manage to get it up once in awhile?

Mr. Cartographer,
map my smooth, uncharted curves.
Don't dare miss an inch.

Nevermind the obvious quirks in my physique—
the thick thighs,
short legs,
t-rex arms,
and that ample, curvaceous figure of mine
which I own and work every day.

[Listen,
I'm certain I could get into the glitter—
no doubt I would have a killer stage name—
I figure I’d get pretty used to the instant gratification—
and there's no doubt in my mind
that whatever I lack in grace and *** appeal,
I could make up for in
charm, wit,
and a cuteness that I'm still growing into.]

But see, I have a slight fear of wearing heels.
It's safer for everyone if I stick close to the ground.
And although swinging around a pole
seems like a good time,
my motion sickness would probably kick in
and I'd ralph hard
on at least one of my investors.

Aside from the faulty mechanics I'd bring to the profession,
I've got my own rationale.

I like knowing
that when my clothes come off,
it's for reasons larger than money.
I like knowing
that I've left a little to the imagination
and can unleash it at my leisure.
I like knowing
that my secret weapons of mass seduction
are, in fact, secrets.
I like knowing
that I still have something to blush about
when I think about how I spent my Saturday night.

Nah,
I could never be a stripper,
but hot ****,
do I enjoy perfecting the art
of smiling while naked.

It’s not a bad goal
to be the kind of girl who
Rumi writes about.

So unknowingly
this bright muse interpreted
to touch and inspire.

But me? Never meant
to be the subject of art—
an object of thirst.

See, I’m the poet,
existing somewhere alone—
a penchant for soul.

Watercolor thoughts,
manipulating the lines
between joy and pain.

It’s not a bad goal
to be the kind of girl
who becomes Rumi

either.

I walk down the street
and there is just this radiating *** appeal
in everything I could possibly do—
even in the way the rubber on my shoes
grips the hot cement sidewalks.
(I realize that may not sound too ****—
at all;
But I’m confident that in this moment
someone is drooling over that step.)
Unmistakable swagger.
A few more moments of this
untouchable cool
& Morgan Freeman will be narrating
my every thought and movement.*

At least
that’s the way you make me feel.

How dare you.

You have the audacity to become
something so earmarked in my
little,
inconsequential,
twentysomething life.

You have the guts
to learn all of those
hidden quirks.
The same ones I relentlessly
and rightfully
keep to myself.

You have the nerve
to become the reason
why I smile for days,
go to bed alone
(but beaming)
& wake up with a larger reason
to grab life by its
big
metaphorical
*****
until it sees things my way.  

& I’m aware that
“*****” may not be the most
poetic of terms—
but the last time I checked,
poetry didn’t have
a **** definition

The last time I checked—
neither do we.

So how dare you
build me up into the only person
I can stand to be,
with only the promise
of an impending expiration date?

Then again,
there is something strangely
haunting
& remarkable
revolving around
the anticipation of that sort of heartache.

They gave me a name that didn’t suit me.
What’s funny is
the universe recognized that
before I did.

She paid me this compliment:

“There’s too much person to you.
You can’t be tripped up with so many
syllables in something so trivial as a name.
Less speaking, more breathing,” she said.

Four reduced to two.
Now I can exist in half the time.

I became “Bitsy.”
Which means I’m associated
with certain things.
Mainly tiny spiders
and brightly pattered swimwear.
It’s easy to be irked by that, you know.
Yet, I smile and take it,
because they raised me
with the patience of an idiot.

I get automatic cute points
just for introducing myself with a name like this.
Newcomers get giddy,
like hearing my name is equivalent
to receiving a box of kittens.
I always try to drop an expletive or two—
I just don’t want them
to get the wrong f#@%ing impression.

“Less speaking, more breathing.”

I instructed the universe
not to do me any more favors.

Start with a tin box guitar—
plucking tortured notes like
he’s known this kind of agony all his life.
Stretching bluesy licks
that bend and overlap—
braiding every bunch of heart strings.
We listen.
Tune into something that seems to be
cooing fluently in a language
only the involuntary celibate can speak.

No, we’re not getting any.
But at least we get this.

