You might be a sinking ship
Stuck in the middle of an ocean that is too big
Surrounded by other boats
All of them drifting with ease
Wondering how
They manage to stay buoyant
When you are drowning

You look around
To all of these people
In the midst of floating
All of them seeming perfectly intact
These people
See you too
And not one of them knows
About the hole in your heart

The one that is filling quickly with saltwater
It is heavy and aching
And the dullness is overpowering
To the point where you almost give in
Thinking that maybe there will be relief at the bottom
That there will be comfort in letting go

Do not let go

Instead
Breathe deep
Fill your lungs with air
And make your way back up
Take up space
As much as you can
Expand
And eventually you will reach the top

You are not drowning
You are merely swimming in rough waters
And it is possible
To make it out alive

So instead of waiting
For saviour
For your mermaid
Or sailor
To come rescue you
Rescue yourself
It is the only way
To truly stop the sinkage

In an ocean that is too big
It is easy to feel small
Do not let yourself drown
You were meant to swim.

I read a blog post
That I had written
Years ago
It was written
The night of my first kiss
And it was titled,
"The best night of my life ever"
I can say now
That it was probably not the best night of my life ever
But it was a good one
I remember it well
The fast pace of my heart
The whirling of my stomach
The smile plastered on my face for the whole week that followed
Prompting my mother to ask what the hell was wrong with me
That sunday in october
Years ago
Was the first time
I had ever felt butterflies
I wrote about it the night it happened
Eager to document my excitement
That sunday in october
Is a night that I still write about sometimes
I have kissed
Many lips since then
I have had hands touch me
Explored bodies
In ways that my 13 year old self
Would cringe at
I am much older now
But some days
I feel like time hasn't passed at all
Some days
I have to remember
That this body is not the same
It has played house to so many men
That I often forget who it belongs to
I am not the same person
That I used to be
I have had so much happen
Since then
So I wonder why
I am still writing about my first kiss
How it is the only memory
Since then
That I don't want to erase completely
My innocence was lost
Not long after
So I keep rewinding to that night
Continue playing it back
Back to spinning objects instead of bottles
For the chance to be kissed
And a moment of infinity
It's funny
How one of my fondest memories
Is a sunday in october
When the boy I liked
Touched his lips to mine for the first time
It's funny
How I still think about it
After so much has happened
After so much time has gone by
I am almost a completely different person
Than I was back then
But I still need reminders
That I'm not that girl anymore
I still think about her
I still write about her
I wonder
If she ever wrote about me
And who she thought she might be
After so many years
I still keep her blog up and running
For the sole purpose of reading it
For the sole purose of reflecting
On what was important back then
And what will always be
She wrote about her first kiss
To be able to remember it
I am writing about it
To keep her alive.

You may not be
The brightest rose
In a bouquet of flowers
But one day
Someone will find you
And call you their favorite
They will admire your petals
Your stem
They will withstand the thorns
And you will learn how to be soft again
They will see what most cannot

Beauty is in the eye
Of the beholder
And the one who holds you
Will find the beauty in your eyes
You may not be
The brightest rose
In a garden
But someday
You will be the brightest rose
To someone.

When he tells you that he is going to be honest
Brace yourself for the worst
Expect nothing less than blow to the chest
And make sure there is something to fall back on
There will be no arms to catch you
When he tells you that he met someone else
He is trying to tell you
That he met someone better
What he is saying
Is that he wants to love her
And that you
Are nothing more than a release
What he wants from you
Is purely physical
He will use your body
But crave her heart
It is understandable
There is no reason for him to want yours
Broken things aren't good for much anyway
He will ask for no strings
Unaware that you are used to being a puppet
And every time you open your mouth
You spill words that have been silenced by men's hands
How many times do they have to enter you without permission
For your lips to shut completely
Strings or not,
You are still dangling from a thread
When he tells you that he doesn't want to hurt you
Believe him
Anyone who really wants to
Will not tell you
What he doesn't know
Is that pain is inevitable
And you have so much of it already
You swallow it in doses mixed with memory every single night
Closed eyes and flashback
There are too many reminders already
You do not need any more
Instead cover up with a cigarette
And then another
I guess it's better
To know from the beginning
That he will end up leaving
A fair warning
Not to get attached
Does he know
That your heart is made of glue
Impossible to hold just once
Does he know
Of your velcro skin
And how it rips every time you are let go
You wonder how many times it will take
Before you learn to stop clinging to sand paper
When he tells you to keep this to yourself
And to not tell your friends that he is an *******
You will oblige
After all,
His reputation is far more important than your sanity
Far more superior than your dignity
And everyone knows a straight white boy's biggest priority
Is worrying about what others think of them
Instead of telling anyone
You will just write a poem
With the intent that someday the whole world will know
And maybe one day they will

When he ends all of this by saying that he is here for you
If you ever need anything
Laugh
Because you know the only thing you truly need
Is a good book
And a bottle of whiskey
Make sure to tell him
You never needed him
To begin with
And you never will.

