that little facebook notification popped up on my phone.
the one that means someone has sent you a message.
you thanked me for all I'd taught you.
five years?
had we really know each other that long?
all that time
and you saved the worst parts for last.
that or your best parts were a mask.

don't read too much into the fact that I didn't reply.
I forgive you.

Je t'adore.*
I say it in French
so the words don't seem as heavy.
Heavy things leave both parties weaker
than when they started.
You make me feel all carbonated inside.

I wish I was a dimmer switch so I could fade in and out.
So the transition through my spectrum of emotions was smoother.
So I wasn't so "on" or "off".

No one wants all darkness;
and the light always seems too harsh when it's bedtime.

Turn me until I'm right where you want me.
Until I'm perfect.

I ran to keep from
UN-
raveling.

The soft bounce of my shoes on the pavement
was my way of pushing back when the world kept pressing its weight on me.

Her lack of self-restraint was a conscious decision to be self-destructive.
She sought a reaction that would produce the attention she fed on like a greedy infant noshing on dimpled knuckles with a mouthful of swollen gums.

She preferred cassette tapes to records “just because.”
She liked long, drawn out silences.
She enjoyed the way crumbs gathered at both corners of her mouth as she devoured a box of strawberry Poptarts.

At any given moment it was quite likely that her tongue was rattling behind her teeth, that she wasn’t wearing a bra, that she was falling in love with a fictional book character; perhaps even doing all three simultaneously.

I like him for his smile
and the way it has a way of traveling throughout his whole body.
And his eyes
like two hypnotic mood rings
that glisten with unspoken promises.

Maybe it's the way
he laughs
and I feel as though my heart is pinched
between his thumb and forefinger.

Maybe I love all the bits of you.
*Even the ones you didn't think I knew.

Slipping away
Or never really mine in the first place.
I can make plans.
I could.

Look at this!
Watch me flail for attention
With the grace of a beached whale!

More free time,
But it'll cost me.
And I've got no limbs left to spare.

My innards become outtards
As you twist my flesh between greedy fingers.
I'm a distraction.

I'm always here
When your plans fall through.
Our plans always fall through
When you come across something better.

I know we can mesh,
But at the moment all I feel is distress.
I want my boyfriend.
I miss the infinite bliss.

****** martyrs
Tipsy tastes
Lavender coated lashes
And wordless betrayals.

Sorry*
Adj:
feeling remorse or distress, especially regarding the misfortune of another.
Sorry.*

Synonyms:
"I wish you hadn't found out."
"I wish that one thing hadn't happened."
"Please don't be mad at me."
"I feel guilty."
"I don't know what to say."

My darling boy
Of green-eyed innocence.
Brown hair bias,
With beige finger tips
warm as the wet flesh of your inner cheek.

You color me purple,
Like your favorite color spree.

Something wasted,
Something ruined,
Something rubbed raw.

Goodbye to goodbyes.
They always turn sour.
Like your fingers after you've touched me.

**** on this.
**** on me.
**** it up baby,
Stop scraping your knees for my sympathy.

I find it amusing that you always inflate your cheeks with fluid when you drink anything. Why not simply swallow the moment it's in your mouth?

Then I met you and I understood.
Some things are meant to be savored.

Handle me gently.
Mull it over in your mind
Until you find the words that match your intentions.
Say them quietly
So only I can hear.
Don't speak harshly.
Don't leave me hanging.
Don't blend into the background.
A word spoken is a word meant
So say what you mean
Because I meant what I said
And I'll say it again.
I love you times one million.
All my bad decisions were worth it
If my one right decision was you.

They played gravel pit while people packed into the courtyard.
It made me think of you.
I'm sorry I didn't take more pictures.

It's hard to tell who's lonely in the dark.
It's hard to hear the shouts of those standing next to me
over the sound of the bass guitar rattling my ear drums.

And that ******* *****
that kept shoving into me.
I wanted to shove my elbow into her gut
to settle her down.
"People don't understand, these songs demand movement," she slurred
with her tacky bozo-red hair.

My feet are in puddles of booz.
I breathe in secondhand air
that tastes of beer.

The fog is thick
and mixes with the smoke of a thousand spliffs.
I wanted a contact high.
I wanted the opening band to give it a rest
so the band I came here to see could play.

But mostly I wanted you there
holding my hips while I swayed to the music.
And on the way home
when I stuck my head out of the window of a moving car
in order to feel something.
Not alive.
But whole.

Goose bumps sprang up on my arms
as dew clung to the warmth of my flesh.
The chill felt so right after all the heat.