I breathe in all shades of purple
and exhale in all shades of blue;
faded plums to cornflower petals—
a bruised kind of exchange
that makes you look up to the sky
and feel something for no reason.
A contusion I keep fresh for
whenever I let someone
close enough to press it.
And if the pain makes my skin
sing notes only my conscience can hear,
then I’ll write lyrics to match;
they'll say
*I’m alive.
I’m alive.
I’m alive.

“To us, white girls are exotic,”
says my Arab American boyfriend.
At that moment, my brain ceases
to make sense of those words
in that order.
Exotic? White? Girl?
Me? Me. He means... me.
So this is what I say
to my Arab American boyfriend
who has
more culture in his pinky
than all of white America combined.
From what I can tell,
to be white in America is
boring static,
AM radio on a Sunday morning
with a broken dial
on a back road in the boonies.
It is the culture born by everything borrowed but wrongfully claimed
as its own invention.
To be white, in America, tastes like
cream of wheat
with no hope of brown sugar.
It is a tumbleweed-kind-of-rootless
and just as desert dry.
It is colorless, odorless, tasteless—
and will choke you slowly
if you don’t build up a tolerance.
But
if you’re lucky enough
to be white in America,
for about a hundred bucks
and a swab of the cheek,
the Internet can tell you
where you came from.
Even if that makes you feel cultured,
tomorrow you will wake up
and still be
white in America.
To be white in America, I thought,
was as far from exotic
as the self-loathing, middle aged guy
behind the counter
at your local DMV.
But white girls, he says, are exotic.
Perhaps it’s because pumpkin spice
oozes from my pasty pores,
or that “there ain’t no laws
when you’re drinkin’ the Claws.”
Maybe he couldn’t resist the fact
that the Starbucks barista
knows my order
better than my name,
or that my hair blowdries pin straight—
no matter the time of year.
I wonder if it’s the combo of
black leggings, messy buns,
and work out tanks—
or the fact that I think I’m saving the whole ******* sea turtle population
with my stainless steel straw.
Exotic?
Maybe it’s my compulsive nature
to buy in bulk, to pet every dog I see,
and to cry over Queer Eye episodes.
It couldn’t possibly be
the steady diet of rom coms,
my collection of Birkenstocks,
or the apple cinnamon candle
burning on my windowsill
that reminds me of “fall y’all,”
but then again, who knows?
To me, my whiteness is a privilege
that will forever be misinterpreted
as entitlement by every person
who checks that “white” box
on the form
without checking themselves too.

“To us, white girls are exotic,” he says.

White girl is just happy
he likes her in spite of it.

I'm sitting the passenger's seat
of a bright blood orange 1973 Ford Pinto.
Adam Levine is driving.
We talk about the weather,
and sing along to some Hall and Oates on the radio.
(By the way, he nails those high notes—
just like Adam Levine should.)

In the interim, we share a pint of
Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte ice cream—
a flavor which we both agree
is subpar and a total disappointment.
As he passes the pint back to me,
he admits that his abs in half the photos
you see in People magazine are Photoshopped,
and pats his little round belly in jest.
I confess that I can always identify
even the most flawless Photoshop jobs—
and honestly, I don't think
he is the sexiest man alive anyway.

We have a laugh after that one, Adam and me,
and devour the silence for a bit before
I lean in and ask him if he even knows
where he's taking us.
He leans in too and makes some brief,
but serious eye contact,
(his eyes are hazel, by the way),
and he says something to me
that I really need to hear.

“It doesn't matter
if I know where we're going, Bitsy.
You can always get there from here.”

I lean back in my seat
and smile as I watch the world streak by.

