there are things i wish i couldn't see;
like my mother crying until she's empty and left staring at the wall
or an animal lying by the side of the road, its life draining as steadily as the cars that pass by

and there are things i wish i couldn't hear;
the sound of my bones breaking,
trying to climb this mountain of attempting to be okay
only to tumble back down
or the deafening silence after asking a question you know the answer to,
but just wasn't prepared for

there are things i wish i couldn't sense

but i saw you
and i remembered all the things i wanted to see;
the type of sunset filled with oranges and yellows and blues and pinks and purples
the type that makes you feel like you're the only one witnessing it
or someone reaching the top of their mountain
knowing that things can only get better from here

and i heard you
and i remembered all the things i wanted to hear;
the sound of rain washing across my roof like white noise
or listening to a song for the first time and suddenly knowing it's my favorite

but you?

the moment i touched you,
i knew you were everything i heard and saw all wrapped up into one

a beautiful mind

i'm sorry but i don't miss you
you were a broken promise shouted into the void and returned as a whisper
you could melt hearts with your hands
then cut flesh with your words
you handled pain as if you were a lighter
and i was a stick of dynamite
we could blame it on a lot of things
but you're sixty percent water and you would put yourself out before you could even reach me and i'm tired of being afraid

*all i smell is the smoke

pale skin turns red
just like her alcohol eyes
she takes another swig
and sings herself to sleep
she'll pray to a God
she doesn't believe in
her soul to keep
she'll dream of days
when she wasn't like this
and she'll dream of days
when she wasn't so alone

for all the times
you threw me out,
i think i've finally landed
on my own two feet
my ankle could be sprained though
and i think my knees are bruised
from begging you so many **** times to just
stay

too many times did i dry your tears with my own
only to be backhanded with an abundance of silence and indifference

i made you a mountain out of all i could pour out to you,
and yet you never bothered to climb it to see the beautiful sunrise up there waiting for you
because you made me feel like a new day

but now the sun is setting
and your face is silhouetted by the shadows
there's no moon tonight;
only the stars that watched us
come together
and fall a p a r t

and for all the times
you let me break,
i think i've finally put myself back together
my hands are shaky though
and i think they're deeply cut
but maybe you'll look at them
and you'll see the damage
you inflicted on my heart

*at least i'm not crumpled up on the floor anymore

this poison ***** with my head
rotting my insides all the way up to my throat
i want to rip it out and throw it against the ******* wall
it hurts and i can't breathe anymore

it feels like a lifetime
but even that wouldn't be able to make up for the short months i spent kindling the fire in your eyes
but our love was so bright and the brightest flames always burn out the fastest
now my heart is a pile of ashes
i wonder if yours is still burning

i was a rundown house
with missing shutters and a shaky foundation
broken windows and a kicked in door
then you came along
those blue eyes making me want to crumble into myself in a heap of butterflies and sweaty palms
but i stood there before you
your hands did nothing
because to you, i was perfect the way i was
the way i came to you
it was your words that held me up more than i ever could
they were sweet nothings
but they were the farthest from nothing
for they meant everything to me
i let you in and i was yours
vacancy and all
i promised i'd protect you with all i had
and you promised that you'd never abandon me

but then you got used to me
and you thought i needed fixing
because my current state was not enough for you
so you up and left
no notice
no note
and god, did my beams threaten to break
my heart wanted to fall through the creaky floorboards and shatter
just like those windows you told me were beautiful in a haunting way
but now you're haunting me
and it's not beautiful
i nearly fell apart into a pile of rubble in an empty lot

but i knew i was worth more than any ******* resident
i won't lean on you
on anyone
as cracked as they may be,
my bones are the only foundation i need
keep your tools
i may be broken,
but i don't need fixing
because the weather may have worn me down,
but that shows i have the strength to remain standing even after the roughest of storms
after you
and ******* it,
that's enough
for me

i want to breathe you in
and keep you in my lungs
but i can't even look at you
let alone take the time
to choke on the cold vapor
that is disguised as your words

my colors are fading out
and i'm afraid
i don't know how
to make them brighter
again

we know it's not
just a ten-letter word
so why do we try
to turn it into a beautiful lie
and simply disguise it
as simply a bunch of lines
and stanzas?
while we need constant assurance
that this disease isn't the only thing
that makes us who we are
we are more
than our mental illness
but these false illusions
that you call "poems"
make us think otherwise
depression is not beautiful
depression is not poetic
you can't make it
into something that it's not
and when you figure that out
you'll find that this irony
is now hypocrisy

if i had a flower
for every time
you crossed my mind
i'd have one simple
(yet the most beautiful)
flower
because you never really
left