Gasping,
as air whipped up into my nostrils
and down into my eager lungs.

I wanted you there.
Over a plate of salty fries,
talking about everything and nothing.

My greatest fear is that I'll never cease missing you
because you'll always be far away.

Space.
Time to erase
The scars and bruises
I've given myself after getting too close
To things that hurt my mind
My heart
My skin.

My scars will fade.
I've just got to wait for
my memories to catch up.

The words echo in my mind.
disgusting
I feel like I'm dying
or dead.
ashamed
I take my punishment.
I don't make a sound.
Not a peep.
you will be forgotten
Sometimes I miss the old me
because no one could love the new me.

I’m lying in fetal position, the bed is the womb.
I am nothing.
I do not exist yet.
I practice breathing.
Sharp in and out breaths.
Growing calmer. More fluid.
I feel myself forming, taking shape.
I do not exist yet.
In out in out in out in out in out.
I move oxygen. I stir the air.

This isn't going to be
one of those pretentious poems
Induced by a wave of sadness.

I've written far too many
Of those.

And I won't let myself
Be miserable again.
There are too many
Numbing medications
For me to tolerate anything less than neutral.
Even that is uncomfortable:
indifference.
impartiality.

Makes me anxious.
Like I'm waiting.
Treading water.

Sweet,
with a subtle carbonation.
Forefinger and thumb
running up the length of the stem of the glass.
Palm at the base of the bulb.
Swirling
Clinking
"Cheers."

Cold,
but warmed by the wine.
Touching lips.
Touching tongue.
*Kiss, kiss

“I’m nervous,” I say because I am.
“Me too.”
“We should just do it.”
“Wait,” you say, holding up a finger as you stare at your watch.
“For what?” I ask, not sure whether to take your response as an acceptance or refusal.
A moment later you point at the face of your watch.
12:00
“Midnight,” you say.

I missed you.

I'm thinking it,
but withhold from saying the words out loud
to try to seem a little less pathetic than I am.

We lie on our sides,
facing each other
an arm length's apart.

We do not move.
We do not touch.

Your hands are folded  beneath your head.
My hands hold my legs against my chest.

We do not move.
We do not speak.
But I want to touch you.

My thoughts become loud
in the vortex of silence and tension we've created.

No touching.
But I want to.

I'm too aware of your mouth
and how red your lips are,
but not yet aware of how they feel
or taste.

No.*
But I want to.

I want

Timing's off.
Different clocks.
Yours says go.
Mine says stop.
Your time's fast,
And my time's slow.

Ephemerality is not my specialty
But I can be short-lived if you want me to be.
I can be fleeting.

I decipher your ever word
hoping to find some hidden message
entangled up inside;
That you miss me.

You were thinking of me.
That much I know.

I was thinking of you too
as I sifted through old photos
of us at your sister's wedding.
My favorite is the one of us kissing.

I'm scared I'll never forget you
but I'm more scared of being forgotten.

That's all any of us are trying to do.
With the edge of a blade
the edge of a spliff
or sipping on the edge of a glass filled with a distraction in liquid form.

Let's just hope we don't jump from it.

he is Peter Pan
never aging.
the boyish upwards curvature of his mouth
is electric
and causes my skin cells to prickle.
he thinks my underwear is fun.
funderwear.
he's perfected the art of making insults seem charming.
and when we lie on the floor in the hallway,
our hair sprawled out on the carpet
his strands getting all tangled up in mine
I feel perfectly beautiful.
our hearts sync
as our noses touch.
Eskimo kisses.
He's a bottomless bag of peanut m&ms;
all green.
Wine stained lips
and a bitter tasting tongue.

I could drink,
but what would I do when I sobered?
I could smoke,
but what would I do when the haze subsides?
I could cry,

I shouted "I love you" inside the walls of my mind.
(Did you hear it?)
I pressed the words outward into the universe.
(Did you feel it?)
I pushed them through your nerve endings
and looped them through your blood vessels.

I thought about lying with my head in your lap.
I projected this image behind your eyes.
I painted still frames on the palms of your hands
and let you streak your clothes with memories.

I want to get naked with you always.
I want to be your *******.
I want your kisses in the night
when my legs feel heavy and I can't get to sleep.
I want your thousand mile wide smile
edging me deeper into euphoria.

He told me he loved me on a Tuesday. I remember because while he said it the thought flitted through my mind that he had chosen one of the most insignificant days to say something so significant. And then my next thought was relief. Because I'd known I loved him for a long time but had restrained from saying so in order to give him the time he needed to decide how he felt about me.