I am the kind of person
Who has mental breakdowns in the line at subway
Decision making is difficult
Or maybe I'm just crazy
And I might be
Every day is unpredictable
Every day I wake up in the same body
A different person
People never believe me
But believe me when I say
I change on a daily basis
My mood is completely erratic
And always shifting
It is not desirable
To be this unstable
With the daily possibility of hurricane
And ever-present disaster
There is bound to be destruction
I think deeply about everything
Too much and too often
My personality is introverted
Yet I get upset when I'm alone for too long
Human contact is critical to my being
But sometimes I get upset if I am looked at the wrong way
I push people away
And then get mad when they don't come back
I don't make much sense at all
Really, I don't
Potato
I got a massage once
And cried for the whole 80 minutes
Because I had realized
I needed to pay someone to touch me for that long
It was still worth it
It's not normal
To fall apart this often
But I do
So often that it's become my daily routine
A repetition
Of overanalyzing
Freaking out
And then worrying
Followed by bouts of hysterical crying
I cry at the most irrelevant things
But never serious situations
I've been to two funerals in my life
And didn't cry at either
I didn't know how to
I am impulsive
I have seven tattoos
All of which were added within a span of three months
I make my decisions at the last minute
I'm addicted to netflix
I bawl my eyes out every time I watch lilo & stitch
Which is often
Sad music makes me depressed
But it's still the only thing I listen to
I say I hate hookups
And then spend a night with someone who will never speak to me again after
I look for love in all the wrong places
And then get ****** when I don't find it
Yell at happy couples because they are happy and I am not
I smoke cigarettes only because I like the smell of them
I drink too much
And then not enough
I look good some days and then like hell the next
My pillow has a permanent imprint of my head because I sleep a lot
Some nights I don't sleep at all
And then cry about it in the morning
I think I cry too much
And most days I realize this
I realize that I am
A mess
A whirlwind of ugly
Black and white
Back and forth
Thunder storm tidal waves
That constantly pick up and crash
A kaleidoscope of everything wrong in this world
All put together in one single being
I am the definition
Of insanity
But when you look at it
In the right perspective
I guess it starts to make sense
Starts to fold into something other than just breakage
I can't see the appeal in the chaos
I can't see the beauty
In any of this
But maybe someday
Someone will.

Note that when I say boy
I say it with purpose
I say boy
Because only men know how to hurt with intention
And you never did

I knew it then
And I know it now
You were too good for me
You are the glowing sun on a california morning
And I am a rainy dark seattle afternoon
The only time my city ever saw blue skies and sunshine
Was when you were in it
You made me laugh
On days when the weight of the world fell on top of me
You always made things light again
I am stubborn
I always have been
I was a bull that you never tried to tame
You never asked me to slow down
Only waited patiently with open arms
For me to come to a halt
I was rough
I would pluck and pull at your thorns until you reached your breaking point
You never did though
And in my moments of panic,
All you wanted to do
Was comfort me and try to understand
I'd push you away before you could even attempt to
I remember laying in bed
Your arms outstreched and caring
And me refusing to give in
Because of some grudge I was still holding on to
We fought a lot
But every time you were the first to forgive
I mastered the art of crossed arms and silence
While you sat laughing out of frustration
Because I was so ******* ridiculous
I picked at you until you bled
Waiting for you to hurt me back
But you never did
Only men know how to hurt with intention
And hurt was the one thing you were incapable of doing
I don't think you could have
Even if you wanted to
You were the first one who didn't try to break me
And I guess I was just expecting you to
I could say I only treated you this way because I didn't know love could be stable
But I think the real reason
Was that I feared if you knew
How great you really are
You would leave
I think the real reason
I treated you so poorly
Was that I was afraid of losing you
I want you to know
That I never intended to hurt you
I know now
I should have loved you better
I should have loved you
The way you loved me.

Money cannot buy happiness

My mother
Has a collection of jewelry
Diamonds are her favorite
Hers are pure and glimmering
She wears them on her hands
And over her heart
She has a collection
Of shiny things
They all sit pretty on her body
Glowing against her tan skin
But their worth is still not enough
To cure her instability
Or ease the anxiety that never leaves
She has all of these beautiful things
But still relies on antidepressants and nicotine
To make it through the day
And even after that
She is still not content
Money does not buy happiness

My father
Has a love for cars
He has spent his earnings
On greatly crafted vehicles
They are kept well and clean
They glisten
Shining almost as bright
As my mother's diamonds
They are fast
And smooth
Like his collection of fine liquor
All of the bottles lined up neatly
15 year, 18 year, 20
All of them rich in age
He has a lot of nice things
But at the end of the day
Still requires multiple glasses of whiskey
To wash out the bitterness of life
And the memories
Of how close he came to losing it
He has all of these cars
That take him from place to place
But it is still he
Who has to drag himself out of bed
Each morning to face the world
And even then
He is still not at ease
Money cannot buy happiness

Celebrities
Have lives that most would envy
But even they can be consumed by darkness
And fall victim to their own sadness
Money cannot buy happiness

The man who lives next door
Has a beautiful house
And a lot of things
To fill it
His home is never empty
But I can tell that he is
His eyes give it away
Money cannot buy happiness

I have
So much to be thankful for
I am provided
With more than one could ever need
And my level of privilege is beyond doubt
But most days
I struggle to make it through this one
And on to the next
It is always a never ending battle
Between me and myself
Between my mind and my sanity
Most nights
I fall asleep to a mix of ambien and panic
Having to **** my thoughts
With substance
I am overwhelmed
By constant fear
By frequent depersonalization and depression
Often feeling sad and then guilty

Because I have everything
I could ever ask for
But I am still not happy
These material things
Are not enough
To fill the gaping hole expanding within me
And there is a lot
That money can buy
But happiness
Is not one of them.