She’s been put together;
spattered with
handfuls of shiny warning labels that
no one ever took the time to read,
only to reside in a lonely wooden box—
sheltered, still, and safe.
Living unlit and knowing nothing but patience,
she’s unaware of all the wonderment
that resides just beneath her own surface.
When the box finally opens,
she’s handled carefully
by strong, gentle hands that recognize
all of her treacherous potential.
She doesn’t flinch,
when those trusted fingers
strike the match
to light her fuse.
She doesn’t fret
when the heat catalyzes
a chemical reaction—
one far beyond her control.
She only sings
when her own jolt sends her rocketing
a hundred feet into the night sky.
And when she can’t stand the pressure
any longer
she swallows what pride she has left
and explodes—
a million strands of glittering fire
decorating the dark, ominous unknown.
Just for a moment, she hopes
she’s the most beautiful thing
those hands have ever touched.
But as she fizzles out into a small cloud
of smoke and something that once was,
she accepts her purpose
as the short-lived,
soon forgotten,
spectacularly unsuspected
good time.

With his tongue coated in sugar
and a smile seeping with sin,
I ignored what Mama told me
and let that devil in.

Sun on my bare neck.
The crunch of grass under toes.
Cheeks ache for freckles.

Oh, I see—you liked it when I used that big word, huh?
You want me to use some more?
Mm, let me just grab my pocket Thesaurus.
Yeah, that's right baby, I take it everywhere with me—
I find it quite useful in these… situations.

Right now, I could give you seven variations
of the word “****.”
Seductive
         Arousing
                Provocative
                          Se­nsuous
                 Mmhm, you liked that one, didn't you?
                    Libidinous
           Suggestive
Titillating…
You'd like more, I can tell,
but I need you to want it.

Let's go somewhere quiet
and thumb through
my college style manuals for a few hours.
We could talk about sentence variety,
the Oxford comma, some syntax,
and mm, if you're feeling real good,
maybe even discuss the proper usage of a semi-colon.

Just know, I've been saving semi-colons
for, you know, that special someone.

If things get a little steamy, we can go down to the basement
and I'll show you my Scrabble board.
I'll set you up for a triple-word score,
and you can put together some of those high-scoring,
two-letter words that really get me going.
Oh yeah, I think I'd be into your strategy.

When the game is over, I'll lean you back,
come in real close, and whisper some Neruda,
some Cummings,
some Dickinson
softly into your ear.
Afterward, I’ll trace lines of Hughes and Whitman
down your naked spine with my fingers.

I'm sure you know it's only polite
to return the favor.

It's just an idea.
I know it sounds good.
Trust me, I'll be gentle—
But baby, believe me—
I could punctuate you in all the right places.

I sat down today and thought of a face—
with kind curves and welcoming eyes,
with a smile that could illuminate a space,
and warm the chilled voids betwixt thighs.

So I snatched up a pen and scribbled like mad,
an articulate letter on said visage so divine—
pages upon pages of marvelous musings—
hunger dripping off of each line.

Then my hands finished working, my fingers at rest,
observing my mess of inked letters and blots.
One simple message derived from it all:

**“You’re in my inappropriate thoughts.”

There was a time before
lies passed through our lips—
before the world tossed us
in all of its muck and mess;
a time when we found redemption
in a bowl of sugary breakfast cereal
and when we thought we were
always one step ahead
of a coyote and his dynamite.
 
There was a time before we
knew how to take advantage of hearts—
when we hid our secrets in glass jars
and buried them in the backyard;
a time when we wouldn’t mind
making the climb, if only to enjoy
the breeze on our way to a crashing halt;
when we thought that sleep
was a punishment
and not a cure for a problem.

There was a time
when living was second nature;
when feeling was as easy
as taking a breath, and
risk was down right,
**** straight,
******* ****.

That time?
It's a figment of a younger imagination.
But that time just may be
my metaphor for you.

We cannot call it my "mind" today.

It's better defined as
a malfunctioning mess
of kaleidoscopic hiccups—
untimed bursts of glitter,
and mismatched shapes.

Curves clash with angles,
overlap, transform, repeat,
until the nonsense makes sense;
until the noise becomes
a soothing hum.

Without warning,
the improper becomes
the most mouthwatering idea
we've had the pleasure to rouse.

Composed of little
ten-second films of us,
bare-skinned in low light,
shifting in tempting tessellations
that bump and spiral
in heightening rhythms
just behind my eyes.

Such thoughts
were never meant
for a box—
rather a shape
more taunted and tantric.  

These.
My wax-dipped daydreams
that do not beg
a single sip of permission.

