I can't wait for the summer again when:
I can stand in a big open field and look up at the sky with the sun setting in the West, slipping down the trees and through holes in the horizon until it's bled away into the atmosphere.

*I can't wait for the summer again when:
I can stand on a hill at dusk and breath in the air that smells faintly like brush fire and soft woodsmoke, tinted with the summery tang of ripening fruit; peaches to be exact.

I can't wait for the summer again when:
I can wake up on the early mornings where the fog veils the trees like wispy lace, scented like lavender and rain, mixing the air like watercolours, swirling pinks and blues and purples together to create a pallet.

I can't wait for the summer again when:
I can sit on my front porch and watch the sky explode with lightning during a thunderstorm, illuminating the fronts of houses and my driveway, drenching everything in purple and white light.

I can't wait for the summer again when:
I can be free.

The sunlight filtered in waves as bright as the hope in her eyes
Clouds had been cast away and for once the blue of a new sky shone
Like diamond

sunlight spilling over someone else's curved cheekbone
and wind howling over sharpened collarbones
isn't as beautiful as the fingers brushed over straightened noses and
lips held together by a love that doesn't exist anymore.

We are the explorers of a sunrise waltz;

I am swirling sand and playful creatures.

You are the land we believed was mythical.

she's better than you
he's better than he used to be
you missed out big time hon

better luck next time

marijuana stays in your system for only about 3 days
LSD only 3 hours
THC for a few days
morphine for 4 days
and you
you have stayed in my system for 7 months and counting.

A whisper of tinted
Love
Rose coloured glasses perched precariously on the bridge of a hooked
Love
Sliding lower
Pushed back up with a drug ridden shaking finger
Who knew how fragile a balanced ecosystem could be?

I didn't think my heart could feel the flutter of butterflies
But there it is
And I didn't suspect that my stomach was capable of holding more than water
But I can feel the anticipation there
I didn't predict that I could see myself with someone other than him
But there you are..
With your long hair at your eyebrows, curled and waved
And your delicate nose that looks fine ***** and pointed
With your smooth lips that can laugh as easily as smile
You complimented me on my Sleeping With Sirens shirt
I doubt I could forget that
You play jazz like I do, you wear the sweatshirt all the time
You speak so softly as if the words you say might shatter over my ears
You should stop
Because soft words make me fall in love

You tasted like love and sounded like poetry
    I could've sworn you had heaven in the palm of your grief stricken hand
But now that I look back I think it was only the sun
    And you must've ****** the warmth from it by the time you left
Yet nonetheless, I still burned myself on your skin

Please tell me you love her
Tell me you never loved me and you never will
Because I'm stuck somewhere in between gone and still here
Which I guess means I'm going crazy
And the only way for me to stay is
If you take me back into your arms
And whisper in my ear that you're sorry
That you're "sorry, so sorry. I'm so so sorry, darling."
That you didn't mean what you did
That the months you spent without me were the worst of your life
Other than that
Tell me you don't love me
Tell me you never did
I'll be gone before you can look over your left shoulder
At what we could have been

Thank you

For the body that has defined, gleaming muscles
So lined and lean, like fire and rope all twisted into you

Thank you

For the hair that it constantly slicked back into that perpetual wave
The sideburns that come down to your chin and turn into stubble

Thank you

For the awesome acting
And insane explosions you can walk away from unharmed

Thank you

For the face that could make angels weep
That holds so much beauty that I crumble inside

Thank you

For the accent that takes on a lilt from Britain when you aren't on set
A hint of something else enriching the tone

