On a day to day basis people ask me how I am
I have come to realize that this is a habitual response rather than a genuine inquiry
On most days, I say 'ya know, I'm alive," and I don't bother to ask this question in return.
On my better days, I'll say "I'm good, how are you?"
And I'll watch as their mouth mimics the same lies in response.
I've started to wonder if anyone else can feel the emptiness in our words
Aren't they supposed to mean, something?

During my senior year I was voted most talkative, my yearbook reminds me of how much I've grown
I used to take pride in that social chatter, being able to talk anyone's ear off, or being seen as bubbly and bright just because I knew how to waste time with the filler words.
Now, I tend to keep my mouth shut. I've learned that not everything needs words.
Why it's socially acceptable to ask mere acquaintances how they are, subconsciously reminding them of all the things going wrong in their lives, when we fully know that no one wants to hear the truth. In fact, they look down upon the truth. Don't you dare say the words depression, anxiety, ptsd, mental illness or anything else for that matter. If you can't muster up the "I'm good," it seems, the only other acceptable response is "I'm tired," because, "I'm tired" has become the go to blanket term for every other emotion.
But you know what I'm tired of? People, who don't even care, asking me how I am, because now I can't even stop lying to myself.
The other day my friend asked me if I was okay. In my most convincing voice, I said "I am - always, okay"
They looked at me and mumbled "not okay"
I didn't need their words. I believe that all words are empty until someone fills them up with the presence of their soul. I may not have as many friends as I used to, but the friends that I do have speak with sincerity. When they say something, they draw from life experiences and offer these pieces of themselves, something I do not take for granted.
I collect the pieces and keep them as treasure.
Words are so valuable, as long as you don't leave them empty.

I have spent the last nine months looking for myself
Because the previous three years I only years I only ever looked to you
We bonded over our broken souls
Exposed scars no one else would understand
And you never questioned when the childhood trauma came knocking on my door
You told me about your manic bipolar mother
I told you about my schizophrenic father
And we built our relationship off false hopes of one day creating the family we never had
For someone who has lived the same life as I,
I thought you would be more careful with your words
But every compliment you gave me was just implanted for future manipulation
Looking back, I wanted to believe that you meant it when you said you loved me, that you thought we would grow old together, that our “children” would have two loving parents and everything they’d ever need.
But as I look back, everything you did was to get me to only see my future in you
To only have opinions that coincide with yours
I didn’t even know that self-affirmation was an option
Because you became the puppet master of my existence
It wasn’t until life slapped me in the face that my eyes finally opened and I could see you for the first time
I told you that I was three weeks late and reality seeped into both of our bones
You told me you weren’t ready to be a father
That you’d never want to have my children
That I was ruining your life
One pregnancy scare, asking you to put your words into action, and you walk away.
I didn’t know who I was without you
But I promised myself that I would never let you back into my life.
My new years resolution was to discover myself
And how to be happy on my own
I traveled the world
I journeyed to twelve different countries
And as I saw inherent beauty in everything around me, my problems became so small
When I was overseas you asked me how I was
You offered an apology and said you wanted to see me
The only thing that kept me from you was the five thousand miles between us
But the distance allowed me to say no, something I had never done before
I’m not sure if I’d have the strength to do it again, but I found a piece of myself, and that’s improvement.

My alarm clock goes off almost every morning
but this morning seems different
I wake up and there are already tears in my eyes
This alarm clock is a reminder that the heaviness in my chest will only grow
I hit snooze and start to wonder if I should even get up if I'll only end up sinking
What do you do on the days when you wake up and feel like the world is against you
When you feel like there's a snow covered mountain behind you waiting for your lowest moment to send the rapid downward rush of new problems and things you have to deal with?
My avalanche always hits me when I think nothing else could go wrong
Maybe it's because I like to stack up my problems behind me instead of dealing with them; they were bound to fall eventually.
I like to pretend that I'm strong, but this feeble body can't hold the facade for much longer
The anxiety is starting to lurk around inside of me, looking for reasons to shatter my ribcage
It's tag teaming with depression which is already tugging at my aorta,
On most days I'm surviving
But on days like this I hope the downpour crushes me
My chest cavity seems to have already collapsed anyways, the tears became so heavy that my lungs stopped fighting for air
In the back of my mind I hear a faint beeping, my dreams interpret this as a time bomb, a swift count down to my inevitable demise, but I am not running out of time. I keep thinking I'm battling this clock but I'm only battling myself.
My eyes swiftly open, I hit snooze. I sit up and exhale the thoughts of myself, inhaling  the responsibilities of my day. Today, I'm going to survive.

I care, too much, about people who always care too little
I accept more than I can take and I’m running out of fuel
They say your body is a temple, but all I seem to do is dismantle myself and give away the pieces.
I have ripped my own soul apart in attempts to mend the souls of others
I am broken, and I only have myself to blame.
I wanted to love everybody
I wanted everybody to love themselves
And I never stopped to wonder if I fully loved myself.