We ran barefoot on the grass alongside the gravel path. I’ll never run as fast as you, but I always try to keep up. The coast line looks like a fresh oil painting this time of day, and I wonder if you notice its colors the way that I do. My focus switches between you and the sun as it sinks closer to the water’s surface, beams breaking and refracting, glittering in every possible direction. There’s no need to decorate this day, I thought.

When we reach the stone cliff, I catch my breath, but the fear sinks in, and I lose it again. Beneath us is a fifty foot drop into deep, dark saltwater. While the surf chops and smacks against the sides of the rock’s base below, I know I would much rather stay up here in the soft sand dunes—safe, quiet and light. The ground I stand here, in this moment, would never hold a candle to your persuasive nature, and I found myself following your lead, stripping down to my bra and underwear. I hated feeling this naked, and the goose bumps on my freckled arms told me the harder we tried to hold on to summer, the sooner September would come.

No part of me wants to look down, but I don’t want to disappoint you either. Let me be clear when I say, I don’t expect you to grab my hand the way you do. I never asked for it, and I didn’t invite it. Yet, the second you do, we’re connected, and I know the jump is inevitable. You’re warm to the touch, and although you never say it, I know you can feel how scared I am; how unacquainted I am with this kind of risk. You fully understand that a person can’t miss something they’ve never had, and I’ve never had this. You know exactly what kind of door it is that you’re prying open; you recognize that the consequences of your introductions and explorations will be dire and deafening.

You know all of this, but you grab my hand anyway.

Despite everything, alongside you, I’m happy to run out of cliff beneath my feet, I’m happy to be terrified, suspended in mid-air. I’m happy… until you let go of my hand. A broken connection, plummeting down, down deep into chilled, murky water—I feel things brush against my legs and arms—I’m alone, and I don’t want to be here. The saltwater stings my eyes as I scour every possible inch of space in front me for some sign of you—hand, a leg—a fleck of movement. My blood pulses against the sides of my head. I need air. As I rush for the surface, I feel something pull me back down. Panic quickly coats my chest and my throat, and I wrestle my tangled ankle free from the thick patches of vegetation below.

You’re nowhere when I finally break the surface—******* up every inch of oxygen my lungs can manage—thankful, but estranged.

You grabbed my hand to jump, only to let go, and now, you’re nowhere.

I look in the distance, and I see your footprints on the beach, leading back up to the path. You’re okay. I’m relieved, but confused—so I follow them with my questions in tow. I follow them the whole way back to where we started—clothed and barefoot, talking about what we should do with the rest of our afternoon.

When I finally find you, I’m flushed and damp, and I notice that you’re not any of these things at all…including alone. She’s beside you, pretty…put together, and dry. You’re sitting still with her. No need to seek a thrill, no need to conquer heights. Although you never say it, I know you can see me silently disintegrating in front of you. Placing your hand on my shoulder, you’re cold to the touch. I pull away. I’m anchored here, but I don’t want to be—I want to run, but I’m stiff with fear as you open your mouth to speak.  I try not to hear your words, but you over articulate them, on purpose. They drip with insincere guilt as you slowly slide each of their jagged edges into my head.

“She gets me.”

*He knew, but he grabbed my hand anyway.

I caught lightning in your bottle,
and I swallowed it whole.
So torrid and treacherously lit,
I became the kind of something
you taught yourself to run from.
Skin tight and white hot,
I radiate light from all angles;
buzzing with fluorescence.
With my fingertips brightening
the curves of your lips,
I trace that familiar fine line
between your fear and fascination.

In a single crack across the sky,
I will set your darkness ablaze
and leave you with
a deafening boom of clarity.
Jolted and stunned, you take in
an infinite illumination,
devouring every inch of
the unknown color and wonder
once shadowed by your thick,
murky doubt.

Blink, and it disappears
as quickly as it came to be.
What you see, you can’t forget.
As the spots dance, staccato
in front of your eyes,
you run, just as you taught yourself,
fast and far, away from the light;
disenchanted once again,
as you recall the fact that
lightning never strikes
the same place twice.
the same place twice.

