They will never know our struggle
They will never know how to empathize
With our extreme abundance of feelings
We have so many words living on our tongue that sometimes
We almost choke trying to swallow them down
Therefore
We are constantly spitting them on to paper
And our journal entries look more like convulsions made by spasms of the hand
Than they do legible anything
But that's alright
We keep our heart in a metal flask
Open just enough to let the air seep in
Ready at all times to pour it out to anyone with open hands
Sometimes to the point of emptiness
Too many times do we leave ourselves with nothing
Having given so much of us to someone
Caution is not something we proceed with
Rather
Speed and recklessness
Blind optimism with eager motion
We are not capable of waiting
We are the ones who romanticize too soon
Fantasize in the most unsettling ways
We are the antagonists of our own stories
Yet we seem to always be searching for a happy ending
We are the wide eyed wanderers
The shy bodies built with open arms
Now and then
Love poems will escape from our fingertips
Never to reach their destination
Our memories are books we reread over and over again
Films that we replay just to remind us how it felt to feel
Our senses our heightened to the point where touch
Becomes crucial
And emotions
Become visible
We are the people
That you do not want to fall in love with
Because once we do
We will never
Fall out.

The reality is
You are too busy
For someone
Who has all of the time in the world.

You’re going to leave my in July
On a warm summer day
You’re going to leave me lonely
For the cold Australia gray

When the air gets thick
When the sky gets blue
You’ll be gone

When the sun sets late
When the stars come out
I’ll be alone

I’ll look up at night
And you’ll look up too
10,000 miles away
Underneath the same moon

Maybe we’re not as far apart
As we think we may be

I remember thinking that I'd finally got it right
Holding hands walking home that sunday night
Crushing burnt reds underneath out feet
The sweet smell of smoke that lingered on your cheek

And I loved you
I loved you so deep
And when you left and went away
I sunk, I was weak
But the love I had for you
Is now gone and faded
Just like the way we were
How we used to be back then.

The first time you are told
That you are beautiful
You will not believe it
You will swallow it down harshly
Like a glass of ethanol
Force a mona lisa smile on your unknowing face
And say thank you
Say it like it's something you're used to hearing
Like it actually means something
Like it doesn't hurt as much as it does
Compliments aren't supposed to hurt
But you were taught them backhanded
Raised on anticipation
Expecting to feel a sting after every one you're given
Conditioned to regard praise as unfamiliar
As foreign territory
Body only knowing warzone
And battlefield
Not knowing genuine
Body was never taught how to be loved
How to love
You were too busy trying to learn to love men with rough hands and heavy breath
Too busy giving away parts of you in hopes of getting something back
And what was left over never felt like enough
Felt hollow
Felt maybe you were never meant to feel like you are important
Or desirable
Or anything for that matter
So the next time you are called pretty
Or something of the kind
You will have mastered the art of acceptance
Will have memorized the routine
Will be able to swallow it down faster
Quicker
Will know how to bury it deep inside of you
Yet still bare a vacant hole underneath all of that skin
You were told at a young age
That there was too much of it
That nobody could ever love thick
That they only want thin
When he tells you that you're body is flower and stem
Is garden
Is beauty
Is something to be admired
You will feel the same kind of longing
You have felt so many times before
A kind of homesickness
For a body that has never quite felt like home
Too many residents have attempted to tear it down
Have set it aflame
Have tried to burn you to the ground
It takes someone who treats you well
To realize how incompetently the rest did
It takes someone with intentions of gold
To realize that the rest were just rust
Flattery may not be a language
That you will ever fully comprehend
But it will always be one that is
Unavoidable
You will learn to nod your head
Learn to agree with a cause you might never truly believe in
Might as well accept the inevitable
So when you are told
That you are beautiful
Do everything in your power
To hide your disbelief
Your skepticism
Your complete disregard towards them
Your inability to understand how anyone could ever possibly love something like you
When you are told
That you are worthy
Do your best
To smile
And make it seem like you already know
Like you have known it
For a very
Long time.

