We don't ask for much.

We want a simple life, a love uncomplicated.

We want nights in with ice cream and movies, lazy mornings with tangled sheets and entwined limbs.

We want study dates and tender kisses.

We want time.

We are held apart by endless miles, barriers more cruel than cell walls.

We want a chance to be near and be happy and be unburdened and be free.

We have dreams,
and empty beds,
and dinners for one,
and phone call romance,
and nine hundred miles of what ifs and if I were with yous.

We will have each other, in the flesh someday, but until then we settle for wants and wishes.

"you didn't dry yourself off very well,"
you tell me while running a towel over my back
I am bare and vulnerable but
I do not care at all

we are post-shower standing on bathroom floor
bodies making puddles between cracks in white tile
laughing as we watch our reflections
dance in routine

my hair is curling and yesterday's mascara is crawling its way down my cheeks
I look more wet dog coming home drenched after thunderstorm than I do human but
I do not care at all

you wrap the fabric around the parts I didn't get on purpose
I keep my raw, the usually covered skin out in the open
I'm thinking about all the ways I can make you stay and
this is just one of them

There comes a time in everyone's life where they have to ask themselves is it worth it. I mean I have the American dream right? I think they're all lies told to make you think you have to reach for something or life is meaningless and wasted. All these empty goals reached don't make me happy. The process is still voided and leads to a dark hole. At 20 my life was never the same and I don't  know whether that's good or bad. Just memories to me currently. I can swim a little, but the waves still still get me ashore. Trying so hard some would say I lost my black card. Some would say my sanity is at risk for extinction. Then I ask myself did it ever exist. Both my sanity and this dream I call mine. Land mines in a field if you ask me. Rat traps to keep you trapped in thinking smaller than you are. Delusion of grandeur leaving me thinking I'm greater than I really am. Balance is the key that kept my door locked all my life. They don't tell you about balance. They tell you failure is avoidable and leads to pits. But really you have to fail to succeed and too much success will ruin you. Oxymorons that's tell you that it's okay to be fine with not being where you want to be.

if
we **** like
we're in love and
we love like
we're just *******
?

All of my belongings are strewn across the floor
lone socks, piled clothing, a book of poetry
the carpet is covered in empty bags and pens and pieces of notebook paper filled with lines I couldn't finish
I never found the right words to

I know I should be putting my life together
folding and storing and cleaning
I should be fixing the chip in the wall or doing something of importance
there are too many boxes I still haven't packed, but
all I'm thinking about is how to get you back

I should be moving out of this house into the next but
I'm wrapping myself in these same red sheets wishing you were sinking into the mattress with me
phantom feeling skin that isn't touching mine
longing like the hungry heart I always claim to not have
but here I am, starving again
insatiable

and when I leave I wont miss the salt in the air or
the sand building hills in every crack of the room
I wont miss the ink stained sunsets much
or the welcoming breeze that morning wakes me up with
I wont miss it at all

not the sound of waves or the way the moon looks when
everyone is too busy to notice
the stars and how they peek out during the vacant of night
not the crawl of sunlight through windows and
the dance the curtains do when the door is left open

not even the sounds coming from the alley outside in the middle of sleep
or the scratch of cars along the one way street
I wont miss it, I promise
there's no point in missing what I can always come back to

but I will miss you
I will the way I have for however long I haven't had you here
for whatever city you're in today
for whatever heart you're casing inside yours
for whatever one that isn't mine
how ironic it was that you used to be just a few blocks down the beach
now we're more than miles apart in distance
I wonder if your thoughts ever find their way to me

I buried too many feelings in the sand  
leaving seems an easier feat than digging up memories
and I don't think there's enough time in the world to get to where I need to be to be okay again

all of my belongings are strewn across the floor
lone socks, piled clothing and a book of poetry
the carpet is covered in empty bags and pens and pieces of notebook paper filled with lines I couldn't finish
I never found the right words to
I'm starting to think I never will

