I am the kind of person
To write love poems for someone I just met
Thinking that maybe words can make up for my lack of confidence
My quirkiness
My overwhelming insecurities
And that awkward laugh that often escapes my mouth without warning
Phrases eager to leave my lips
I compose sonnets without thinking
Sew them on to jean pockets so that
Everytime you get undressed
You think of me
I don't know if that's socially acceptable
But I'm willing to take the risk
See
I am the person
Who fears coming off as creepy
Yet still hands out lines of poetry like candy on street corners
I swear my purpose
Is not
To reel you in
Capture you between spiderwebs spun from my fingertips
My intentions are honest
I am not looking for one night stand
Meaningless
Not on a constant hunt for momentary happiness
I want something that will last longer than sweetness
Longer than saccharin
Hit harder than whiskey
Won't leave a bitter aftertaste on my tongue
I have drowned too many times in salty waters
To know that I am more likely to sink than float
I have not yet learned how to swim in the deep end
I do not know how many attempts it will take to get to the center of me
There is no sweet middle
Waiting to be divulged
I have blocked off the pathways to myself
Not very often do I open them back up
I have a sign tied around my body stating
Warning
Do not enter
You might get stuck
I have a heart that is filled with quicksand and duct tape
The longer you stay around the harder it is
For me to let go
I am not trying to trap people
But everytime they leave,
A part stays with me
I have a photo albums on the insides of my skin
Sometimes the memories flowing through my veins pile up
And it is too much
All at once
I am the kind of person
Who runs towards sharp edges of opportunity with open arms
And then complains about the bleeding
I am the kind of person
Who can't help but repeat
Repeat
Everything I feel
Until I don't feel it anymore
I have promised myself
That I will stop falling at first sight
I have hit my head relentlessly
With severity
Too many times
But has never been enough for me to stop
None of this
Has ever been enough for me to stop
I am the kind of person
To write love letters
And never send them
Keeping them behind locked doors
Keeping them
For myself
To remember every detail
I am the kind of person
That may never know
How exactly
To love
I am still learning
How to love
Myself.

I am not the girl that most want to love
I am a siren at all times
Full volume blasting
I do not keep my words bottled up
I have far too many
And not enough places to store them
Instead
I am vocal
Wear my ripped out heart on my sleeve
Still bleeding from the times
I've had to bury it back inside of me
I have dug it out on various occasions
Only to sew it back again
I have never much of a repairman
My veins are blue
With the stories that coarse through my body
I have so many
That sometimes I worry I will burst
Fragile skin turned volcano
Lava running through my bones
I am not gentle
Or sweet
Rather harsh
And honest
I am not a sugar coated mixed drink
But
Bourbon taken straight from the bottle
I am bitter
With a tendency to burn throats
And leave headaches
I am unapologetic
In my ****** ways
Do not call me sweetie
When I am the farthest thing from candy
I will leave a forest fire in your mouth
Melt down everything in my path
And still not know how to say sorry
I am anything but
Polite
I am stubborn, taurus, bull
Anything but amiable
I am not the girl your mother ordered
I am the one she warns you about
I am more medusa than aphrodite
I am not goddess
Nor princess
I do not yearn to be swept off my feet
Simply to be desired
For more than just one night
Nicotine lovers that want only momentary bliss
You will not get me momentarily
I cling like black ash on white sheets
Smoke that stays in the air
Leaving you gasping for breath
I am not the doe-eyed
Day wandering
Innocence that men crave
I am not delicate
Not silk
Rough to the touch
Spikes that can ***** yku
But my edges smooth over
When I love
And when I love,
I love hard
I am not the girl
That most want to love back
I am not one to stand out
I am an opal among diamonds
I do not need to shine
In order to know that I'm beautiful
I am an oak among palms
I am hoping that someday
Someone will be able to admire my wood
Scars and all
I am not the girl that most want to love
I am not the girl
I am not
I am
Girl
I am human
I am willing to open my wide reaching arms
Willing to let down my titanium plated guard
Mold my brass knuckles back into bone
Turn my metal wired fists into string that you can wrap around your fingertips
I am willing to ease
But I am not
Willing to change
I am not the girl that most want to love
I am a tree in a forest full of split branches
I am not the girl that most want to love
But I am anything
But
Hollow.