I speak with apology in my voice
Almost every word I say is followed by sorry
And my conversations are often riddled with insecurity
I do not mean remorse
But I was bred from repentance
Mother told me be cautious of my speech
Taught me that speaking my mind
Is not lady like
That profanity
Is not feminine
I learned to replace my ***** with apologies
Muted my voice with shame
Always reluctant to say how I feel
Afraid to withhold
I was told
That the worst word in the english language is no
Engrained this belief so deeply into muscle memory,
That when he took without permission
Refusal didn't even cross my mind
The word no
Never made it through my vocal chords
And out past my lips
When I blamed myself afterwards
It felt more warranted
Than actually accepting the reality
That this
Was not right
I somehow managed though
To place the fault on myself
For his taking
Of what is rightfully mine
I placed the fault on myself
Not for my inability to decline
But for feeling like this was what I deserved
I was raised
How every young girl always has been
In quiet tones and hushed voices
In keeping secrets and asking for forgiveness
I was taught how to please a man
But was barely even familiar with my own anatomy
Knew how to reach male *******
But not my goals
I was taught that women
Are here to satisfy
And that my body
Was made to satisfy
A present to be saved and someday gifted
That pure is synonymous with wanted
That my value was only to be determined
By the number of times I have slept in a bed other than my own
I was raised thinking
That all I could ever be was leftover ash
Nobody ever told me
That I am made of fire
Capable of burning at the touch
I grew up believing
That I was nothing more than a burnt out star
Dust to be picked up and reassembled by whatever man chooses to fix me
I was told
That I should call myself lucky for the saviour
And if I get the chance
I sure as hell better take it
I was trained to believe
That being with someone
Meant that *** is always wanted
I learned how to speak guilt before I learned the word consent
And I am just now learning
That all of this
Is mistake
What we were taught
Is mistake
But I am not a mistake
And there is no room for sorry to follow every question I pose
There are far too many words to get out
And not enough time
For silencing
I have realized
That I
Am meant to be here
And there is no apology
Needed.

My smile is burden with the weight of disappointment
With every let down I have been handed
Envelope folded desolation
I have learned to speak sorrow
With my tongue bended backwards
Trained in speaking a language
I might never fully understand
Sew stitching every reality
Along the corners of my mouth
Wear glasgow happiness
As if it's enough
To trick me out of my insecurities
Help me to believe
That contentment
Is not just temporary
That not everybody who comes into my life
Plans on leaving
But I am too familiar with goodbye
To understand welcome
I am used
To crossing my arms into shield
Knotting my fists into apology
I may never know conversation without sorry
But am attempting
To set my expectations low enough
To able to reach them
Without falling.

I am not a mismatched puzzle waiting to be put back together
There is no point in trying when most of my pieces aren't even there
I am not just some toy
Some mild entertainment that you get to throw aside once you get bored
I am not some science fair project
Some hypothesis in which you decide you want to solve
I can not be solved
I am an equation
A cocktail of antidepressants mixed with the excess of words I have bundled in my head
It is people like you
Who have prompted me to
Put up caution tape inside my heart
And around my body
My body is something I am still learning to love
When you tell me it is good as is
That I am your definition of perfect
That does not make it all better
Does not make me love it any more
Just because you think you can see something I do not
Doesn't mean I want to as well
I do not need to be told that i am beautiful to be okay
I do not want to be told that my scars are beautiful
When they are anything but
My skin has been a battleground too many times to be anything but leftover warfare
Dust and dirt
I do not want to be kissed with love
When these wounds have only shown hatred
It is not romance
It is disaster
I am not blessing
I am unholy mess
I am not a question waiting for your answer
Mental illness is something I never asked for
But I was given it anyway
I do not want you to want to know what its like
To wake up every morning to grey skies
When it is anything but cloudy outside
I do not want you to take any of my baggage
I have had enough practice lifting it with my own two hands
I didnt ask for your help
You can not heal me with touch and words
With roses and sappy ******* love notes
I do not need to be healed
I do not need to be cured
I am not sickness
I am complicated
And this complicated creature
Wants to tell you
That she does not need you
That this crazy *****
Has done just fine
On her own.

You are a kind of comfort
I want to wrap myself in
A type of warmth
That I have never quite known
It is christmas in your arms
There are street lights in my stomach
And I am dancing on pavement
Dimly lit yet glowing
I have never been
So content with feeling small
But I want to be folded into the pocket
Of your favorite winter jacket
And found when shuffling hands search for memory
Admist chilly air and temperature
I know
That California
Does not know cold as well as I do
But if it did
I'm sure
Would want to be under your shelter
I'm certain
If California
Knew you
It would envy
Your warmth.

I want my arms and legs
To know what it's like
To turn into vine
To tangle with yours admist bedsheet and skin
Want my eyes
To know
How to open up
To something other than darkness
Forget getting lost in despair
Have them get lost in yours instead
Want my shoulders
To know how it feels
To twist into something
Other than knot
To melt into smooth
Into comfort
Want my hands
To know
What warmth feels like
When it doesn't burn
Want my body
To know
How to let down its guard
How to mold from armor into flesh
From metal into cells
Back into human
Want my body
To learn to its ability
To hold on
Without fear
Of letting go
And I
Want to be able
To hold on
Without the fear
Of being let go.