I'm trying to move forward
Trying to build a life for myself
You know, the one that everyone seems to be striving for
We may not all want the same white picket fence or number of children but I'd be ****** if somebody told me that they didn't want the roof over their head to feel like home.
Some people say that home is not a place but a feeling
I don't know what they're talking about
I wonder if this is why I always feel lost
Why, whenever I go home, I feel misplaced. Like an oversized puzzle piece in the wrong box.
I am trying to fit in but it is clear that I don't belong
I am trying to move forward, trying to build a life for myself, but I have come to realize that I have been filling this void with material possessions
I have so many nice things in my house, that for a while I even had myself fooled
You cannot buy that feeling, but maybe it can be mended. 
When I look around me, I see that most people have the sense of home weaved into their foundation.
Some things cannot be built from scratch.
I had to take the good with the bad, despite wanting to leave them both behind.
I went home the other day, and by home I mean hell, and by hell I mean Phoenix, but it might as well be hell because that scorching city holds all of my demons.
I drove to my childhood home
To my surprise it was still standing.
I could have swore that the foundation would have given way by now, and that I would have to sift through the rubble just to find what I was looking for.
I glared at this house in disgust, as if it were a monster that swallowed my happiness.
As I was about to drive away, a woman walked out with two little girls in sun dresses. They were racing to the car, I couldn't make out their words but their smiles and laughter hit me like a brick.
I drove away and everything began to make sense.
Home is not a place, home is a feeling.

Sometimes, I dream about the ocean

How the currents pull me under and I’m left gasping for air

Only to ingest the salt water poison that is my love.

I reach the ocean floor.

There’s a gap, a crack that leads downwards

A never-ending whirlpool swoops me in, and there is no escape

You see, I am convinced, that this dream started when I was drowning in my tears

Fighting, like the only way to keep you is to reach the surface,

Sinking, my love knows no depths, and I keep spiraling down

Always loving people who will never love me back

Probably, because I am so broken, and ****** up, that I was never supposed to reach these depths to begin with

I was supposed to drown, but I fell in love instead.

My type is the person who will hurt me

Who has never known love like I have

Who can never fight for me because they’ll only end up drowning themselves

I will never be the first person to leave, I never learned how.

I forgive too easily; the salt has scraped away my ability to differentiate between honest mistakes and abuse.

I’d like to say that I love unconditionally, but the truth is I love recklessly

But I will never apologize, and because I’m always the one getting my heart broken, it means I never have to.

I may be the one to always love more, but it has allowed me to see the depths of something, so beautiful, something so magical it pulls me under.

You may think I’m drowning, but salt water is an acquired taste.

I'm really good at running,
It may be hard to believe at first sight, but I have been running for my entire life.
Ask me what I'm running from, and I'll tell you where it started.
With fear.
When your body senses a threat, it produces adrenaline, increases your heart rate, induces heavy breathing, and signals the brain to make a decision, to fight, or to flee.
What was my younger self to do when I was unable to fight back?
Fleeing became my safety
But as the fear built itself a bullet, the pain could only ricochet itself into me 
So many memories of my feeble body yelling stop, trying to escape and having no where to hide.
I was drafted into a war zone of a home
where I was taught to thicken my chain mail skin, knew how to navigate the trenches of danger, but still ran any time I felt safe.
Safety came in doses.
In grams, mostly ******, the only shooting in this war zone was through needles.
I always dreamt of a place where I could become my own superwoman, a place where I could stop the shooting and no longer feel fear at every turn.
They say you shouldn't enable an addict, but if their drug dependency replaces your abuse, hand them the syringe yourself.
It's the rope I carried and gave so they could tie their own noose.
It's taken me a long time to accept the notion that parent does not equate good person.
I was conditioned to love the people who hurt me the most.
I was told that children who didn't love their parents were ungrateful and selfish.
Good kids love their parents.
But I.. I was a bad kid.
They thought I was a fighter because I layered myself in an armor of sass, and sarcasm.
Couldn't they see I was just trying to survive?
A war torn home and a fantasy of make believe heroes
I ran to find comfort, ran to find cover, ran to find a freedom we all hope exists.
Now, I'm still running...
Too afraid to stand still because if I slow down..
My past might catch up to me.

People say that blood is thicker than water.
That the family you are born into should always come before friends.
Because friends will come and go, just like the tide, but I will never stop loving the ocean. The waves that crash onto my feet may be composed of different drops of water, and when they decend I can't even be certain the sames drops will return, but I do know that those bodies of water kept me afloat even when my blood turned to lead.
My blood stream has never been pure, I started injesting poison by the time I was 4 years old. The empty viles remind me of just how thick my blood has been, so thick that it almost stopped coursing through my veins.
It wasn't until I took a leap into the water that I was able to wash away the pain.
People may say that blood is thicker than water, but I say that without water, no one can survive.

Do you ever look at the stars?
Because I do.
There are certain constellations that remind me of your smile.
You see, I used to be a morning person, but when I met you everything changed. Meeting you was like looking in a mirror, we were the same, but opposite, you were like my flipped reflection.
You showed me the beauty of your world and made me fall in love with night.
But as time passed I soon became nocturnal and realized that I missed myself.
I missed the morning sun. I missed the way it's warmth caressed my skin whenever I felt frozen inside. I was so absorbed with you, my metaphoric mirror, that I only allowed myself to love what you loved. I looked to the stars because it was the only brightness I had left. I kept trying to convince myself I was in love with night, but truthfully I was trying to convince myself that I was in love with you. And I was, or I tried to be, but the clouds have shielded any starlight that your nights once provided. You keep asking me to love you, to forgive you, but it's too dark and I refuse to set myself aflame to light up the path for you any longer.