Sleeves of scars
and a garter of silver lines and burns
oh the hurt I've endured
Seated by the fire as a child
Lord knows I've had thoughts like this for a while
I'd dwell on the discretion I took
brooding over every hook that snagged my flesh
made a mess
of the little girl I never was
and they who shook me
pet me from the inside out
must have forgotten to what degree
their consumptive hands made me bleed
God how I wish they could see
every stain left with or without cause
was provoked by their nostalgic applause
but I don't even blame them
It was a conscious disease
perniciously eating
still chewing at me.

The night
The sun
In east
In nest
I lay awake
You sleep the best

when you tell me I'm in love with all our friends
I know it's a joke and I laugh along, but really, it's true.
I can't help but love so many
five
ten
twelve faces
Girls are so beautiful and boys are so beautiful and all others are so beautiful
I don't love you any less, I don't love them any more, but sometimes it overflows, dripping down the sides of my form
cutting through negative space
I have always been the one to sit in the attic, always been the one to savour the cold, always been used to metallic rattles and the feeling of coughing once more before I can pull away from from the back of my throat
and sometimes when I'm surrounded
by beautiful people and their conditioner words,
it just glows

i would say that it hurt when you tried to hold me again
but the pain from my wounds are numb

Like a once broken promise, she came to me
Out of my past, across forever seas
Recasting truth into the furrows of dreams
Sewing intimate seeds that hushed the screams

And unsolved riddles of throttling fear
If one day more, hope would not get here
Over rolling swells, far from land
Spices and driftwood and contraband

Like caramel drippings from a Dali sun
Her eyes cast the color on taught sails of muslin
She sweetly falls soft through scents and caresses
Like a settling snowflake on winters dried branches

She is more than a feeling, brighter than sight
She is the stir in the morning to my withering night
And I recall her breath, a fathomless deep
landing home in the heart, from a precipitous leap.

But the bitter serenity when out of my sight
Is her touch to my soul like raw senses at night
I spiral away, she¹ll not get here in time
To keep me from falling deeper in mind.

In this strange numb world, it¹s just her and me
Afloat on the tears, of wounded poetry.

i wonder if the doors in the house you grew up in
started slamming themselves to save your father the trouble.
i wonder if you can remember the last time you prayed,
and if you had trouble unfolding your hands.
i wonder if your mother knows
about the collection of hearts you hide in your closet,
i wonder if she could tell mine apart from the rest.
i wonder if your shoes know the reason why
you keep them by the back door and not your bedside.
and sometimes, i wonder
if you ever think about that night when i told you,
you wouldn't need to drink so much if you had me.
but it seems like we only speak when you've got body on your brain,
whiskey in your glass,
your judgement is overcast,
and you know i'm too weak to ignore you.
i learned how to translate your texts
from drunken mess back into english.
i am fluent in apology, but i don't ask you for them anymore.
this is just how it is.
it's not enough for either of us
but ******* it we are not above settling.
so i will ignore her name on your breath,
and you will ignore the fact that this means something to me.
i always thought the first time i kissed you,
it would be on your mouth.
i just wanted to be something warm for you to sink into,
something that could convince you to stay a second night.
but i sneak you out in the early morning,
and you take a piece of my pride with you when you go.
i am left to nurse the hangover from a wine i've never tasted,
wondering how this is possible.
waiting for the next drunk call,
for the next time i get to pretend we are lovers,
the next time i get to live out the fantasy i am most ashamed of.
it is the one in my head where you want me when you're sober too.

- m.f.