I have been trying to stop romanticizing introductions
Attempting to grasp the reality
That not everyone I meet is a potential soulmate
My mind was just born open I guess
Conditioned to want to love at first sight
I am more so addicted to people than I am smoking
I have been trying my hardest
To keep my expectations low
Understand that not everybody has the intention of staying
I have had too many hellos turn into goodbyes
And
Too many hugs turn to leaving
I had been trying
To learn the opposite of welcome
Embrace temporariness with arms as wide as my eaget heart
So when we met
On a directionless sunday
In the living room you were calling home for the week
Know that
It took everything in my power
To not let down my guard
It wasn't until the quiet of the night
That I realized
I had already dropped
Goodnight turned to words to questions
To 3am caress
I was in your arms before I could even stop myself from letting go
But you
Are not the meaningless
One night momentary bliss I am used to
You
Are everything I have tried to avoid
For fear of losing again
I am trying to figure out how it is possible
That you are the kind of thing I'd been attempting to refrain from
Yet exactly what I want at the same time
You are the nicotine from the 5am cigarrette on your last night in town
Your goodbye serving as reminder to everytime I have been let down
But there was more hope in your seven letter goodbye
Than there is in any poem I have ever written
I am saying grace in a language that I still do not fully understand
And although both distance and time
Are two names that usually define ending
I see beginning
I see different
When we kissed
I could taste the promise of future on your lips
My hands spelled out in the creases of your back
Said exactly the same as you did before you left
Said please don't forget me
So please
Don't.

Sometimes it's okay
To say

"The world is too much
For me today
But I will try
Again
Tomorrow."

I have always been terrified of driving
I confided this to you in our second conversation
This city
Has an abundance of bad drivers
And the way the road twists and turns
Makes my stomach do the same
Anxiety takes over my body
And I become a worried wreck
That night in July
I had to drive home late,
Worn from a busy day
You assured me that I would be alright
Called me to make sure I was okay
Talked to me patiently as I made my way home
Your voice calming
Turning my worries into laughter
You told me you would take me anywhere
I could just sit back and relax
That you would love nothing more than to have one hand on the steering wheel
And the other on my thigh
I pictured it
Pictured you next to me
Windows down
Wind blowing through my hair
And your palm on my hot skin
Moving with ease
The thought of it
Almost made me crash
The though of it
Took every ounce of nervous off of my shoulders
And sent me into a spiral of wanting
I wanted you
So terribly
Worse than any anxiety I had ever known
And my biggest fear
Was the thought of you leaving
I used to be scared
Of car accidents and collisions
Terrified of the crash
I am not afraid anymore
I do not hold my breath any longer
I do not tense up
Instead I am calm
I am not afraid anymore
My greatest fear already came true
And it had nothing to do
With losing control of my car
It had to do
With losing you
You left
Just like I feared you would
Just like you said you wouldn't
You left
I am now learning
How to let go
I drive easier
Knowing the worst already happened
I am not afraid anymore.

I don't know how to ask you to leave
When at the same time
I want you to stay.

The second night we spent together
Was in a warm apartment in the city of angels
You, laying on the couch
Windows open letting the summer air in
And I, dancing around the room
With a bottle of maker's mark in hand
Taking swigs with every chuckle
I laughed as I made my way on to your lap
Your arms holding me like you already knew me
We had only been together a week
But every day felt like an added year
You were so familiar
And on the first night we spent together
Our failed attempts to drift off turned into to talking
You leaned close
And asked about my life
We spoke effortlessly as strangers
Just to become less strange
You listened as I relived every moment
Every second feeling infinite
You told me
You never wanted to leave
That you wanted to stay and make home in my body
I would have let you
But the next day you boarded your flight back to New York City
Your eyes promising return
I said goodbye like I always do,
So accustomed to leaving

It has been three months since that day
And sometimes we talk
Your voice sounding the same as it did in my ear
Only now we are separated
By time zones and reality
Our lives both consumed by busy
There is only so much time in the day to miss someone
And I spend almost all of mine missing you
Thinking back to the night you held me like temporary did not exist
Your touch felt permanent ink on my skin
I bet if you looked hard enough
You would find your fingerprints as evidence
There was no caution tape with you
I let down my guard in an instant
And wore vulnerable
You told me
It looked nice on me
I said that you,
Would look nice on me
You are still so far
But one day when you return
We will start again
A new bottle of whiskey
And only future ahead of us
Until then
I will be here waiting patiently
For you
To come back to me.

It is 3am
And I lay in bed
The rain is singing me to sleep once again
Thunder rolling against the summer heat
Lightning blinking against the pale purple walls of my childhood bedroom
I came home yesterday
And tonight
I lay in bed
Listening to the rain
For a moment it stops
And I sense myself restless
I have always found comfort in storm
The sudden halt of it stirs me
The clouds have cleared into empty
And I sit, longing
I want the rain to come back to me like a forgotten lover
Want it to soothe me to sleep like it always does
But I know
That the sky
Isn't going to cry
Because I want it to
I know
That the sky will not be angry
Just because I am
I cannot expect nature
To take on the responsibility of lullaby
Cannot expect the weather
To try and match emotion
I want nothing more
Than to watch the downpour caress my windowsill
Watch the drops race against glass
I want
To hear the music that is torrent
But it is 3am
And I lay in bed
Knowing that the sky isn't going to cry
Because I want it to
Knowing
That things do not occur
Because I want them to
Life just happens
Ignorant of want
And the sky will only cry
When it feels like it.

