my town
where wild flowers grow
between tram tracks.
there was a time when
it was hardly morning,
no bridge into daylight.

walls had ears,
neighbors had eyes
whispering behind the curtains
there was an emptiness in the guts
of the city
and poetry locked in the drawers,
Borges was read under the blankets
while Dostoievski was  a comforter:
demons were embedded.

yeah, people were clapping and smiling
watching the nub of history, numb
they had a life to live,
what can you say?

one day the radio
burst on in the streets
some were shivering in the attic
"we are free", they said
"we are free",
came the echo in trance

"shhhhh"! said others,
let us wipe the blood
don't disturb the sacrificed
so we can sleep
without dreams

it's Thursday in my town
streets are weary
and our souls are
slowly expanding

Maybe I don’t love you
As much as I think I do
Maybe I’ve just invested too much
So many nights;
Countless hours wasted thinking of you
That I’ve turned Liking you
Into obsessing on the impossibility
That you would like me, too.

Because how could you not,
Right?

"Always"
Is an understatement
For the number of times I think of you

You see,
"Always" doesn't quite understand what it means
To wonder how your smile manages to lock itself
In my heart
And how your voice plays in my head
Like an annoying alarm clock
Whose snooze button I never even care to press
"Always" doesn't understand
The way I see you in every daydream
And the way I fit you into every metaphor
I could ever come up with

So when you asked me if always thought of you
I said, "No."

No, I don't always think of you
I don't have to.

I hear ten… No, eleven.
Eleven different voices everyday.
I try to shut them up,
But it only gets worse.
They shut me up.
Until I can no longer hear my own voice,
Screaming, as I tell my friends about the man I see across the room
Holding a dagger, ******.
Smiling, with teeth stained with the flesh of all the people he hurt before me.

They tell me, "It’s all in your head."
But how can that be
When I feel it piercing through my skin,
Gnawing on my bones,
Eating up my brain?

Eleven.. No, six.
Six voices telling me I’m beautiful
In languages I was never taught.

They tell me to calm down.
"Breathe."
But what they don’t understand
is how I can never tell the difference
Between crazy and sane,
Reality and delusions

You held my hand one night,
And I knew for sure
*I was ******.

Will somebody please break my heart?
I need to create something beautiful and tragic.

I want to write about bones breaking
Bloodless veins dried up after endless nights of tear-soaked pillows
Cold mornings that make you dread ever waking up, mornings that even coffee can't fix

I want to write about the agonizing pain of rejection
Of isolation and desolation
I want to write about the way you (hypothetic lover), effortlessly outshine the stars
And even more effortlessly, outsmart the mess that I am (a messy woman seems more dramatic)

I don't want gardens growing from my skin when you touch me
I want your fingers to create stories and scars I can't undo

I want your anger and your hatred
I need to create something beautiful
So that I can destroy it
So that we can destroy it

Will somebody please break my heart?
I'm running out of disasters to write about.

Room 20: Emergency Room

She is lying there,
Barely breathing
With a heart barely beating enough
To keep her alive.
All the tubes, wires, and prayers
Are fueling her soul to hold on.
"Please, don't leave us."
And then,
The sound they've all been dreading.
The endless beeping echo of death
Resounding in a room full of
Regret, anger, and relief.
"She's in a better place now."

Room 22: Stroke

He keeps on saying
He feels better
Ready to go home
100%!
All the while,
His wife's patience is dwindling.
"I'm all he's got now.
I can't leave him."
They're 70 years old,
Married for 45.
45 years and a ruptured artery
A plaque on his heart
And a boxful of God-knows-what drugs
She still holds his hand
Even when her own heart
Is heavy.

Room 24: Cancer

Maria went through three cycles in past the months
Three excruciating cycles of chemotherapy
They tell you the anti-emetics will reduce the side effects.
When you're 65-years old
And all alone,
And cancer is swimming in your veins,
What else do you hold on to?
These are the side effects:
You lie awake at night
Wishing you lived a better life
Wishing you didn't shut everyone out
You should've married
You should've spent more time living
Instead of merely surviving
"You're a survivor."
But what good is surviving when pain comes with it--
The type of pain
No medication
Can take away?

Room 25: Beauty

I am a mother of two.
A boy and girl.
Beautiful
Is what they call me.
I'm looking at my daughter,
And..
And if only I accepted her,
For what she was
For what she wasn't
Then we wouldn't be here.
Tragic
Defiled.
I took her to the Dermatologist
To fix what wasn't broken
She injected her with chemicals
That would heal her
But a horrible allergic reaction ensued.
I should've seen how
Beautiful my baby was.

Room 26: Prostate

Everybody loves him.
Even all his 20 kids
Whose mothers he can barely memorize.
I honestly don't know how many wives he has.
I don't even know how many
He has actually married.
All I know is this:
I am his current wife.
At 71,
His body doesn't work right
anymore.
At 31,
I have needs
He could no longer meet.
But I love him.

Room 27: Not For Admission**

I am dark & desolate
I am hungry
For souls that need shelter
And tears that need hiding
I've seen enough deaths to even care how I'd look.
My paint is almost drying up,
My walls are almost ready
I can't wait for the next story.

As I breathed life into your soul
I found myself hollow
Emptied of the zeal I possessed
Before you came
And crossed the narrow bridge I built
For the one brave enough to fall
And you did.

Yet I still feel deserted
As if your coming signaled my sanity to leave
As if you took every last molecule of passion
I have left
And gave nothing in return.

I have so much Love to give
I kept telling myself before You, before Us
And I gave it all

Or threw it all
Away.