I pull your face up to mine so we can kiss again.
Your mouth mirrors the eagerness of mine.
“Do it,” I plea. “I want you to.”
You press against me, rubbing against the outside until my pleas for mercy are reduced to faint moans.
And when you finally give in my moans are no longer for mercy,
but as a demonstration of my gratitude.

tell me something I don't know.
like how the wind chooses which way it wants to blow.
or why pain can distract us from our hurts.

tell me something new.
about the parts of the ocean that have yet to be explored.
and the time it takes to get over a person that got over you.

don't waste my time with common rhymes.
tell me what made you so blue.

She spent her whole life dreaming. Everything and everyone she encountered told her
to stop. “It’s a waste of time” “It’s not healthy” “Grow up” they’d say. And eventually she
started to believe the things people said. She wanted big things - for herself and for
others, but it didn’t take long for her to realize the importance of settling. It made things
easier and she had the tendency to complicate them without even trying. She felt
isolated from the world just outside her door but she didn’t know how to change that or if
she even wanted to. The best things in life tend to waste away after a matter of
moments. They pass away as if they’d never existed. Maybe she’d imagined them all.
She began to condition herself to expect disappointment. It worked for a little while, but
hard as she tried to shield herself from the pains of everyday life - the bullet always
seem to find her. It always came, without fail and pierced her heart with little regard for
the repercussions. She longed for the day she would be good enough for the people
she loved. Maybe you had to earn it, and she hadn’t yet collected enough gold stars to
pick out of the treasure box.

He was always restless
and his foundations
never held.
He didn't know how
to love himself the way she did
so he remained wrapped
in the blanket of comfort
she provided
until her fleece
was no longer warm enough
to keep the cold
from engulfing him.

He's a ghost  now.
His eyes are dull
his touch is feathery
his voice is the wind.
Every time I spoke
he drifted further
away.
So I learned to be silent
and cherish
the time that was left to be spent
until my wallet
was empty.

Everything was empty
and flat
when he left.
I collapsed into myself
as the dimensions
of my heart shriveled
up into the ash
that would one day
consume my entire body.

for a moment I touched the face
of something worthy of every ounce
of love I could muster.

but the tides change
and I never learned how to swim.

Too many parties.
Too much numbing.

I hate this song.
I hate this ****.
Just kidding, this is so fun.
lol nope.
wher u b at????
oh my god I think someone roofied me.
probably shouldn't have smoked.
YAY TRUTH OR DARE!!
****, I'm hungry.
im not tired.
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

there's this game she likes to play where she talks to people and in the most subtle way possible, tries to tell them she's dying.

it's funny because she's dead by the time they notice.

She was the girl that hated being called cute
Because she felt cute
Was a word that should be reserved to describe puppies.

She was the girl that used her daddy issues
As an excuse to cling on
Too tightly to the ones she loved.

She was the  girl that could be read
Like a book.
Wearing her emotional spectrum
Right between her eyebrows
That were  overdue
For a waxing.

She was the girl that wore lipstick
Instead of gloss.
Any shade of red or pink would do.

She was the girl that tried too hard
To please everyone
And forgot herself.

She was quite the girl.
She was.

The worst thing about people is our capacity to disappoint.

This is the void they speak of.
This is the abyss.

I always wondered if love
is nothing more than holding onto what you've got
from fear that you won't find something better.
Just one big settlement.
Deal or no deal.

We carried on in our mutual settlement
weighing the pros and cons.
Trying to determine each other's worth.

When my pockets were empty
I decided it was time to make a return.
I could no longer afford all he had cost me.

Proposed, she said.
And I said, congrats.
Because that means a couple wins
And there isn't enough of that.

I hate and love my bellybutton at the same time.
It's half inny, half outy -
as if playiNg coy.

I'm down to my socks and knickers.
I'd describe them, bUt you don't care.

I choose a flattering filter on my webcam
and strike a pose
as the countDown begins:
Three - two -
on**E.

*** with you felt like it was my first time.
it was nice, to feel virginal again.
to be pure.
innocent.
this clean, untouched thing.

arguing with you felt disheartening.
made me scared.
amplified what little doubt I had.
and then there was that one time,
the first time,
and hopefully the last
when you felt like my dad.
(you complained from up on your tower,
about how my complaints were unjustified.
only later to complain about some other matter,
but I was too inside my brain.)
and I had to tell myself there was a reason,
God had a purpose for the pain he was letting me feel -
to thicken my skin
so that nothing and no one could hurt me ever again,
because I wouldn't let them.
wouldn't give them the opportunity.

Love
Is an active choice.
Not
A passive fall.