In the back room of dia’s basement is where i had my first kiss. a halloween party game of spin the bottle or seven minutes in heaven that consisted of 8 or so 13 year olds sitting in a circle and spinning a cellphone. Yes this was how we interacted with the opposite ***. As if we needed excuses to be able to kiss one another. And somehow or the other, it always worked. We would spend our  saturday nights huddled in someone’s basement anxiously turning a piece of plastic or a different object because no one ever seemed to have a bottle on them. But still that night, the night of my first kiss, wasn’t as awful as a
middle school encounter may seem, i remember a bottle being spun, my heart beating out of my chest due to nervousness, i remember how it landed on my 8th grade crush. Butterflies celebrated in my stomach as we stood uncomfortably in that back room, and shared a kiss that lasted about two seconds. But alas it was a kiss. And to an awkward and quiet 13 year old girl, it was like winning the lottery. I had never felt such ecstacy, i remember going home and jumping on my bed, replays of that moment running through my head, that night was the first time in my life that i had ever felt that good. And it amazed me how someone could make you feel so awesome. That night will always be a memory that remains sweet to me, it was perfect, and cliche, and everything that i could’ve wanted to be, it was innocent. It's crazy
to me, how a kiss can make you feel so much, how the touching of ones lips can give you such a rush, its crazy to me how we may never feel as good as we did kissing our middle school crush. I remember every kiss that’s made me feel something. I remember every person that’s made my heart feel bubbly, i will always remember the ones that turned my stomach into a home made out of leaves, hosting butterflies after butterflies and then setting them free, there is no greater feeling, than feeling free. I remember feeling free. I remember the first girl i kissed, i remember the softness of her lips, i remember feeling something that i had never felt before. and then i remember feeling ashamed and confused because what from what i knew, girls weren’t supposed to make me feel the way she did. But she did. She made me question everything i knew before then, she made me wonder if i could ever feel that way again with someone of the opposite gender, the problem with that, is that i was so concerned about gender that i forgot that we were human, and we all have the ability to kiss so who cares if we were both of the same ***? Because when our lips touched for the first time, it felt right. It felt free. And maybe we will never feel the same as we did in 8th grade, maybe its a bad thing that we can no longer rely on a
game to make us feel that way, maybe were too concerned with titles and labels that were missing the point. We should love like two lanky teenagers who have just figured out that braces don’t get stuck together when you kiss. We should listen to our old versions of ourselves and how we felt back then, we should
remember that if two lips touch and butterflies fly free, then that’s what its supposed to be. Were supposed to feel free. So Be free.

I wish I could hate you
It would be much easier
But I don't
In fact
It is the opposite
I cannot wipe you
From my mind
I cannot erase you
From my thoughts
And although
I can pretend that I do
I do not hate you
At all
Not
One
Bit
And that
Is the worst part
Of it.

It's as if
Time didn't want us to be together
Almost as much
As I did.

I don't really know
Where home is
Right now
I'm still searching for a place
To call one
I'm still looking for somebody
To be one
I don't really know
Where home is
But I am determined
To find out.

I know
That I should be over by now
Or at least
That's what people
Keep telling me
But moving on seems
Like an impossible feat
When I am
Still hanging on
To words said
That meant nothing
Hoping that the flame I set inside them
Will somehow not burn out
I am
Rubbing my skin with alcohol
Trying to remove every spot
Of where your lips
Once touched
Attempting to drown my memories
In bitterness
My words are
Too complex
For you to ever comprehend
But that has yet to stop me
From writing them
So I will keep on
Until
I can melt down your place in my mind
I will keep holding on
Until I become a master
In arson.

I think you are absolutely crazy
Crazy in the way that you can't seem to grasp your potential
Crazy in the way that you are blind to every trace of beauty enveloped in your skin
Crazy in the way that you are a full moon visible at all times of the year
Crazy in the way that you make crazy seem like a desirable thing to be
You are crazy
And I love every inch of it
I love the smile that stretches over the lower half of your face
And the laugh that follows its appearance
I think you are a treasure map puzzle
Beautiful in its inability to never be completed
You are pieces that will never be able to match up correctly
For some reason you never seem to understand that you are worth more than the ones you pair yourself with
Guy after guy
Each who is never fully capable of appreciating your worthiness
Guys who throw words at you like daggers in order to bring you down
I wonder sometimes how you are still standing
How after all of these wounds you have managed to stay so tall
You are still tall
He makes you feel small only because he is afraid you will outgrow him
I think it is time you let yourself grow
He does not know your true ability
And if he were to see it
He would not know how to treat you properly
You are a constellation that deserves to be seen at all hours of the night
Not only when he wants you to
You do not need all of the makeup that you paint over your freckled face
I have seen your complexion bare enough times to be able announce its beauty
And you are nothing less than extraordinary
With a body that most would **** to have
I wonder how it is that you could envy those that don't even come close to your kind
You are a sunset
Not the typical orange kind
But the one that is purple with hints of pink in blue in it
You are a sunset
That I would pay to watch over and over again
I have labeled you my best friend
Because I see so much in you
That few are able to
I only pray that someday
You'll be able to see it yourself.

