I wish I wasn't
jealous of such
absurd things.

my mom and I are walking through Big R
when I ask to leave, nervously crushing
my keys in my palm, the lady at the
front has this pleasant accent and talked
to me like I was a woman--I brush my fingers
across all the stacks of denim embroidered in
silver thread with gaudy buttons

we are in the parking lot and she says you didn't find anything?
and I think that all the carhartt hoodies looked like your chest and
all the jeans said you ruin everything down the seams, all I could see
was me swingin' around a hardwood floor that didn't exist--attached
to a hand that was fading away

but I say, no, nothin'.

no one tells you what the strain is like
when you know you're waiting but the
when is questionable and the who is for certain
when you want to stay frozen because without
a leader you know not where the ice cracks
but just how to crack it--with your heavy feet
and sand-laden spirit, with a body drained
down to the dregs, so hopeless and inconsequential
an existence in the flesh.

I mean to say that nobody tells you what the strain
is like--to be plagued by the notion that your choices
put a spin on people, a timer on chances, a could-he-be
would-he-be play in a hundred acts in which girl
sleeps with his sweater while simultaneously
managing to hate herself because she can't actually
see herself with him, hugs him with a hand slid
meticulously over his chest as he turns away
scared to death of the inner monologues that
begin with "I will hurt you..." and end with

maybe
if i just
s  t  a  y
a w a y

he will tell people
that the Eagles won because we weren't together
that this winter has been so warm
because i took Skaði and hid her
beneath my skin
and this summer will be perfect
because I am not the one.

let me
be kind
to myself
because
this has
been a
year of
hating
myself.

slow down,
november
don't let me
live week
by week

Someone tell me:
what do you do
when everything
turned out to be
the biggest lie
you had ever
encountered?

for the simple reason
that love makes us want to
sing, or all things, I'm sure.
ladybug footsteps and the
sounds they might make
would also let us know
that very thing a little
better. If only we could
look that much deeper.

draw the
mud from
my heart.

be slow
be heavy
be gentle.

how could I
have lost myself
when you were
the one covering
everything up?

we have no mutual friends
but you pop up under suggested
users. I never look you up because
i never want to know and I never
remember your last name because
last names mean aquaintances and
i'm not sure we were even that.

but you're in that little rack, a black
and white photo, you and a pretty face
she must be fantastic, she must go down
on you on the first date, promise to put
it in her mouth without even knowing
your mother's name, she must have
been swift at giving in, going under
submitting to your wrath hidden
under nice-mormon-boy-with-a-soccer-ball


or maybe those were just your standards then.
I'll admit to checking the social board and pretending I wanted
to be an English tutor, waiting for you to come out of Math 101,
a chance to talk tacked up with the rest of the pamphlets

And, I dunno, you seemed normal.

under the guise of study-buddy, math ****, in the name of grade A +,
we started with kisses and you made a beeline straight for calculus,
and I realized i didn't know how to say No. No. No.

No.

No. No.

Mike pins my hands above my head and tries to unzip my jeans.
it's dawning on me that for the first time in my life I am not as
strong as I thought, but I play my weakness off like a champ.
Have you ever not wanted someone to touch you? You feel it
in your spine, in my spine, in your ribs, in my ribs, the sanctity
of a body barring the doors and cowering in the temple, little
girls scattering for the edges and becoming shadows, engravings
and hieroglyphics.

He never gets there. He kind of gets there. You have things you want to preserve and others you don't mind sacrificing in order to be loved
or maybe just

prized.

Prized for a quarter until Mike is absent the last three weeks of Math 101, supposedly sick with Pneumonia. You offer to bring him soup,
heating pads? Bribes, on bribes on company. But you're just a towelette, not even full-blown dish rag, not even sure why i'm trying
not even sure how to say no to

Suggested Users.

of the mountain peaks and
lofty wave crests, even in the
troughs you rest, for the stars
find  y o u  in the deepest pits
where you come to lay my parts
to bed and the pines they bend in
your  w a k e  like blades of grass
beneath my feet, so should the
salt settle in oceans deep
just so they could meet
your lips,  then would
my thoughts gather in
a heap, a group of
injury, fresh and
raw, find me
find me
find me.

i don't
k n o w
how to
rely on
anyone
b   u   t
myself.

my father smells
like radishes and
moist soil after a
good rain, a hint
of dewy tulip, or
maybe rose.

i'm glad you passed that
stage, where changing your
name could have given you
a different outlook but ultimately
let you split your personality, maybe
you've returned to your body and picked
up your bones, decided that you can only
have that skin, maybe you'll fall in love
maybe you'll fall in love,
maybe you'll fall in love

Ah, Dakota,
did you know I see the
mountains when I say
your name? That when
you touched me I saw
no sparks but the entire
flame?

have you ever loved
an old-self, a husk of
person no longer there?
maybe I am an old-self
too.

my hair is a wild mess and smells like gasoline,
like solvent and you--old spice and hay
you can't chicken out now you tell me
and though I can't see your eyes, your smile
is the whitest thing i've ever seen and makes
my shoulder blades ripple and pinch together
and my pulse unwinds and slows to a heavy
hum--picks up like a bush plane when you
start up your truck.

you throw an old jacket at me,
smirk when you see how i'm drowning in your coveralls
and tell me well, you shoulda worn something warmer
drown out my replies by gunning the engine and I have
no choice but to shut up and hang on--ask me if I had
anything else to do today but barely wait for my answer
you knew better through a grin that I have no problem hearing.

i think about how i've changed a lot in the past two months
how I feel like all of the little girls I used to be are growing up--
how you teach with your voice before your hands and are silent
during my expected bouts of self-doubt, don't shoot the bull, is all you say before I pull the trigger and my ears start ringing--so funny
how I'd trade dozens of other moments just to relive that one over
and over, hear you say i think you hit it, at  least twice more.