Thank you

For being 40 something
Because otherwise you wouldn't be safe from me

Thank you

For being Hugh Jackman

I never thought I'd kiss your lips again or feel your hand on my cheek
I never would have guessed that I could see you smile again because of me
Even after all these months, almost a year, I think,
When I dream about you I wake up like the day is new
And last night was no different
Because you sat down next to me and pulled me closer
And then you turned my face to yours and kissed me with soft lips
It was like the universe stopped expanding
Stopped pulling us further away from each other
It was like the oceans stopped churning
Stopped drowning us
Even as I'm writing this I'm crying because who wouldn't after
Nine months of not seeing your face turned towards mine
You were you again
Not the shell that I had grown accustomed to that ignored me
Or didn't know i existed anymore
God, it was heaven in a few milliseconds
And I never wanted to leave

i am not your dream girl

i am the trees and the wind that breaks them
i am the dead grass and the fire that burns it
i am the oak and the vine that kills it
i am the abandoned house and the water that rots it

in my head, your voice is still calling me the sunshine that comes in through the window
when i knew better

i knew i was the dust that needed the sunlight to be seen
and i knew i was the ache that settled in your left shoulder overnight

knowing you for even this long has been nice
it's silly of me to think that i was the most beautiful girl you'd ever seen
when it was obvious your mouth had whispered the same things to women

the most ****** up thing about thinking "maybe i'm his" is the inescapable epiphany that he's not yours

I've thrown my body to the wolves more than once
And come back to find their teeth still embedded in my shoulders and my thighs and my neck

When the night is darkest, the moon is the highest and I want nothing more than to drown in lust covered sadness

If the lights were a little lower and my skin a little brighter would I consider myself ethereal?

The dreams that I've been remembering are the ones I'd rather not think about, but without them maybe I'd be a little happier

When winter hits, my bones will deteriorate until they contain no more than stars and remnants of you, until they exist only to those who touch my face too roughly

I'm not delicate by any means, but if kinder hands had cradled my aching laughter then maybe, I'd be a little happier

let's
      forget
              each
                    other
                           together

Beneath my veins, he feels wrong
Because he doesn't feel like you
My throat is heavy, darling
Oh God
My throat is heavy
I've fallen for entirely the wrong person
The flowers are sad
Because I've fallen for
Entirely the wrong person
I promised myself
I wouldn't regret, darling
And I promised myself I wouldn't
Miss things
But things are messy
To say the least
There's a million more things
I want to say to you, darling
Just know that I hate the things you do
Because I care too much

i find myself eating with the thought in mind of how it will feel coming up
i find myself staring at the toilet when i go to the bathroom
wishing i had the guts to do something about it
what a pun

Poetry is written by the haunts that crawl from their caves in the dead of night

I am no different

it's almost time to explain The Jealousy to you
the spiteful selfishness that pools in my eyes

i hoard the love i am given because it is the love i don't have for myself

daylight is the first note of morning-
violet and singing for a triumphant breath!

Sitting watching the winds dance through bare ***** trees, their branches swaying methodically
The leaves twirling in graceful loops down through the stubborn branches getting caught on the jutting appendages
Lands with a soft pat on the dried grass below, flicking into a comfortable position, nestling into the leaves
A mourning dove cooing in soft burbles of sounds intermingling with the cry of calling crows
A woodpeckers tap-tap-tapping up the trees and flitting through the browned leaves their strangled songs ringing
The hawk circling lazily above the treetops with wings outstretched in a long line, undisturbed and smooth
A squirrel scuttles through the leaf litter and digs a home for the nut it holds in its quivering mouth, front paws scurrying
The family of turkeys cluck a quiet conversation to and fro with feathers ruffled from the chill wind
That wind carries the promise of winter in its icy clutches with the scent of polar clear in its currents
My reddened cheeks tingling from the sun warming them out of their frozen stupor, egging them from the shock
The sunlight dimples across the perfectly fitted leaves littering the forest floor below me, dappled from the shadows
Fuzzy grey outlines pattern the weeds lining the bases of trees, the stick thin traces of branches divide and crack
The air is coloured with a warmth undescribed, brown and red and orange licking the edges of everything like flame
You can almost taste the seasoning of fall mixed with the oxygen, spiced like pumpkin and cinnamon sticks
Rough bark crackles beneath my curious fingers, tips brushing flaking tree, the very skin that holds in the feelings (sap)
Blue sky peeks between fluffed clouds fresh from the dryer with the sheets still mixed with them
Pink veins behind closed eyelids faced towards the orb of light in the sky that heats the ozone around the earth
Autumn eating fire surrounds the people too oblivious to notice this indescribable beauty.