“Let it go,” he said.
So I release it all slowly,
like those 99 red balloons that saved
our little misled souls on bad teenage days.
Release it, and watch it float up and away
in 99 different directions,
in 99 different shades of ruthless red.
Let it go, and instruct yourself
to set fire to any and everything
it’s ever touched.
Burn the bridges, scorch the paths,
cauterize the arteries that
pumped warm blood for its purpose.
Set the fires, and let the light
from the florid flames
illuminate the corners
of your newfound smile
as you watch the embers
dance themselves
into white, meaningless ash
above your head.

If you often have
great *** and are good with words,
pen that **** for all.

Not my policy
to consider saving those
who stand on my cape.

Enveloped tightly in a space
that once provided enough
but never promised a lifetime.
She twists and unfurls
beneath its surface,
ignorant of even her own colors,
her shape, her scent, her purpose.
And when she breaks open,
it is not without fear of wilting.
It is not without fateful wonder.
Still, she blooms,
catching the sun
just as the universe intended.

When I was a little girl, I occasionally loved to wear dresses. Not because they made me feel pretty, or because that’s what the damning norms of society taught me I should wear—I wore them because I loved how it felt when I would spin myself around. I’d scuff my Mary Janes, litter my tights with runs, and twirl around until my balance ran out and my little knees met the ground. No scrape or brush burn kept me from the thrill of that momentum, smiling wide as the material rose up to meet my fingers while I flew around in haphazard circles. I’d watch the colors of this huge, painted world blend and blur together, amused that, for a moment, I was out of my own control.

Eventually, much to my dismay, I grew up in nearly all of the ways a little girl can.

I realize, as an adult, that it’s important to harbor the mindset that we should regret nothing. After all, every experience typically gifts us with a little wisdom nugget, right? We collect them and look back fondly on the good and the bad, carrying our souvenirs with us as we move forward. Well, I have the nuggets (heh), but I can’t help but feel some regret as to how I came about retrieving them. Recently, there have been so many instances where I want to hop in the Doc’s Delorean, go back in time, grab the hands of little me, and spin ourselves into oblivion. We crash in the grass, eyes closed, world still spinning. In the midst of giggles and grins, we lay on our backs, watching the clouds come back into focus. I turn my head and look at her, fully prepared to tell her everything she needs to know to protect herself from all of the hurt and pain I know she’ll come to endure in the next couple of decades. I want so badly to save her from it all, but before I can speak, she does.

“Don’t worry, I can see it,” she looks at me, warmly.

“See what?” I ask, catching my breath.

“I can see all of the cracks in you.”

I don’t have the words for her, as she searches my face. She traces the outlines of my cheeks, somehow still as round and rosy as her own. Her eyes are my eyes; a bewildering gray green—unchanged, even after all of these years. In that moment, I realize that I’ve forgotten just how young I actually am.

“You don’t have to tell me about them. I know they’ll be mine someday.” She smiles and turns her eyes to the sky.

I’m in awe of this child—her understanding and intuitive nature. It left me perplexed.

“You already know what I’m going to tell you?” For a brief second, I relived the heartache, the fear, and the anger—and I wondered if she understood, I mean, truly understood what she was saying. “But if you know, then how can you be smiling?”

She turns back to me, lips curved sheepishly into a grin—an expression we had come to perfect. “Because where you’re cracked is the prettiest part of you. You fill them with gold and silver and all the rest of the glittery colors. They’re not empty—just spaces replaced with things that mean more to you than what was there before.”

I imagined this—a map of myself, sporadic damage branching out in all directions, repaired in technicolor brightness, more eye-catching than ever. I fell in love with the thought of my tattered soul, patchworked into something my heart could use to keep warm.

I kissed her, lightly, on her little forehead—a thank you for the words I still didn’t have, and hugged her tight.

“You should get back now,” she said, still grinning, “you don’t want to miss it.”

I don’t know what she meant by that exactly, but I had this unmistakably good feeling that she was on to something.