Loving the addict is
an addiction in itself
Learning to digest
all of the sharp pieces that
come with it
Apologies and how
they lose meaning
after the second
Loving the addict is
as much of an art as
the hiding is, as
the covering up, as
the forgive me
After some time
I love you and I'm sorry
start to sound the same
letting go and withdrawal
become an equal amount of
swollen
and coming back is
more relapse than any
tangible substance
Loving the addict is
a guilty habit growing
inside a dark closet
feeding the plant until
it becomes animal,
ravenous
love and dependence
are both diseases that
share the same root

But being the addict
is always an attempted break up
It is avoidance at
its finest
It is ripping apart
strings of a rope
with chipped fingernails
in attempts to
cut loose ends
It is sawing pieces of
wood with bare skin and
trying not to get a splinter
It is leave me
It is don't go
It is I am trying to not destroy
everything in my path
It is painting with
heavy winds and rain
hoping there wont be
a mess to clean up
But mess is as inevitable
as the art is creating
And love and addiction
mix like oil and water
nobody is perfectly
capable of cleaning
up correctly
So we leave in a pile
to return to later
Coming back is
more relapse than any
tangible substance
that has ever
existed
and mercy is more perilous than
we'd hope it to be

I have the word jealousy plastered on the walls of my mind
I do not announce it
After all
I am much too proud for that
But I think it
A lot
Run it back and forth through my head like a car on a track
Envious is engrained in my genetic makeup
So I make up reasons why I shouldn't be
Cover myself with thick layers of false confidence
Draped over my insecurity
She
Is prettier than me
She is tall
And
Skinny
Natural blonde hair that falls over her shoulders
Wears her smile like she is just happy to have had woken up this morning
I
Am bitter
Often overthinking the reality that life is
Plagued by my inability to hold onto happiness
Not to mention
Short
And what my mother would call
Curvy
I am not like her
We do not have similarities
The only time she is on her knees is when she is praying
I do not pray
Instead
Beg my sorrows away to alcohol and other unholy sins
I have never been able to believe
In things that cannot be seen
But she
Is different
She on the otherhand
Probably doesn't need to be touched
To believe
That you love her
Your word is probably enough
But see I've learned not to trust
For I have been let down too many times
And I constantly find ways
To build myself back up
So I call her a stripper
Although she is an avid church goer and I myself have never been
I say she dresses too mature
And although she is only a few years younger
I say she is too young for you
To make myself feel better
Let me be the first to admit
I am jealous
I am envious
I am everything that most people would probably never guess
I am all of these things
Not because I want to be her
But because
She probably makes you happier
Than I ever did

Tell me when it was
The first time you learned to hate yourself
The first time you tripped over your own fault lines
And started taking caution in every step
When did it happen?
Was it at 10?
When your shaking hands couldn't hold still
And the shame of them drove you into isolation
Maybe it's because others noticed
Or because they did their best to make it clear you were different
I don't think you know
That the rhythm you had and still have
Is unlike the rest
It is crooked and uneven but beautiful nonetheless
You didn't know it then
And accepting unsteadiness is easier said than done

Tell me when it was
The first time you learned to hurt yourself
Could it have been at 13?
When the weight of too much pressure motivated you to lose it
To the point where bones stuck out more than your voice
Loud girl became quiet that year
And then even more so the next
When your changing body didn't morph the way you would have liked it to
Left you shaped uncomfortably
A little too top heavy
The kind that drew unwanted attention
At a time when standing out was the last thing you desired
You turned skin into a battlefield into remnants from too many losses
Wrists became front lines, then hips, then neck until
You became too much destruction to keep the war going
You learned that it is impossible to win in a fight against yourself

Tell me when it was
The first time you learned to forget yourself
Was it at 15?
When the sacrifice of your body wasn't enough
To make a careless boy love you
It was a silly thing to give it all away
When you barely had enough of you for yourself
Your efforts changed after that
Trying too hard turned into not trying at all
Feeling too much turned into feeling nothing at all
You learned to repress and erase
And start over in the morning
You have been heavy from trying to hide away for so long

Tell me when it is
The first time you learn to love yourself
Will finally be after all of the years of disappointment?
Of self-deprecation?
When you realize you deserve more
Than to be the dust swept off to the side
Deserve better than to be an ashed out version of your potential
You were not meant to be wasted
You were not meant to be washed out and pushed down
You were meant to stand tall

The first time you learn to love yourself
Will be when you realize flaw is inevitable
When your skin turns itself different colors
And nothing can be done to change it
You will then learn acceptance

The first time you learn to love yourself
Will be when you stop comparing
When you look in the mirror and see only yourself in the reflection
Nobody else
You were meant to be here
You were meant to embrace it all
This body
This skin
This image
The only one you will ever have
The same one you will have to love
And eventually you will,
You'll learn how to.