Mother
I see the sadness in your eyes
The uncertainty
The fear of solitude
I saw it the first time I told you I was leaving
Spat out in awkward silence during one of our quiet dinners
I told you that I was leaving
Going across the country
Moving 5,000 miles away
To where the air is always warm
And sun is in abundance
Leaving
To experience real life
For the first time
Mother
You took my haste decision to go
As nothing more than a reason for abandoment
To leave you
Alone
And longing
Just like my father did
But you see
Mother
I am not leaving to spite you
I am not leaving because I no longer need you
I am not leaving in attempt to forget every memory built in the drywall of this home
Mother
I am not leaving
To solely leave you
I am leaving
Because the roots I've planted refuse to grow here
I can not bloom into anything more than weeds and grass in an environment like this
In constantly cold weather
With bitter neighbors
In a town surrounded by people whos only intention
Seems to see you fail
I have failed too many times
To want to give up
I have lost myself on too many occasions
And am just finding out
Who I am
I know that
There is a longing in my heart for ocean
And sand between my toes
I want nothing more
Than to risk everything I have ever known
To be able to see through a different lense
I would rather lose it all
Than condemn myself to a life of unhappiness
Of wondering what could have been
Mother
I have never been one for small towns
And I have lived here long enough to know
That I don't want to come back
Mother
I know that
You're afraid
To be on your own
The typical story is usually about letting your little girl go
But there is no need to
Mother
I want you to hold on
And one day when you've pinned down the demons you've wrestled with for so long
The crippling anxiety that has left you confined to this house
The depression that has kept you prisoner to yourself
One day mother
When you finally overpower fear
And befriend adventure
You will join me
We will replant ourselves
Grow all of the petals we never before could
And become something beautiful
Mother
You have made me who I am
And regardless of where I go
You will always
Follow
Mother
I am leaving
So that one day you can
Too.

I cut myself into pieces for you
So that maybe
I would be easier to swallow
You somehow still managed to choke
On my rough edges
On my bitterness
I am not sweet
Or saccharin
But I refuse to be forgotten
I will stick on your tongue with no remorse
You may have spit me out
Still in pieces
But I will become whole again
Soon enough
And I
Will linger
On your mind
My skin
Will linger
On your hands
And my taste
Will linger
On your tongue.

My depression
Wears a leather jacket
Smokes a cigarette against an alley wall
And asks me to dance with him
His voice is a scratchy mess of desire and impulse
His mouth is fresh of whiskey and regret
He extends a thin pale arm
And asks me to dance
Most times
I decline
Do my best to refuse politely
Even tango with mania instead
As an attempt to avoid him
But there is so much temptation
In darkness
And sometimes
It is hard to tell the difference
Between light and pitch black
Between white noise and screams
My depression
Whispers to me with heavy breath
Calls me baby girl
Tells me
That he can love me so well
Reminds me
That no one else will
Offers me rough hands
Convinces me
That they are the only ones left open
I do my best to resist
But almost always end up giving in
Eventually letting him hold me
Rock me back and forth
His arms feeling more haunted than house, than home
I watch
As he replaces the blue in my eyes with empty
Turns my occupied body into vacancy
He strokes my hair
And in my ear, says unworthy
Paints me ugly
Tells me that I am not pretty
And that nobody will ever want somebody like me
But that he does
So why shouldn't I love him back
Give all of myself completely
I think of all the ways he will treat me
Wonder if he is going to hurt me again
Know that he is
He will wrap my wrists into bleeding when I am lonely
Fill my mind with nightmare when I can't sleep
It is only after saying yes to his proposal
That I realize I do not want any part of this
My depression
Is the hardest lover to break up with
And every time I keep coming back
I always come back
My depression
Is the train I cannot step off of
I am too afraid of letting go
All of the paths intersect together
And the route is bound for destruction
It is unhealthy
To love something so volatile
But the clawing turns into comfort at night
And I do not know
How to sink my nails into something other than skin
My depression
Smokes a cigarette
And I watch the ash fall to the ground
As I fall to the ground
Like a bad habit that is all too familiar
My depression
Is nicotine
My depression
Is alcohol
My depression
Is an addiction
I keep coming back.