Just yesterday
We were 12 years old
Plagued by acne and awkward physicality
Attempting to conquer middle school and everything that comes with it
******* too large for our scrawny figures
Pale skin
Freckles painting our faces
Yesterday we were 12
I swear we were just
Giggling about boys between slow dances at whatever bar mitzvah was that weekend
Smiling as they stared at awe at our changing bodies
Sticks blooming into carved wood
Futures as tall as we were hoping to become
Although I myself never made it past 5 foot 2
It was the promise that kept us going
The promise of straight teeth and symmetrical eyeliner
The desire to have boys' hands on our skin
Craving the rough callus against our delicate thighs
There were no cages back then
Our stomachs were filled to the rim with butterflies
Free to do as they please
We never thought twice
Only did
Immersing ourselves in adventures
Back before excitement moved to glass bottles and late nights with crowded rooms
Back when
It lived in our backyards and the mall down the street
The other day
We were 12 years old
But today I just feel old
Feel strange
Feel like I left a part of me back home
I am miles away from where I was at 12 years
But it feels so close in time
Feels like I can still look in the mirror
To find us in poorly applied makeup
In Ill fitting pants and hot topic t shirts
Neon pink accessories
I find it hard to believe
That these people have been gone for six years already
And that for the first time since meeting
They will be apart
We have been through it all
The good
The bad
The disappointing
The awkward and embarassing
All of these years in my life
Have already passed
So why do I feel like they are still stuck to my skin
Why do I feel like nothing has changed at all
I know
That change is inevitable
That time goes on no matter how many times we hit snooze
That we are older and that this is real life and we don't get to choose whether it's easy or not
That we have to face it head on
I know we're going down separate paths
But they have to connect somewhere
I know they will someday
Someday we will look back
And say
Yesterday we were 18
Where the **** did time go?
I don't know where it did
But until we find it
Let's just breathe
Take it in
Go slow.

I have known pain
In every form
All too well
My box of memories is filled to the rim with moments so vivid
That if I close my eyes
I can almost taste the blood between my teeth
Pain has been
Someone I have turned to
When emotion has defeated feeling
Sometimes just a pinch of the skin
To remind myself
That I am real
That this
Is real
Pain is an alarm clock ringing
Begging us to wake up
In a world full of dreamers
Who just cant seem to face reality
Without pain
Without the sandpaper glued to our palms
Life would slip right through our fingers
Pain is attached to every year of my life
Marking the moments that mattered most
From ages where seconds of happiness seem blurred
And mostly pain is remembered
Age 4
Chin shattering against the kitchen floor
Skin and bone to hardwood
When a game of horsey with my older brother
Goes too far
Stiches sewing me back into place
I can still taste the melted twix bar that I was given
For being such a good patient
Age 7
Scrapes from falling off the bicycle
Were enough to get me to stop trying
Needless to say
I never learned how
Age 12
Words thrown at me like razor blades in the school cafeteria
Hurt enough for me
To use them against myself
In fits of aching rage
My body refuses to let me forget
Age 15
Watching my father
Sick from chemotherapy
Hunched over in agony
Hair falling to the ground like the ashes of cancer victims
Watching him suffer
Hurt more than any broken bone
Than
Any paper cut
Scratch to the surface
The worst kind of pain I've learned
Is the kind that can not be erased from memory
With a rub to the eyes
Is the kind where
You are forced to watch
Loved ones
Experience it
Without being able to help
Or do anything to ease their discomfort
The worst kind of pain
Is being witness
Is being bystander
Pain is more than a bully
Pain is a backstabbing neighbor
Who pulls a gun to your head just when you think you've got it right
Is a ghost
A physical form that fades
But remains forever alive in memory
In the faces of people you've hurt
In the scars of skin that forces you to remember what happened
What happened
Does not define you
But the thing about pain
Is that whether or not you want it to
It shapes you.

This skin that I live in
Has not always been home
When people ask me why I have turned my body
Into a canvas
Into a picture printed piece of art
I respond
With a smile
And a shrug
But I know that the reasons
Go much deeper in me than the needle has
That there is
A volcano explanation
Waiting to errupt from my mouth
But it is not worth the energy
So I lift my shoulders up
And let them fall back down
I am often asked
What I would do
If I woke one morning
With regret burning inside of me
Filling my lungs like smoke from a wildfire
What I would do
If I learned to hate
The self-inflicted artwork that adorns my limbs
My response to that is not one I can cover with a laugh and a movement
Too many times
Have I awoke with a hatred for myself
So strong
That I've had to water it down with whiskey
Too many times
Right before my eyes
Have I seen my skin morph into alien green
Into stranger's clothing
Unfamilarity becoming a familiar concept
When people ask me
About fear of regret
I want to tell them
That my only fear
Is not having any
That if
A drawing on my skin
Is my biggest remorse
Than lucky I will be
I am told
That when I get old
When my skin is
Wrinkled and worn from
Years of experience
I will be embarassed of the photo albums glued to my body
But if I live long enough
To tell the stories
Of my limbs
If I live that long
I will know that
At that young age
It was
And
They were
Exactly what I wanted
I would rather have
A painted complexion
Than a vacant blank page
Rather have
An ocean of color
Than a sea of scars
If the filling of ink in my pores
Is a step towards
Learning to love myself
Then who cares
My tattoos do not read ****
Do not read rebel
Trouble
I have hope written all over me
And that is something
I do not plan
On regretting
My body
Is something
That I do not plan on regretting
I am trying
To make this house a home again
I am determined
To find shelter
Under this leaking roof
I am determined
To become
A masterpiece
Because I know
I am
A masterpiece.