I am a social
Not-erfly
One of the outcasts
From that group
Of people
You sneer at
Whatever

Dear J
   Some things happen for a reason, but I'm not quite sure our happening had a reason. We were like the collision of an asteroid and a comet, both sailing through space in opposite directions, looking for somewhere to land, to feel embedded. And for an instant I think we both felt that, that feeling of love and inviting comfort, a place to lay a head, someone to belong to. But it seems like for some different reason, we could not keep that feeling.
   Whether it was because the alignment of universal truths directed us on our separate paths or because we were meant for different planets, I'm not sure. Maybe looking into each others' eyes and folding our hands around hidden galaxies wasn't our destiny. Maybe it was yours instead of mine. I can't tell why we ever intersected. Some might say fate, destiny. I say it was because we both needed to taste freedom and hope and most of all love.
   Our happening wasn't backed up by truths or reasons or anything in between. It was set precariously on the precipice of a steep cliff, dangling by ******* and strong set jaw. We hung there as if nobody was there to catch us at the bottom, we hung there as if we would never see the light of day again if we let go.
   You let go and believe it or not someone broke your fall.
I, however, am still falling.

That room engulfed me as soon as my foot hit the worn wooden floor
All red light and zagging lines, ethereal art decorating the whispering walls.

A man stood next to me with a beer bottle in one hand and his Rolex ticking quietly on the other, a sound that seemed to clash with the echoey quietness of the voice telling us all its secrets.

You were all stars and shimmer and so much **** beauty, still
The red light creating the same shapes on your face that my dreams created for two years after that night.

My head spun with the fiction of the circumstances I found myself in;
This small room with its glowering characters on the walls and its eerie lighting with all of these people who probably had more pent up sadness than the entire continental U.S., all pooling their resources into the middle of the splintering floor, covered in dust and sweat and the hearts of every quivering poet that had poured out their guts to the crowd. To me.

It didn't make the sadness *****, though; it only amplified the sheer agony of it all.
And when the band played their songs with too much bass and too little voice, I was so enamoured with every single person who was closing their eyes and listening as if the sky itself was singing about wailing midnights and midsummer loves wrapped in that ephemeral depression.

I was so enamoured in everyone
And you

There is a boy in my theory class that looks like you
His nose is gently sloping and straight like an arrow
Just like you, his hair is deep brown and smooth, straight
And his lips are bowed and soft pink, covering teeth a little too big for his mouth
But perfect for his face

There is a song that reminds me of you
It's by Tame Impala and makes me think back to the summer
When you drove around with me in the passenger seat
You hand covering my bare thigh, sticky with sweat but immovable because I am yours
And I loved that

There is a kind of day that reminds me of you
Sunny and breezy with the taste of freedom lingering in the currents
It slips between my lips and makes my voice laugh and my eyes water
Because the sky was never so blue than on days like that, days that slid through my hands
Slid through my fingers

There is a certain type of feeling that comes with my memories of you
It hurts and it burns the back of my throat
And it sometimes makes my skin crawl with regret and grief
But it also feels sore and delicate because my heart is so tired and heavy with these memories
With these reminders

There is a boy in my theory class that makes me think of you
Sometimes I stare at him for too long and watch how he laughs at a joke
And sometimes I feel my face lose its shape and seep right through the palms of my hands
Because even though he obviously isn't you, he looks exactly like you and makes me remember all of the times I kissed you while muttering love
   All the times I hugged you tighter than you deserved
         All the times I laughed too hard at something you said
               All the times I thought you were my one
And there's this word that reminds me of you sometimes
    *pain

God, can't you hear the ghosts in my lungs and the spirits in my mouth?
My head feels like the sea has moved in and made a home.
I see the wind through the trees but all I hear is your voice.