Distance
Does not make the heart grown fonder
It rips it out
And swallows it whole.

I'm not a morning person
But I think I could be
If I woke up
Next to you

I make wishes on every eyelash
On each penny thrown into fountains
When the clock turns sticks
I close my eyes
And make another
I am a believer
But mostly
I just take every chance
I can get
Any opportunity
For a wish to come true
My wants
Are not complicated
Simple
Consisting of happiness
Contentedness
Wanting to feel whole
Without needing someone else to fill the gaps
I do not put my wishes into words
Only thoughts
My mind is filled completely
With ideas I've strung together
Hopes I've held on to tightly
I make a wish
Every chance I get
I have never seen a shooting star
But I've had eyelashes fall from my lids
And land on my cheeks
Enough times
To be able
To call it
The same thing
Wishes do not come easy
So I am taking
Every chance
I get.

I am done writing love poems
Done pouring my starving heart into a never ending buffet of possibility
Optimism has never been a specialty of mine
Therefore I can never seem to pinpoint the positives
Or any kind of genuine reality
Only uncertainty
And minor cracks in the foundation
I am skilled in hanging on to breaking rope
With the mindset that it will hold
Too many times have I unknowingly tied my own noose
With over analyzed thoughts
My soul is always eager
To grab at whatever arms shoot out towards me
Justifying the flaws in their grip
With the only alternative being seclusion
I used to avoid solidarity
For fear that isolation was a trap to being made undesirable
I now know this is myth
That being alone does not destroy your chances at finding love
Love is a term that I have never correctly defined
I have spelled it out on countless occasions
Unaware that my definitions were unsound
Romanticising the blatant errors in every episode
Believing that love was supposed to hurt
Engraining it into muscle memory
I have hurled myself towards black holes expecting nothing less than escape
Only to find that everything has an ending
From it all I have learned
That happiness through another can not be created with metaphors
And a sense of hope
That it can only be made with sincerity
Therefore
I am through with writing love poems
Through with throwing sentences at people like lassos
You cannot make someone love you
With words
You can only incite it
So I am done writing love poems
Until I find someone
Willing to write me
A novel.

Addiction is not beautiful
It is nights spent cradling bitter liquid in a glass bottle
Held against your heart like a bible
Scraping the ash out from underneath your fingernails
It is learning how to cover up the parts that you are ashamed of
Scarred skin that shows every war lost with yourself
Finding ways to pull fabric over even your darkest corners
And figuring out how to leave the least visible damage
It is crushed pills making a home in the sides of your nostrils
And holding back your head until the bleeding stops
It is nocturnal nights and sleep filled days
Obsession over every single sober second
Addiction is ruthless
Harrowing
Agonizing
It is something that nobody chooses
And it is anything but
Beautiful.

I wonder
If sleep will ever come easy
Or if every night
For the rest of my life
Will consist of tossing and turning
Of restless body
Of running thoughts
I wonder
If I will ever find peace
In silence
Ever find serenity
In quiet
Wonder
If maybe
The key to curing insomnia
The remedy for my inability to sleep
Lays in the hands of another
In the arms of another
If maybe
Instead of counting sheep
I could count breaths
Count the seconds between our heartbeats
Maybe sleep could come easy
If it came
With love.

I wonder
If you still read my writing
From wherever you are
Secretly hoping
That you're still the center of it
I know
You would much rather do that
Than actually talk to me
Would much rather read my words
Than hear my voice
After all
My name looks much better in poetry
Than it tastes in your mouth
And promises are easier to break
When you don't keep them close
I wonder
If you still think of me
Every night before you sleep
I wonder
If you know
That you're the reason I don't
My insomnia is too hopeful
And memory refuses to let me forget
I wonder
If you think of me
When you're holding her
If you long to know what I feel like
While you touch her
Does she know
That I almost slip off your tongue
Every time you open your mouth to speak
You kiss with confused lips
They are not sure if this
Is what you truly want
You will say her name loud enough
To drown out mine
Practice repeating I love you
Until you can say it with shut eyes
I wonder
If you see me when you close them
I wonder
If I am still in your ear
From conversation miles away
Maybe it was the bad connection
That made me want more
But you
You are still in my head
I planted you too deep and
Now I don't know how to dig you out
Rooted you in the trust I never knew
Pretended like it was something
I was used to having
I could have buried myself in it
But there is none left
And I am trying to figure out
How you are still growing without it
Still molding into optimism in my mind
I want to believe you'll come back for me
I know
That you stopped calling
For a reason
But a part of me is still believing
That it's only temporary
The only permanent thing you gave me
Was false intention
That I will use to twist into material
Into something I will write with
And I will continue to write
I can only wonder
If you
Will keep reading.