There wasn't a lot
I could do for you
With the distance and everything else
I couldn't give you much
Only some small piece of myself
And the image of my body bare
For you to keep
I would like to think the fantasy I spun
Helped you in some way
I know it probably didn't
And it was foolish nonetheless to play a game of falsity
The reality of us sunk in too deeply
Too quickly
And all at once
Our future,
There was none
I forget that in reference
I didn't have the time to care
So I stopped all at once
I'm sorry for that
I hope I broke your heart enough
For you to be able to write a song about it
Maybe melody and lyrics
With some semblance of us in them
I hope wherever you are
You are getting closer to happy
I hope you still think of me.
I know you do.

Dear lover
By the time we fall in love i would hope that you will have already learned my name, but just in case you havent i will tell you. My name is danielle lauren shorr. danielle like some ancestor i never met, lauren because my mom liked it, and shorr like the beach. I like the beach. No more like love the beach. Maybe almost as much as i will love you. I like the sand between my toes, the way the wind blows through my hair and makes it an ugly mess, i like the way pigeons search for any trace of food like its all one man for himself and this is the hunger games. I like food. But at first i might be embarrased to eat in front of you, i can attribute this to my history of insecurity and that ******* belief that girls are supposed to order salads on dates. But fear not. Because i hate spinach and fries with extra cheese are my favorite, and soon enough i will learn to embrace it. I will always want to embrace you. To hold you, to be close to you, i have an overwhelming need for touch. But a slight fear of intimacy. I will be afraid at first when you try to get close to me, i will put up my guard and attempt to hide my battle scars and everything i dont want you to know about me yet, ive been hurt before. And i know im not the only one on this earth who has been. But when i tell you that i want to get to know you i am telling you that i want to memorize every part of you like the way i used to stay up at night as a kid memorizing lines of books. I love to read. I love getting lost in the words that someone else wrote that so closely manage to speak to me. I want you to speak to me. When you are struggling or lacking in anyway i will assure you with 100% certainty that things will be okay. I will pull you out of pits of depression with every muscle, bone and limb i have in my body, i have not always been comfortable in my own body. And thats been a cause of my own depression. So when the day comes when i give myself to you, i am hoping that you will remember that every part of me is devoting itself to learning you, i want to learn you. I want to trace the lines of your skin, connect the dots with your freckles or birthmarks, play silly little games and hope you let me win, i will let you in. But only if you let me. And theres parts of me that arent my brightest, i will have days where i will be unable to see anything but darkness, i want you to hold me regardless of what i say, or my stubborness, i am stubborn. I am a taurus. When we fight i will be a bull, strong in my pride and unable to see any other side of the argument, i will tell you this right now: give up. unless its important. I want to feel important. I will want to be included in every part of your existence and when I’m not i will get annoyed and ******* and demand to be the center of your universe. I will act like this because i want to feel like i matter. Like i am matter on this earth so important that if i disappeared even for a mere second the earth would crumble and fall into pieces. And if i crumble and fall to pieces, i only ask one thing of you. Do your best to help me back up, im not asking you to put me back together but to try your best to keep me from breaking even more. And when you break, know that i will be here to comfortyou. To hold you. To tell you that i love you. to make you laugh at the most innapropriate moments about the most innapropriate things, to make life seem a little less painful, and a little more bearable. I will do my best to help you stay your best. And if we end up not working, it will be okay. Because nothing will matter more than the love i gave to you when it was good and if in the end it doesnt go the way we thought it would, well, we'll be okay. But if it does. If this love stays, know that i will love you and give you every single day i have, i will make you remember why you decided to fall in love in the first place, i will make sure to make you feel okay, i will always make sure you're okay. if you're having a bad day, I'll be right there with you. I'll be here now and forever.
Sincerely your future lover.