Rain splatter
Wetting my bare ankles
And my lanky hair
Looking at the world from a side view
And pitter patters graduated to booms
And floods
Headlights illuminate each rebound of
Water
And the lightening illuminates everything
From an angle
Trees elongate
Grass elongates
I elongate
Wind pushes weary droplets onto
The front windows
They explode and scream
And die in a dripping mess
Blue/grey/brown clouds look as if God
Swiped a ***** paintbrush on a flawless
Canvas
To create a work of art out of
Watercolours and oils
The trees stand bare *****
Outlined with black Magic Marker
And shaded with the blackest of
Crayons
To birth a skeleton
The flowers wilt in their
Nests of leaves and rain catching
Umbrellas
And the people dash into their houses only to be incinerated by the white washed
Lightening

The summer of my eighth grade year
I was terrified of high school
My mind raced with
Unthinkable thoughts
The what if's and the ands
A panic attack on the horizon
First day drawing ever closer
Even though
It was an hour after the
Last day of eighth
Cry myself to sleep for
The first time
And suddenly it is
Time for the first day of
Being a freshman
Wake up and wipe away
The falling mascara
Already, falling apart at the seams
Feign excitement and smile
Nobody notices the difference
And then it is over
And you are not a better person from it
In fact
Things are worse
And only progressing in that direction
Of backwards
Food is fat
Weight is sin
Gaining it is worse than death
Or is it?
And I am smack in
The middle of it all
Just where I wanted to be
When I thought about the end
Of this year
At the beginning of the summer
Of eighth grade

Dear J,
   I may be at a loss for words half the time, and the other half I might have too much to say, but I can almost always say this; I love you. I have felt fear and I have felt bravery and I have felt loss. I can look pictures of us and I can recall everything we did that day. I can listen to videos of you and I can tell what you felt. And I know that you didn't think I was paying attention, but I knew how you looked when you thought something was unfair. And I knew the look in your eyes when you saw the light just right in a sunset and you knew that nothing could ever be recreated quite like that. I felt the same way about you.
   Wherever you are, know that loving someone isn't a matter of feeling something or not feeling something. It's a matter of knowing what you're feeling and when you need to let go.
   I think that people know that letting go involves unfurling your fingers and watching something fall from a great height. It's the act of following that objects downward motion that gets to us. That once it meets the ground or whatever surface it is deemed to hit, it's gone. What was there is gone. And once you think about that you think of what could have been there. That one last touch, that one last feeling of bliss that comes with knowing that the moment you wake up the sun will be shining in rivulets through fingers that tangle in hair fresh off the pillow. It's sad to know that nothing like that will happen again.
   The sun won't shine the same way. Instead it may simply fall. It won't cascade, it won't flow over the edges of noses or smiling lips. It's the same way water may lose a stone from a riverbed and from there on after it doesn't run quite the same way. But another stone, another pebble will fall in place because replacement happens.
   I guess what I'm trying  to say, is that letting go is letting someone else take a spot. In order for something else to happen you have to let your joints move out of their grip and unfold from their hold on something that wasn't meant to be held by you anymore.
   Sometimes you have to let them land somewhere new.
I only hope that it's somewhere even more beautiful than before.
            Claire

Things that nobody talks about:
The desperation of loving someone who doesn't love you
How the sun feels warmer when you've spent a year being cold
The feeling of weightlessness after crying yourself to sleep
When he stares long and hard at you and smiles softly, making your eyes feel shy even when you are not
How people who used to exist in your orbit still take chunks off of your surface, even when you've taken so many hits you hardly exist.

Things that nobody talks about:
Even when you've moved on, even when you've found someone who loves you more, even when you've discovered better things, your skin remembers things best forgotten.

