I promise to be your
                                          rain storm;
            thunder
            and
                          lig
                 ­           ht
                           ni
                             n
                            g,
     if
you will remain
                  as the
                                             mud  
that
          keeps me
                         stuck.

My body,

This overgrown graveyard,

This home for ghosts of the wrongly loved,

Doors open to broken souls,

Offering a warm bed,

Clean clothes,

A listening ear.



Most come in the winter

When the cold starts to ache and

The snow sinks through the gauze bandages and the wounds start to drip again,

There's never enough firewood,

Have to start chopping down trees,

Even the new peach tree at the edge of the yard,

So they can stay warm.

The blizzards shake the power out so they all congregate in the atrium,

Divulge tales around burning furniture

Of how they found this place,

This decrepit shelter

Turning more skeleton than home,

Their voices bounce off the hardwood floor,

Come to a resting point,

Fade out.



An old man with sad cheekbones who tried to drink his father back to life but only stumbled through the front door drunk,

A child in her Auntie's pearls led to the porch by a boy hungry for anyone,

The brokenhearted boy and the girl he could never hold tight enough who walked in on the same night but never called it fate,

The swollen lung man who choked on his words and fell blue faced in the entryway,

They all take up rooms here,

Mark their heights on the pantry door even though it never changes,

Claim ownership of these walls as they pull off the paper and paint over the scraps left behind,

The roof is starting to cave in because

They've started using the pillars for kindling.



They don't call this place home,

Don't plant any seeds in the garden that will take too long to sprout,

They call it an in-between,

Call it a place to spend the night,

Call it falling apart

As they tear it down,

Call it a place to hide while they fix their mistakes,

Leave their mistakes stuffed in the knife drawer.



When winter begins to melt

And the grass sticks up through the snow

They find their way out,

Leave with fresh pink scars,

Leave their used bandages in the bathtub,

Take a strip of wallpaper,

A peach from the tree by the edge of the yard

To remember it by.

I’m picturing these two deities
sharing a loft just off of Madison Avenue,
maybe near an F-train subway station.
Naturally, the neighbors are complaining
of glass shattering bleeding screams
and thick, throbbing scents of charred hair
penetrating the floors above and below
while Trent Reznor’s trademark chain in the breeze voice
blares “I WANNA ******* LIKE AN ANIMAL”
from some speaker system seemingly embedded
in the trembling walls turned all the way up to “*******.”

Opening the door to reprimand the two,
the landlord is shocked
to find thick, juicy molten stains
of red wine and blood pulsating a putrid perfume
akin to petrol mixed with cinnamon sweat
as shards of plates and glasses glisten
across the kitchen and living room
while the duo erupts
into a carnal carnival of frenzied roller-coaster screams
as Kali plucks out a rib of Dionysus to lick and gnaw
and while her runaway train hips derail against his—
he stuffs out a cigar against her shoulder
despite blindfolded eyes and ankles handcuffed
to the hissing oven
while she shoves shrooms dipped in acid
down his throat
simultaneously sniffing the remaining white powder rocks
from under his nose.

The burning wild eyes of both beings slam
against their skulls--
exploding pupils cartwheel with each ******.  
The landlord cries, tears teetering the steak knife's edge
of maniacal hyena glass shattering laughter
and wrist-slitting sadness
until both beings ******
a mushroom cloud volcano blast piercing souls & hearts
bleaching away reality in a reverse black hole super nova
just past Park Ave.

Today I watched your
lungs turn inside out against themselves,
the air unsure of where to go so it just
hovered
in that middle space between coughs,
when you thought you'd caught your breath but
your voice hitched when you tried to talk and
you started choking again,

I saw
that today, your
eyes watering as you struggled to
remind your body how to sustain itself,
you cussed between fits and asked,
"isn't this supposed to happen on its own,"
you wheezed,
"shouldn't something so
instinctual
be easier than this?"

You didn't sound like you wanted an answer so I
kept my mouth shut,
brought you a glass of water.

When you decided to stop smoking
you kept buying cigarettes,
still carried them around in the
pocket of your jeans
but told yourself that
every time you lit one
you'd have to put it out on your hand,
and so you savored every moment
that smoke rushed through your lungs,
let them all burn down to the ****
before you took a deep breath
and pressed it against your palm.
You still smoke.

To fill the emptiness with hollow things

To speak through our teeth only in whispers

To find remorse in the beautiful memories

To pour the milk ourselves

To walk away from that which we hold closest

To clog the drain with pebbles from our shoes

To hate those who love us

To hate those who cannot

To dog-ear the pages in borrowed novels

To hide lies beneath our skin

To lie thorns beneath the bedsheets

To forget to say hello

To forget to say good bye

I can feel the fire
licking up my legs until they are charred,
black as my soul is believed to be.
Screams of the innocent echo in my ears.
This was meant to be my funeral pyre.

I **** myself awake
drenched in sweat, with a shriek of pain
catching like a lump in my throat.
Sheets bunched up against me like kindling
gathered to be lit beneath the stake.

I glance around the room
still feeling the eyes of my accusers
bearing into me, hatred blazing the
path of their need for destruction.
“WITCH!”
Many fates sealed with a single word.

Except I am still alive,
the blood of the crimeless flowing through my veins.
Those flames that condemn
spared no one but me, resurrected from the embers.
The Sole Witch of Salem, survived.

I'm suffocating
Life is leaving
Without you there to hold me
Your my oxygen

I don't care where you are going
But whenever you leave me
I feel like I'm dying
Your my oxygen

And I know this isn't a fair thing to be saying
It's hard to tell you because I want to set you free
But I keep you here because I need you to breathe
your my oxygen

And I keep denying myself the one thing I need
I'm growing older
And I need to figure our how to do this thing
Before you leave permanently
I need to know how to breathe
*Without my oxygen

Am I boiling beneath your skin yet
You waged war
When all I wanted was peace
Let's explode
Paint all over our bodies like canvases
I promised to paint you
And you promised me pianos and voices
Loudly roaring and softly muttering
I'm tired of all these promises to never lie
Never hurt me
You can't guarantee your future
Sure as hell not mine
So now that your skin
Bleeds purple and green
From my brush and needle
Are you ready
To believe me
Don't forget to breathe when I boil you through
For it was all you
You waged war