i am so sick and tired
of waiting for
someone
to bring me
flowers
i think it's about time
i planted them
myself

and if there comes a time
when i let someone in
and they pick my flowers,
leaving behind nothing
but broken stems,
i will grow them again
but this time
i'll make sure
they are bigger
taller
brighter
stronger

and there will be a time
where someone comes along
and sees my flowers
and they will not pick them,
but find my flowers
far too beautiful
to take them from me

i used to love wandering around
until i got lost in your eyes
and never returned home

i heard that if i scream loud enough
you'll come back
but i've already spent my nights
sobbing into an empty space
where your chest used to rise and fall

or maybe if i pound my fists on the ground hard enough
i'll eventually reach you with my bruised hands

i grazed your cheek yesterday and i swear
i could still feel your lips on my neck
i could still hear your voice which sounded like gravel
i could still smell you;
lavender and rain

you told me "forever"
and now that's nowhere to be found

maybe you're clutching it with the hands i'll never feel on my skin again
while you're confined in a dirt prison made of things that used to be and have yet to be

i hope your bones become a home to the prettiest of flowers
because you'll know that i meant it when i said
"flowers will grow even in the darkest parts of your soul"
but *******
i never thought you'd have to take yourself away from me in order to find that out

now "forever" is just another arrangement of 26 letters that i'll never see because without you
i don't want to

i spend my days alone
standing in the rain
and then thinking of you

i'm still hoping you'll come home
and hold me just like you used to
while i sip my tea and you kiss promises onto my body

but you're there and i'm here and i will never taste the rain again because it will always remind me of you and the "forever" you took from me

i could live without you,
but that is something that would be hard to achieve
as if i wanted to succeed in something like forgetting about you
because you run laps around my head,
to the point where my brain has to stop you
just so your legs don't give out

i always told myself to not allow another human to become my happiness
but you make my heart so bright
kind of like i swallowed yellow paint,
but without all the toxic side effects

i was in a rut for awhile
but your touch made all the good come back to me
like it never left
and i felt okay on my own
but you made my okay burst into a thousand great's

and that's more than enough
you are more than enough

i often tell myself that i'll never be good enough for anyone or anything or what others claim that i can amount to but i'm not even good enough for myself i'll probably apologize for taking up space when i'm six feet under of what i always thought of myself to be and so i'll tell myself that i'll sleep when i'm dead

when it rains diamonds on jupiter,
i can see you smiling from a million miles away
the stars seem to be aligned,
and i think those might be the diamonds we always talked about;
the ones in your eyes,
twinkling like those that rain on saturn
you are born from the universe and the planets themselves
and one day,
i hope you return home to it all
only then will you know that you are far more significant than the simply complex body you were given for your soul to temporarily inhabit
because when it rains diamonds,
*the skies are crying for you

i swear to you
i will adore you up close
and i will adore you from afar
if my arms could outstretch the miles,
i'd never have to feel empty again
because you are the most lovely collection of millions upon millions of atoms that i have ever seen
i would kiss every single inch of you until my lips ached
i would trace my finger softly along your skin just so you could feel me in the softest way
and i would listen to your laughter fill up the room
along with my heart
you are the last breath of air that rush into my lungs before i go under
you are the last drop of daylight as the sun disappears behind the horizon
you are every good thing that resonates long after it's gone,
leaving me with a deep sense of security and infatuation
you are everything i have ever stayed up late crying for
you are everything i had hoped you would be
you are everything i love and will continue to love
and now i never have to wonder what it's like to feel so alone ever again
all because of you
and that's all i've ever wanted

just once i want to be able to be comfortable with the fact that it happened. i saw stars in your eyes and all i wanted was for galaxies to form between us. but those stars exploded into a million supernovas that burned so bright so quickly and have since burnt out into nothing, and the galaxies have all caved in on one another. i'm so uncomfortable with the sudden darkness and i want to be okay with starting over. i want to see stars in my own eyes. i want to feel them within me. and i want to burn bright on my own. just once.

last night;
you told me to *******
but i got so attached
i didn't know how
you left so many bruises on my body,
now i can connect them
like stars to make new constellations
my own universe
right on the surface of my skin
i'm a walking astronomy project

last night;
i found a constellation out of your anger
and it looked like a heart
a misshapen, ugly heart
and i thought,
how ironic
there's your signature,
in all its black and blue glory
and thanks to you,
i realize how bright i shine
with your heart on my sleeve

but you see
this girl
she could move
Mountains
with just her words

you are not numb
you are just afraid of feeling
it's okay
your hairline fractures are only a magnified flaw
you are greater than your broken parts
and you are not as damaged as you think you are
you still have so much left to give
i promise