"I'm sorry darling but it just won't work
the feelings I feel do no more than lurk.
Those words we said so long ago
might be interpreted as nothing but show.
I love you, darling, I really do,
but I can't keep saying that it's me and you."

I’ve begun “The Wasting” once more.

That ragged uncovering of bones and peaks and ridges that crop up along my spine and shoulders.

My scapulas revealing themselves like the bed of a lake as the waters recede.

Indents beside and under my kneecaps, hollows that match the ones slowly sinking themselves back into my cheeks.

And the hipbones…the things I truly crave to see through the paper thin layer of my skin…

Those…I’d starve myself to waifish proportions just to graze my hands along the mountaintops of those things, those sharp little things.

I lose my hair and my colour and my shine just to dig my fingers into the hardness of my breastbone, just to know that my jawbone is an overhang, just to plunge headfirst into the thrill of being thin.

“The Wasting” and I are friends, and I want to drown in her.

He's tired. His eyes tell us when he watches us.
His tail goes every once in a while. But he's tired.
Over the years his body started to betray him. First his eyes, his ears, his hips. Then his bones decided to adorn his frame more prominently, his spine a mountain range, his ribs canyons.

He's tired. His naps in the noontime are his specialty, his days of chasing rabbits submitted to dreams. His paws run from time to time. But he's tired.

He's tired. And now his body is telling us. He sways when he walks and sighs as he sleeps. Sometimes he groans when he stands up and clatters when he falls. He's had thirteen years of sun-soaked days, cold weather play, of lively life. But he's tired.

He's tired. And I'll miss him for a while. But I'll be glad he isn't so tired anymore.

she worried about everything
the weather and her outfit
whether or not she packed enough food for lunch or too much

and she worried about him

she worried about his health and how he drove after a night with friends
she worried about his lungs and his teeth and his brain
and what her dad would say when she came home smelling like smoke and
worried that he wouldn't have enough time with her

she loved him
thought of him as this supernova that had just opened up in front of her
this great expanse of opportunity and future and present and everything she's hoped for

and so she worried about him until she did not eat
worried until she all she wanted to do was sleep so she didn't have to worry about worrying about him.

but he was the best thing I had ever worried about.

I think loneliness
is the worst kind of pain.
It is your heart hurting.
And your heart keeps you alive.
Loneliness is definitely
the worst kind of pain.

"Why are you mimicking me
Oh foul beast?"
"Because I had this glorious pattern first
And to help me better feast."
"But you are so loud,
obnoxious even glorious."
"Alas, I am not, but I do admit that it is
My hide for which I am notorious."
"My gleaming fur is also well known
to people far and wide."
"I see your stripes hung up, strung out
And dried."
"Our likeness is uncanny,
Used for such different reasons."
"But they both bring upon
Those two legged demons."
"And for this sameness, this
alike this identical..."
"We are created the same,
All of us are equal."

This body I inhabit
It's seen 19 years worth of wear and tear
Mostly tear

I tell myself that this skin covering me
Is beautiful
A protector of my being

But I do not love it
I don't love this body I live in
That I breathe in

It's made me feel insecure
Afraid of my innards
Forced me to cover it

I do not love my stomach
Or my thighs
With their unappealing size

I do not love my arms
Or my ankles
With a little too much extra

And I do not love my skin
A road map of acne scars and
Fresh stress breakouts

I no longer want the body I was given
I don't want this thing I live in
Give me something I love

This year is different
There's a carefulness in the air that I haven't smelled before
It whispers "Caution, she is hurting. Caution, she isn't there."
So then the people I am closest to take heed of the warning and put me at arm's length away from them
It's safer
This year is different
The rain isn't the only thing that makes me sad
The sun does too
If I wasn't mistaken, I'd say that my heart knows that something is off
But how can this be worse than two years ago during the grip of winter
This year is different
I've begun to take a liking to staring at empty spaces just to the left of people's ears
When someone else touches me I shiver and hug myself in closer
I can't meet anyone's eyes, I can't speak, I can't match their smiles
And I've forgotten how blissful sleep is for the ones who are hurting
Until now
This year is different