You're not smiling but there's sunshine
in your drawl that I can't help but taste,
there's 14 inches of snow outside your door
but you could melt it all blushed with those red flannel cheeks--
can't help but feel like your dog loves me a little more
even when I'm full of fears that you don't bother to coddle but certainly don't ignore--

how even though you're probably hurting
you still want to show me every last thing on this green earth
in your red heart, this stretch of land from here past your
grandma pat's house--
 raise welts--
and snap my thighs
with dish towels
throw snow in my hair but gingerly
pick it out once we're back inside
trash talk my aim but make sure my shirt gets dry
dislodge my sedan near the corral--but not before rolling me into one of
those side embraces, where you tuck me beneath a heavy arm and lift me off the ground, oh,
i never want to touch down
i never want to touch down

if i am anything like
the underbrush between
mountains, the thick fauna
that sprouts in the ravine
near the creek, with young
aspens and their slender
bodies nestled in rotted
trees teeming with
creatures and inks and
dyes, unburdened by
the wind that can't
reach between the
leaves, it was so
easy to get lost
in me, the
way i got
lost there
where i
could
only
hear
my
voice, all
hushed like
a whisper in
the night asking
God to deliver me.

I said;*
let me
take my
hair down
for you, let
me slip my
sweater off,
let me leave the
doors all open
and leave the
lights all on

I won't take you in
i'm unwild, unwild
wouldn't wind my
way though all of
your knots, my
pages are dog-eared
unalphabetized, uncapitalized
you can't hide behind that, no
curtains, big windows, small
door, free but contained, uncorked
but restrained, tied my hair down
for sails, a single breath could
******* away.  won't build
monuments in your name
or dress your letters in
gold trim, i've
idolized too
many men.




but i
could
love
you.

when you still sneaked out
of your house at midnight
(when sneaking out was still
a thing) and we watched that
Jim Carrey movie until 3 am
when my room was still blue
and I always smelled like vanilla
I told you,
when you hold your hands
like this
over my heart it sort of feels
like maybe you're keeping me
together.

why
can't
I find
your
hands
in anything?

I let you too
far in and like
a brisk wind you
threw                  my                     doors
open and whistled
through the kitchen
nestledbetweenthe
crackswithyourdirty
self and skittered beneath
the dishwasher, in the corners
under doors, but I'm sweeping
you out because I want none of
you beneath my fingernails
none of you locked in the
cuticles of my hair, I will
whitewash the walls of
my heart if I have
to.

i thought to myself
about how cold my
fingers were and I
tried to think of at
least one person
that I wouldn't
mind holding
hands with
and it's still
you, it's still
you ******.

A hummingbird mistook
my father for a flower, what
a pure existence he must have.

I  s t i l l  b l a m e  m y s e l f.
a n d  w e  c o u l d  a r g u e
t h e  d y n a m i c s  o f  h a t e
a n d  w h a t  c o n s t i t u t e s
a s  h a t i n g  b u t  w h y
b o t h e r  w h e n  y o u
w i l l  never  s a y  m y
n a m e  w i t h  a
p o s i t i v e
c o n n o t a t i o n.

you eat a lot of cucumbers.


at first you only slice them,
but then you're cutting them
in half, in quarters. You eat
them with carrots, no carrots,
with lemon pepper and salt.
You eat them in your room
with hot tea boiled to 150
degrees, in the kitchen
at the counter staring
out the window, at
the dining table
at the patterns
on the hard-
wood floor.
Is that real wood?
It could be. That doesn't
really matter. You put too
much salt on these. And
sometimes in the tub
you crouch down
and study the
curtains with
an unbridled
amount of curiosity
because you need to be
deep about at least something
but mostly you just realize that
your legs are bruised and your
cuticles sting because you bite
them so often. This water could be hotter.



This water could be hotter.

you have always been
fringed in gold, always
back lit, probably born
with a silver lining, never
having been a cloud but
you effortlessly drifted
into my life, and out
and out, and out
and
out

I should worry less
about the talent in
your fingers and
take pride in my
own

There is no
home where
my heart is

yet

I'm still waiting
to turn that proverbial
corner and see you

Moby ***** was a humongous
mess of religious garble that threw
everyone for a loop in the shadow of
Typee and Melville was publicly shamed
for writing such a flop so outside his genre,
supposed.

But bound by blue canvas, inscribed in
gold, would you find failure to be subjective?
oh, don't be scared to reach beyond your known
talents, beyond what is said of you,

beyond your genre.