can't get you out of my head
please take me back to your bed
you're in my heart and that's where it hurts
i can still smell you on all of my shirts
i don't listen to any of our favorite bands
and i set fire to my hands
because they could touch you in places my words could not
like your ribcage where your lungs are set to rot
from all the smoke we inhaled that night
i looked over at you and my chest felt tight
but now i'm there and you're here
and i swear to god i can still hear you in my ear
"i love you so
please don't go
please don't go"

i don't want to pretend
everything's not spinning
because i'm dizzy
or is the room
just not where i want it to be?
maybe i'll build an hourglass
with my hands
and watch it shatter
maybe i'll pick up the lost time
and let it pierce my skin
because i don't want to pretend
that i'm not bleeding
i don't want to pretend
that my veins aren't running pale
i won't

don't cry me a river
because i'll drown in it
and take you with me

and so
i kiss my own scars
because no one else
wants to get that close

sometimes you'll crumble
and take mountains with you
you'll scream until you're out of breath
and hurt yourself on the glass you broke
and i'll break my finger
from how hard i pulled the trigger
i'll cry until i puke
and my guts will heave
my hands will shake
and yours will crack
my eyes will burn
and yours will shut
you'll shrivel up
and i'll bleed
my wrists will hold onto cold metal
and you'll stitch me up with your words
i'll tell you i love you with my lips
but you'll pierce my chest with silence

and i'll apologize for getting blood on your shirt

i've been told
that the stars
and the galaxies
are made up of
us
i've been told
that we
are made up of
the stars
and the galaxies
and i've been told
that when we die
we go back into
the universe
then it hit me
and it all made sense
you said you were going away
you said i wouldn't see you again
for a very long time
and you said
that you were going back into the universe
then it hit me
when i found you
lying on the floor
with the stars
and the galaxies
forced out into a puddle around you
*and it all made sense

your mouth is a barricade
of wooden slats
on the front door
but your eyes are stain glass windows
that you wouldn't be able to miss
even in the biggest storm
so when you say
"i'm okay"
your mouth may be prominent
and the wood may be sturdy
but your pupils are dilated
and the windows just shattered

my head spins
a euphoric feeling
brought on by only you
the way your smile curls up
at the corner of "i love you"
your deep eyes,
synonymous with the universe
endless and twinkling and piercing
your lips that speak volumes
even when i can't seem to hear
anything but the mess in my head
the way your hand traces
its own love language across my body
creating tiny little storms of electricity
right beneath my skin
how your intellect lights a fire underneath me,
the flames flicking at my soul

i can only hope
to build a grand enough foundation
to support the profoundness i call "us"
as we move forward
and i can only hope
it will not only survive the storm
but reach into the eye and destroy it
because in you,
i see a future
that is bright
like a supernova in our backyard
and in you,
i see what a young girl
stayed up late at night
crying for,
hoping that one day
all this heartache will be a distant memory

and even if you can't see it,
even if your eyes are in gray scale,
my love for you is a collection
of reds and yellows and oranges and pinks
i bleed sunsets and sunrises when i am with you
you are bright
you are colorful
you an abundance of tomorrow's that i now want to see
you are all of my tomorrow's

they say
that time
heals all wounds

so then explain to me
why my heart
aches more and more
as each
agonizing second
ticks by

stop making permanent homes out of temporary people
their foundation will always be shaky
and they can leave at any time
no eviction notice
nothing
and the vacancy will make you feel more alone than ever

why is it
that i feel like crumbling
in a room full of people?
why is it
that i don't see anyone's eyes
flicker like a supernova
when they see me?
why is it that i can build people up
so they can see the sky
go on for miles on end,
but i tear myself down
until i am inside the earth
feeling its breaths in sync
with my own?
i want to feel as bright
and as big as the sun
but i keep caving in on myself
i'm so tired
of looking at myself
and seeing nothing
but sadness buried in my bones
i want existing to stop feeling so heavy
i want to feel alive again
without wondering what the catch is
why is that
so much to ask?

there’s a sort of familiarity
about my sadness
like an old flame
who lights you up
every now and then
knowing you two shouldn’t
but do anyway
and you’re left more burnt
than before
but the fire is a sort of comfort
because that’s what you’ve known
for so long
and you hate feeling like
your whole foundation
is being turned to ashes
blown away into a tomorrow
that you never quite want to see
but the embers rage for so long
they start to feel cold
so you don’t know what to do
when it is all extinguished
except wonder why
you let yourself feel this way
in the first place

my eyes are so heavy. i thought i saw light, but there was so much darkness and i was choking on dirt and there were weeds in my lungs and i couldn't breathe. i clawed at my throat and i could hear someone screaming. i thought it was me, until i looked up with hazy vision and realized it was you, yelling that you never loved me. but it turned into a dull whisper. and so i felt myself falling back under.