Some forgive easily, and some
Do not.
Some deliberate why they should forgive,
Others deliberate who.
There are people who should be forgiven
And many who should not be.
There are those that think they should be,
And those who believe they shouldn't.
I, forgive slowly.
I ponder why I should forgive.
I do not forgive easily,
But I have forgiven those who deserve it.
You, are not one of those people.

i'm alone again
the darkness keeps *finding me
holding myself together at the seams
and asking the voices in my head
if i should die
would anybody want me after what i've done?
would somebody accept me for what i've not done?
i miss two people now
but the thing is
they do not miss me.
after they leave
i can't breathe
oh god i can't breath
you see i am
not dead yet
not everything is bright and good
they are all gone** though
so their lives must be getting better

The morning was partly cloudy, misty and golden with the hint of a sunrise in the sky
Rain came in like a quiet friend and left with a suddenness that shocks even the most familiar
And evening rolled across the concrete with the smell of grass fires a couple states away and hazy beauty
The distances shrouded in a fine layer of imagination that makes clouds seem like abandoned structures
Makes the sun seem a little more sleepy than usual and the horizon dusty and ready for the night

Dear J,
     What if we became friends again? What if we began trading music again, or sharing secrets, or reveling at mortal sunsets that last but half an hour? Sometimes, well, lately, I've been tempted to ask how you're doing, ask if you want to get coffee sometime. I wonder what we'd talk about, if we'd sit in awkward silence, or laugh in embarrassed stupor at the folly our cut up relationship is. Or would we just stare? Look at each other with wide eyes, sip our coffee and smile occasionally.
     Or maybe we'd talk like nothing ever went wrong, like we never stopped telling each other how our days went, or what new music we had recently discovered.
     But who's to know? We have never tried to talk again, not even said a tired hello or strained good morning. Out hands have never brushed, nothing but out clothing ever touching.
     Our heights are still finely tuned to each other, even though we're dawning on the second year of silence. Did we ever make a truce? Or did you decide that your confirmation of us never being friends again was enough? I felt so empty when you told me that; told me nothing would ever come from us. You claimed it was because we loved each other too much, and that we'd just fall into the same trap as before. And maybe that's true.
     Or maybe we would have stayed best friends who shared coffee and clothed and beliefs and thoughts. Maybe we would have gone down different paths; you a straighter one, me a less travelled one. But it would have been a path with you on it, so either way it would have been okay.
     But what if if we never loved each other like lovers? What if it was loving each other as friends, as siblings? We could have seen each other grow up over the past four years.
    We've become much more since we've last spoken. And we'll continue to change and differ as we keep the distance between us.
     And maybe someday I'll walk up to you, shake your hand, and you won't recognize me; because we've spent years shoving the thoughts of each other to the backs of our memories.
    We'll introduce each other, I'll smile and say I recognize you. You might look a little closer at me, smile awkwardly when you realize who I am. And then we'll continue walking our separate ways.
     And we'll keep the past to ourselves.

               Love,
                   Claire

sometimes i think about you
the one that i loved first
(the one that i still do)
and i get so incredibly sad
because you were mine
i was yours
i thought
talk to me
Jesus Christ just talk to me
its nights like these
where i cant help but to miss you
so deeply
that it rips my chest open
so i can see the flowers that you planted there


*are still growing

that i do not miss you
would be a lie
because i still find you in the trees
and in the new blades of spring grass

to say that my heart does not hurt
would be a lie
for it aches sometimes
with the knowledge we will not speak again

to say that i wish to forget you
would be a lie
because remembering makes me stay away
from your broken smile

but to say that i still want you
would be the biggest lie of them all
for i have found that the shade of your eyes can be found in other things
and your smile can be matched with a storm