I see my reflection in the mirror and I am                              I see my reflection in the mirror and I am
delighted. Long hair falls past my shoulders,                        disgusted. Long hair lies on my shoulders.
lying beautifully down my back. Eyes                                  dead from my need of change. Eyes covered
enhanced by liner, winged at the end, with                          with thick, black eyeliner, and tinted blue
contacts in, transforming my eyes to an                               from my hate of glasses. A single fake tooth
emerald green. Perfect, straight teeth giving                       whiter than the others, caused by a
me a smile so radiant. Thin collar bones                              childhood accident. Broad, non feminine
leading to my soft shoulders. A stomach                             shoulders, with collar bones protruding. A
thick enough to hide my ribs, yet full of                              stomach that sticks out in the wrong places.
muscle. Hips not too wide, yet fill out my                           Hips too flat, causing my jeans to hang
jeans while leaving enough room for                                   loosely. Legs longer than they should be,
imagination. Long, toned legs that go on for                      skinny and gangly. Feet the size of a mans,
days. Large feet, arched with long toes, and                       making it nearly impossible to walk straight.
cute polish. I have grown to love the girl                             I have grown to hate the girl staring back  
gazing back at me.                                                              ­  at me.

In a world of zombified teens so loaded up on antidepressants,
anti-anxiety and anti things-
it must be asked.

Did that boy who jumped off the bridge just last week,
leap in an attempt to grow wings?
Maybe he did it just to see if he'd be scared?
Or perhaps.  
He felt just too much to live
with the numbness his medication offered
He was never looking for
A temporary solution to his pain.

What about that darling girl who's arms and thighs are
In a love affair
With an abusive razor?
Does she stay with him for fear of going back,
Again and again,
only to be called weak for leaving in the first place?
Or for the fear that she'll
Never
Feel the same exhilaration
From another's kiss?

The last question of tonight.
How is it that I am just noticing now,
How carefully he avoids the word
Home
Almost as if he knows the place
I grew up in
Will never be a home again.
Not to me.
Does he know,
It represents
Nothing but a return to the front line?
Just like being ****** back into the trenches
A still wounded soldier.
Nothing but a band-aid
Covering what once
Was a gaping bullet hole.

She still feels his hands on her.
They sound as loud as a grenade in her head
The slap of his hand traumatizing as an atom bomb,
She reaches for her lover,
Hoping he can distract her from the battle
All while
Neglecting
To acknowledge he brings with him
His own
War.

They all stand at his funeral
Holding hands and saying a prayer.
Hoping,
Praying,
He grew his wings.
Nobody understood
What could have led him
To choose the pain of
A jump
Over
The silence of a pill
Or the speed of a bullet.
Most of all though,
His mother just wants to know
Why he didn't tell her he needed to be held.

We all have our demons,
Skeletons in the closet.
What people don't realize is
Wars are fought every day
The trenches lie
Not in Dead-Mans Land
but
Inside our heads.

warm black coffee syrup
down my esophagus
it's a shame
you kinged me when you did
because i have more to offer
than those sweet mint nights
out in those cars
and as much as i wish
i knew how to whisper
to the bees,
I'm glad I can't
I'd rather keep the sting a mystery

I hate to sleep in my own bed-
it is already filled with ghosts
and everything plastered on my walls
is a reminder of everything
i have failed to achieve

your elbow excites me
because the angles
tell me stories of when dew
settled on grass

but those stories are
strictly for my dreams

ash in rainclouds dripping air
lilac perfume in her hair
clipped on limestone as a marker
parades of silence growing darker


in such delicate hours
when u breathe in whispers
        and morninglit frosts
your ponytail neck
and
        hibiscus flowers
spill your time in glassine
fingers drowning moments
                       as nothing lingers

I heard
That I’m made out
Mostly of water
And star stuff
They say that there is
A secret galaxy
Located in my mantle
Just beneath the crust
Of my pale skin

They nodded at me
Twirled me around
Inspected and pulled on
My skin
They nodded
Saying, “Yep, it’s in there.”

I heard
That I’m made out
Of water
And star stuff
They say that there is
A secret galaxy
Located in my mantle
Just beneath the crust
Of my pale skin

I got excited
And grabbed a kitchen knife
And cut through
The equator line of my belly
And I found nothing
But sticky, stinky, bouncy globules
Planets, maybe
So where are my stars?