is this what a bruised heart feels like?
*or is my head pounding so hard and my chest tried to take the beating?

i used to be filled with so much envy
in some ways, i still am
i would wish to be anyone but me
in some ways, i still do
but i've realized that the person you so achingly want to be just like
is actually wishing so badly to like someone else,
and so on
i've realized we all spend so much energy yearning for the things we are not instead of appreciating the things we already are
there's nothing wrong with wanting to be a better person,
but you cannot be a better person until you learn to love what you are instead of loving what you are not

my psychology teacher asked us to close our eyes
i saw nothing
he told us he was now going to say a word,
and for us to think about the first thing that came to mind
"love"
you
i saw you

one day, you're going to meet someone
and when you look at them,
you'll be overcome with security and you'll suddenly forget what it's like to feel alone
you'll look at them and everything in your head will go quiet except their name
that's how you know you're in love

you are fixed on the idea that love will heal you; put your broken pieces back together
and that if you don't find a soul
whose thoughts are compatible with yours,
you waste your heart on someone else,
and wonder why you weren't good enough
and that's what's gonna ******* up

i think we were both so high on the idea of finally having someone to combat the lonely nights that neither of us realized that maybe we weren't as in love as we thought
i loved the idea of you, the idea of being in love
you loved the idea of not being alone
so we settled and disguised our insecurities as "true love"
i thought i had fallen for you
but now i know that i never even leapt in the first place

i clawed you out of my skin
and all that's left are red marks
and what could've been
but never was

every time i tried to be kind and said the things i wished someone had said to me,
i ended up being ignored,
taken advantage of,
or somehow ended up not helping at all
i didn't know which of the three was worse
then i decided they all were
maybe that's why i grew up to be so cold

i still feel broken down
like a road less traveled by
but one that still has cracks
and weeds growing
from under the concrete

and there is a storm in the distance
i can feel it beckoning me
into its cold yet harboring embrace
i feel at peace here,
standing on the precipice of
what i know will haunt me
but wanting so achingly to fall into

this stretch of familiarity
goes on for miles
i almost cannot see the end
but maybe that is just my eyes
playing tricks on me
alluring me until i am ridden
with paralyzation;
until i am a statue,
reminding those of what used to be

this road may never be re-paved again,
the storm might threaten to destroy all that i have,
and i might be tempted to chip away at myself

at least i am still standing

i will stitch myself up
like a thousand kisses
to a bullet heart
that pierced my lungs
i will learn to forgive
and i will learn to
make mistakes
and grow from them
i will take my scarred skin
and lie on a thousand petals
so i will feel
as lovely as i know i should
there is nothing wrong
with starting over
and growing again
i will plant myself
on new soil
so i can take in
a different perspective
and it's okay to crumble
but that shouldn't
make you
who you are
you are more than that
you a thousand leagues more
than that

you came along
ran your hand down my spine
like a match
and ignited a fire so bright
i blinded myself
to what i should have seen coming
the lick of the flames kept us warm
and the fumes made me
euphorically dizzy
but we fizzled out
before i could catch my breath
you stopped supplying me
with the oxygen i needed
to keep the fire raging
my heart is a pile of ashes now
and the nights are colder
without you
i'm still waiting to rise up out of the dimly lit embers
sitting inside of my chest
but right now
i'm choking on the smoke

i hope you see
how badly you burned me

i am afraid of being afraid
i don't want to be scared
of myself
of others
of chances to be alive
i'm afraid of not living, just surviving
and that scares me more than dying
because when i die,
i want to have left behind a life well lived
i want people to remember me as the girl who looked fear dead in the eyes and didn't even blink
the girl who moved mountains before she climbed them
i am afraid of shallow living
the depths do not bother me
because that's where it is the most beautiful
that is what makes life worth it
we don't get a second chance at this
so why are we so afraid of placing one foot in front of the other?
there's always things to be gained and there's always things to be lost
but we can't let our losses keep us from new gains
the sooner i stop being afraid,
the sooner i'll start breathing
i want to make something of myself
but i'll be ****** if i let fear be apart of that

i depend too much on love
i depend too much on someone else to pick up my pieces and put me back together, only for them to leave as soon as they came, leaving me more broken than before
it's like i'm taking one step forward and two steps back
i don't know why i still try
i don't know why i'm still even here
i should've given up a long time ago
these feelings remind that i am indeed feeling and that i am alive but these feelings are the sole reason why i don't want to be alive
it's a vicious cycle that i never asked to start
i'd like everything to stop, please

i poured all i had into too many people who gave nothing back
and i have nothing left to give
i'm empty and i'm sorry