I spill out the contents of my heart
Every time I flip to a new page in a notebook
I am forced to face my demons
Cut them carefully in half
Let them pour out
Then clean up the blood and guts I've left behind
And the mess I've made
Always turns out to be prettier
Than the process it took to get there
I turn the sting of open wound relatable
My bruises ring purple and black
And I let people touch them
Let them poke at the ugly
So that maybe they can find comfort in knowing
That they aren't theirs
Pain is so attractive
When it isn't yours to wear
When you don't have to carry it around all day on your back
And then tuck it into the same bed as you
It is difficult to drift off at night
When your pain speaks lullabies into your ear
It is impossible to sleep
When your pain wakes you up every five minutes
To remind you of its existence
It is routine
To go through the day and break off parts of it
Hand them to people
So they can find solace
In trying something they'll never know well enough to hate
The salt of it only tastes good for so long
And after a while
It begins to sit uncomfortably
It is so easy
To admire broken teeth
When they aren't in your mouth
So easy
To find scars beautiful
When they aren't on your body
I have gotten used to putting my distress on display
I am used to it bearing it with ease
And my body has become a ******* number 5
For everyone to awe at
The disaster and mess is striking
When it isn't yours to have to put back together
But the appeal is only temporary
And my hands are raw from the cleansing
There is still so much stitching to be done
To keep myself from falling apart completely
I am taking caution
When it comes to opening up
Holding the binding of book by its thread
I am too terrified by the inevitability
Of losing
To spill
Any more
So I am done pouring out
Until I find someone
Who can love me
Empty.

I swear to whatever god there is
Out there
That when you touch me
Light is emitted

When your skin
Just barely grazes
My skin
I swear I can almost see
The air particles kiss

When I wrap myself
Around your body
I can hear the silence whispering
About us

I can hear them speaking
Saying softly
how beautiful
Incandescence is
In the human form.

Tonight
Is the first time I find myself feeling homesick
Feeling maybe I am not meant to be here
In this stretched out city that I have not yet learned to navigate
Feeling maybe these bright lights are too much to bare
Maybe it's the way the car I sat passenger in
Smelled of mommy's menthol
Maybe it's the way I have never missed the scent of newports until today
I am not one to turn back
After all i hated the cold
Hated the way the sky never seemed to come out from grey
And sun became such a commodity
That we'd sell ourselves just for the chance to see it
But a part of me misses rain
Misses the thunderstorms and lightning that would soothe me to sleep
Maybe I'm just weird in that way
Most wouldn't crave disaster like that
But I'm accustomed to ****** weather
I was raised on snow storms and below zero temperatures
Maybe this sunshine
And warm sand
Blue ocean
Is too good for my cold bred soul
I have always said that this is where i belonged
Where I am meant to be
What if we're not meant to be anywhere
That maybe we just are
Maybe we're just here because theres nowhere else to go
California
I have spent years writing love letters to you
Awaiting the day when we would be reunited indefinitely
I have always been one to romanticize
But maybe I built you up too high to be able to reach you
I hope we can be on the same level someday
I hope you can welcome me as much my heart welcomed you
Praised your beaches and mountains
Wanted nothing more than to learn every part of you
California
You have always been the center of my earth
Maybe always will be
I do not know you enough yet to say for sure
Have only tasted certain parts
Most of which were sweet
I am devoted to trying it all
I might never know
Where my place is
But California
It is an honor
To get to know you.

My days
Would be so much better
If they ended
In your arms.

Do not get yourself into trouble
I have been told this too many times before
Warned that my clothing
Or lack of
Is enough to justify another person's actions
What I have been told by my mother
What she means
In much simpler words
Is
Don't get *****

My mother's concern is understood
I am 5'1 and do not breathe fire out of my mouth as I would wish to
I am not a master in the art of
Self defense
Only sarcasm
And making myself look pretty enough
To catch the wandering eyes of men
But neither of these
Are invitations
To my body

What my mother is saying
When she says don't get yourself into risky situations
Is don't drink
Because if you do
It then becomes your fault
As if the increase of alcohol
In my blood
Makes me more responsible
For another mans decisions to take what is rightfully mine

What my mother is saying
Is that it is okay to look good
But not good enough
For someone to want you that way
How do i tell her
That ****
Is not about what you look like
Or what you wear
That it is solely
About power

My mother tells me to cover up
Implying that ****
Has something to do with
The appearance of my *******
Or curviness of my hips
Tell me mother
If this is true
Why do millions of girls worldwide
Who are covered head to toe
Get ***** daily
How is it that
They can be fully clothed
Yet still stripped of their dignity
Constantly

To me
The worst part is
That we teach women how to protect
More often
Than we teach men to not touch
Do you know mother
How dangerous it is
To give out these warnings
As a disclaimer

It is a dangerous thing
To play games with blame
Politicians do
A good enough job of it already
Therefore
We do not need our own mothers
To do so as well

What we need
Is for our mothers
To tell their sons
About
Boundaries
And teach them
That consent
Is not written
Into the lines
Of shown skin
On a woman's body

What we need mother
Is to stop the defense
Of actions that have no predecessor
What we truly need
Is to stop telling our daughters
That they are responsible
For preventing the doings
Of someone who was never taught
That no means no.