I have never been one
To be direct
To speak with clarity
But do not doubt me
My intentions are true
So I will write this
Will all riddle aside
Dear you
You who has
Been there for me
In every struggle
With a consoling arm around my shoulder
My life these past few years
Has been an obstacle course
I have jumped hurdles with shaky knees
Only to land face down
But every time I have fallen
You have helped me
To the finish line
I have never been one
To shoot for the stars
But you have made me feel
As if I'm an astronomer
I now see hope in every constellation
Every crescent moon
No feat is too difficult to overcome
I am overcome with thoughts
That I feel the need to let out
So that
I can breathe easier
I have known you for three years
I have spent two loving you
And just when I finally
Build up the courage
To tell you
It is too late
I am knocking myself down
Because for all of the times you've picked me back up
I never realized
How much I needed that
How much I wanted
So much more
You call me best friend
Which in itself
Is an honor
It is simply to know you
But I know
That I love you
And I'm aware that it's impossible for you to return that love
Funny because you make me feel
Like nothing is impossible
Like
Somehow being 5,000 miles away
Won't change anything
Like
Somehow I have been hiding out in the back of your mind
Maybe that's just my optimism
I was a pessimist
Before I met you
It's crazy to even think
That you could ever think of me
As more than what I've always been
But the clouds have cleared for me
And ******* the sky is bright
I can see everything that we could ever be
Right in front of my eyes
There is no need for sunsets
And rainbows
When there is so much beauty in what already is
See I've had a revelation
I have not found god
Or seen the light
But I see the light in you
And maybe someday
You'll be able to see the same one
In me.

Sixteen wasn't too far away
But I can remember it
Feel it
Like it was yesterday
Hearts beating out of chests
As if to reach for one another
Speaking language on skin
Goosebumps as braille
That only we could interpret
I do not remember every second we spent together
Only certain moments
Sacharrin memories that have stuck to my tongue
Can not be washed off with mouthwash or salt
They are far too sweet to erase
I do not remember it all
But I do remember feelings
I remember movement
The involuntary curve of upper the lip
Brought on by overwhelming delirium
Contentment
Happiness
I can feel your smile more than I can picture it
I can picture
The lone tear that would escape an eyelid
Every now and then in the heat of an argument
To remind us
That this is real
And it was
Our distance was never anything more than a few miles yet
We always stayed up to make sure
That the other
Was home safe
Tucked beneath the covers
After driving home
2am in pouring rain
It's funny how
Love comes in more than just four letters
In more than a word
In more than just saying it
An announcement
It comes in
Reminders
In ensuring well-being
In wishes
In thrown pennies into wells
In nostalgia
In remembering how lovely it is
I know we were never ideal
Maybe we fought way more than we should have
Our persistance got between us more than once
You a virgo
And I, a taurus
I'm sorry for being a bull
But I never meant to bully you
I used words like grenades all too often
I was a detonator
When I should have been shelter
Protectant
It was silly for me not to be
I was sixteen when I met you
And sixteen when I loved you
I'm older now
Slightly wiser than I was back then
But in reality
I'm no different
The scariest thing to me is that
It seems as if
Years are nothing more than days
It seems as if
This was all yesterday
That time hasn't even begun to graze our youthful skin
But it has
And it is
Time has touched us in ways I never imagined possible
We have already grown apart
Streched to other sides of country
Dipping our bones into different waters
But if there's something you've shown me
Something you've taught me
It's that
Your first love
Will always be your first love
Regardless of how life goes on
Regardless of who you meet
Where you go
What you see
Regardless of distance, time
Whatever it is
Your first love
Will always be your first love
And love,
You will always be
Mine.