I'm not this perfect entity untouched by anyone.

I'm just a girl who has touched too many people
And not enough hearts.

Part of me doesn't want to belong to anyone.
Part of me won't.
Because I don't want anyone to feel entitled to the things I can't give them.

The things I won't.

Why would you love a girl
that needs to lie next to strangers to cope?

It is not an excuse, but it is a reason.
It is not your fault that I am not strong enough to stop this thing I do.
This thing that hurts the both of us, but it really hurts you.
Part of me thought you already knew.
I convinced myself that you’d picked up on the subtle hints I’d dropped on your feet like soggy feathers.

I don’t need you to forgive me.
I need you to do what will make you okay.
I need you to be better in spite of me.
I need you to graduate and become successful.
I need you to marry someone with blue eyes and blond hair so I hate myself every day.

People make excuses for me and it makes me feel like hemorrhaging.
I don’t want to party.
I don’t want to dance.
I like to marinate in this pain I’ve earned.
To know that I may never know you because I got to know someone else. Might never open my eyes to the sight of your face two inches in front of mine.

Do not fall in love with these words because they are made of ink and ink bleeds, but I don’t.
I sent you all my love in an airplane that crossed over the sea.
And by the time it got there, you were half way to me.
Don’t let my tears coax you into settling.
My hurt is irrelevant when it is what caused yours.

So many things I want to say but have no right to.
Sign a permission slip to grant me access to the places closed off with yellow tape.
How could I ask for a second go at cutting you into confetti?
Come here, I said come here.

You need to be here, so I can stop being this way.
But is not fair to say.
It is not your responsibility to restore my innocence.
When did I become so selfish?
Why did I take directions from strangers that played their music too loud?

I should have done molly.
Should, shoul, shou, sho, shh. Sshhh.
I should have done more drugs and given less hugs.
Sshhh.
I should not have dressed that way or done my make up just so.
I should have been looking through pictures of you on my phone.
Oh, that face. The one that thought I was perfect.
You know the one, with the eyes I wanted to one day see on the face of our child.

I'm naïve. I am an airborne virus. You caught me on the bus.

You were never not perfect.

And he realized then that she wasn't his.
Passing her off like a spliff.
Round and round she goes.
Nobody knows how it feels to die.
We're all too busy pretending to be alive.
She fell to the ground just like the ashes.
And I inhaled her like the smoke.

This poem is for the man in love with the bottle,
because it's the only thing he can hold onto.
The bottle demonstrates its love by helping him forget.
Because the bottle is filled with magic
he thinks will make him loveable.

This is for the man that can't fall asleep
because the bottle is empty.

be still.
make a choice to avoid making any choices for as long as you possibly can.
what power do you have when so many other people's choices blur your own.

close your eyes.
decide not to decide.
decisions are for people that have nothing better to do than choose.

but I do.
i just choose not to.