Once, I thought my bones were made of marble
and bullets would sing through the air, press my flesh and fall
clinking to my iron-cast feet.

Once, I believed my mind was an untouchable machine
that thundered like a herd of wild horses, a hive of bees, a freight train
firing synapses in record time.

Once, I felt my choices made me something more than human
not like the mass of one-dimensional thinkers who wrung their pretty hands
fretting over day-to-day dramatics.

Once, I knew I was a demigod - immortal, special, surreal
and you could bask in the glow of my gold-forged heart and never be able to break it
pounding blood of fire and mercury.

Once, I was invincible.

Then this morning, I woke up made of clay
a creative, though unremarkable casting of dust
crumbling.

Just like everyone else.

I tried to find
the perfect words,
most poetic line,
or graceful prose
to encompass
the passion that builds me,
but in this moment
every lyric
makes the world
a solitary
cliché.

and so we write.

we write words filled with sadness;
words that flow from our pens like trails of salty tears
from beneath closed eyelids.
we write words bursting with joy;
words that appear on the page
in brilliant cascades of blue ink.

words that speak of love.
words that speak of loneliness.
words that speak of unfathomable bliss
and unimaginable pain.
words that no one wants to hear.
words that we wish would be heard.

onto clean sheets of paper,
we release the words that have scarred us -
words that have cut their way
through layers of skin and muscle and bone
and burrowed deep into our being.

we transcribe our innermost thoughts.
we describe our innermost desires.
we inscribe our stories onto countless pages
declaring,
'i may not be much,
but, i am here.'

how do you
tell if people
are lying to
you?

So let me ask you then
how many nights I have spent lying on my kitchen floor like this
praying to a piece of paper that I find a way to make this all come out right?
And while I'm lying there have you tasted
the emptiness that settles on my lips as I count the stars on my fingertips
begging a soul I don't recognize any more to come and carry me?
Have you ever tried to hold something that heavy?
You don't make it far before you're dragging your feet
around a promise nobody had to make, but was clear

It was clear that you loved me more than I
always knew you did.

So let me ask you then
how I spend the time I don't have on fixations like that
hallucinating that I see your feet by my door or your name on my telephone?
And while I'm smudging my eyes from the minute reminder
that I waited longer than me and the god that holds me now knew I should have
I turn to the clock that haunts me.
Have you ever tried to feel how long that is?
You don't realize it until you're twenty-five staring the same blue-eyed problem in the face,
that grew from the memory you have of him as a kid you tossed through,
and you're wondering how you managed to scrape through with the amount of dignity
you gaze at in the reflection of the mirror.

I know that you love me more than I
always knew you did.

So let me ask you then
how come we aren't better than this?
How come it's 12:28 in the morning and I'm waiting on a call I'm never going to get?
How come we bank through changes with a common hand in hand,
but we can't make it through to see the sunrise?
How come we aren't better than a vulnerable night, a couple drinks, a wish
between the sheets of a bed with no destination that somehow
we'd wind up back in the fragmented places we've been?

How come we always want more, but we can't have it now?

How come you won't have me now?

When I know that you love me more than I
always knew you did.

the pendulum princess taps her pen on the desk
as the dogs whimper in their sleep
and the trees wrap themselves in the witching-hour starlight

the silence suddenly seems so frantic

i swear
i can hear my skin shrinking

the wind slithers over the roof
whispering through the moon beams
in hopes of finding someone to snuggle up with

at least i'm not the only one who's sick of sleeping alone

my body no longer feels like home
my bones creak like splintering floorboards under stubbed toes
my head's busy running in circles of constant contemplation
     am i awake
             or am i dreaming?
        was that a sigh
                or am i screaming?

buzzing like a firefly
trapped between a ***** countertop and a frosted beer mug

three weeks of bed rest
(and counting)
and all that's grown stronger
is my understanding of exhaustion