This one is for the old souls—
for the minds sustained on stories
and the lips that speak only
in combinations of words dusted
with jaw-tingling purpose.
For those who can find salvation
in a good bass line
and the disciples of that
aww sookie sookie now—
for the air guitarists
who will only ever make it big
going solo at a stoplight—
for the pairs of eyes
that can’t help but see things  
the way love is felt:
inexplicably with hungry fascination.
This one is for the old souls—
may the world always be
your zealous oyster,
producing enough pearls to fill
an Olympic-sized swimming pool,
and may you always be
brave enough to jump in
wearing only a smile.

I don’t find it odd
to enjoy giving pleasure.
Here, let me prove it.

I have this revelation—
like some eerie recurring dream.
It dips and cleanses my conscience
for a full five seconds of clarity.
A situation, short in stature, where
I can take slow breaths knowing that
I am able to walk away from this
bearing enough grit and grin to
repair all of my cracks and voids
with something stickier—
something I found on my own.

I have this revelation—
and in it, the boy is just a smudge
in the upper left-hand corner
of a yellowed photo
depicting a new me
and a new someone else
skinny dipping in some unnamed waterfall
deep in the secret folds of Appalachia.
In it, the smiles on the faces
are so incandescent
that the person holding the photo
doesn't notice
the charming tummy rolls, disheveled hair
or the smudge in the upper left-hand corner.

I have this revelation—
happiness should not be Rubik's-cubed into impossibility.
I have this revelation—
happiness should be simple.
Happiness should be simple.
            Happiness should be.
                                   Simple.

My mind resembles something like
a rabid VCR—baring its teeth,
foaming, unapologetic, at the mouth,
rewinding and replaying and repeating
all of the small cuts of two people
I swear I used to know and love.
Rerunning a patchwork reel of the scenes
I can stand to remember—
(which is all of them when I’m feeling
particularly masochistic).
Rhythmic static travels from
top to bottom of my mind’s eye—
a familiar flaw, cracking and popping
as the picture struggles to come clear.
I try to stop it—all of it.
Rip plug from outlet—
throw this snarling archaic beast
against some unsuspecting wall.
But it’s made in the good ol’ US of A
and runs on something
a bit more complicated than
any energy they can send me a bill for.
So I'm stuck
in this cyclical hell,
where there is no fresh air,
and the only oxygen I can get
has to be ****** through
a barely functioning dollar store crazy straw.
And, really, my only anger is directed at Dante
for not including this part
in his little ditty about the Inferno.
I swear I’d take
trying and failing
to escape a river of boiling blood
over whatever it is that causes me
to create a dramatic VCR metaphor
any day.

Some live for pleasure.
Others? They've missed the **** boat.
I've earned my sea legs.

They say we need things
like calcium and sunshine;
I think I'd survive

without all that stuff.
Though I may wither away
without pretty words.

Dear NASA,

I read somewhere that voluptuous women
do well in zero-gravity environments.
This makes complete sense to me
(and the “ladies.”)
Trust me, I've seen the pictures—
and we want that.

Hear me out.

Gravity's a drag.
Bras are too ****** expensive.
I feel like I’d manage to look twenty-five
for another twenty-five years
if I could somehow
avoid the sandbaggage
that I'm doomed to inherit.

It's a comfortable thought
to picture the once distressed,
top-heavy lady population
floating in ecstasy,
brassiere-less and beaming—
soaking in a  freedom so sweet
that a word just couldn't do it justice.

I think I speak for the whole
of my curvy comrades  
when I say that we'd appreciate
your cooperation in getting the lead out
as you breach the final frontier.

Because let me level with you:
there are plenty of things in this world
that can bring a girl down—
our most enjoyable assets
should not be two of them.

Please join us in the fight to stay ****.

With the warmest gratitude,

B

Eyes tightly shut, I pretend that
not a single part of it was real—just
some kind of lucid, rotten daydream
straight out of a can
found forgotten and rusted
on the back shelf;
its contents laced
with so many preservatives,
the expiration date just hangs there
a waste of ink, ignored.
Its nutrition facts, faded,
from too many days of
denial and hope.
No, I don’t care what’s in it—
it tastes good, and
I could die tomorrow.
So I nosh on it by the spoonful,
happy for sustenance,
happy when my stomach turns,
happy, once again,
when my eyes open.