There will be times
When your touch is not enough
To wrestle the demons out of me
Times when your hands
Loving in their intention
Will feel foreign
Will feel too similar
To every pair that has hurt me in the past
Will bare resemblance
To every one that has been laid on me
Will remind me of every bad memory I had planned on forgetting
So many times before
There will be times
When your touch is too much
And the amount of affection
Will be far too warranted
For what I feel deserve
Will feel overwhelming
Will feel blanket on heatwave blood
Feel like more than my worth
Worth more time than what I merit
There will be times
When you will have to practice holding me
Rehearse me into routine
Remind me that safety lives in your arms
In your gentle grip
In your palms resting backbone
Calming shoulders speaking comfort
I am still learning to be still
Still learning to not flinch
At a man's touch
But my skin craves to be loved
Almost as much as my heart does
And trust
Is something I am just starting to give out
So in regards to me
And the way you approach my body
Please proceed
With caution.

My fear of heights
Often overpowers my fear of isolation
So I fall
Closed eyes and full optimism
Open arms and empty handed
I jump
Before I even can see the ground
Sometimes
I don't even take precaution
Deploy parachute far too late
And leave no time for regret
I have always said
That I would rather dive deep end
And hit bottom
Than stay shallow
Would rather crack my limbs against pavement
Than stay entire on grass
I want to learn how to bleed
I want to learn how to break
Just so I can figure out
How to put myself back together
I am willing to shatter clumsily
Split carelessly
Just to know grace
So I will fall
Regardless if this ends in canopy
Or in bungee chord tied noose
Will give all of me
Even if I get nothing in return
Will wring myself vacant
Just so that someone else can be gorged
I have been climbing mountains
With the sole intention of looking up
I say
I am closer to the sky that way
And if I fall
It will be
With complacency
It will be
By choice.

I can still smell
Your smoke stained skin
She asks me why
I have a pack of cigarettes underneath my bed
A small box of short marlborro reds
I am not a smoker
Instead
I like the scent of them
She says
It's strange that I do
But I do
I will sometimes open a pack
And Inhale
Breath in
Just to remind me of you
And my 15 year old self
Who I was back then
Back when I believed that love was supposed to hurt
Sometimes
I get the urge to light one up just to put it out on my skin
In order to remind me what it felt like to love you
I do not smoke
Yet sometimes the memory of you
Makes me want to until I suffocate
Makes me want to form an addiction
Start a relationship with nicotine
Just to remind me
How it felt
To be addicted to you
People say cigarettes are dangerous
But you are poison in the raw form
I used to hold my breath around smokers
But now
I take it in
Keeping my lungs wide open
And my heart
Sealed
Shut.

My mouth tastes of whiskey
When it should really taste of you.

When Blake wrote his words
And colored them into image
Do you think he knew
That hundreds of years later
We would still be reading them
Do you think he knew
Centuries forward
We would still be singing his songs of innocence
And experience
I wonder
If our curiousity about his work
Pleases him
Or if maybe
He rolls in his grave
Sick of hearing his own art
On replay
Maybe he is laughing
Because we are trying
Too hard
Over-analyzing
Too much
I wonder
If he ever imagined
His poetry would live on for so long
Still continue breathe
Long after he stopped
I wonder
If he knew
It would remain alive
Even when he was not
I wonder
If any of the greats
Knew just how great they really were

Did Shakespeare understand
The potential in his pen
In his ability
To turn blood into ink
Did he know
How many decades could live
In just one short sonnet
And that one single story
Could become universal
Maybe he too
Is puzzled by our wondering
Maybe he didn't think
As much as we do
Maybe
He just did
Without thought
I often question
If we question too much
If we twist simple into complex
Make things more complicated
Than needed
All too often

If every writer
Who wrote our stories
Knew how much
We would become them
I wonder
If they would have written them
In the first place

I would like to think
They would
That they knew
Of the beauty
In challenge
That they wrote
With reader in mind
And the hope
That you
Will find it.

Some days
I am a mess
Consisting of red lipstick
And nicotine teeth
Of black dress
Drenched in whiskey
Alcohol fallen from shaking hands
Crumpled white bedsheets that
Barely cover skin
Not knowing how to keep anything warm
Only knowing
How to look good against glow from morning sun
Sometimes
I am disarray
Most times
I am out of place
And even further out of body
But I
Am not looking to be cleaned up
I do not want someone
Who finds my disaster pretty
When it is anything but
I do not need someone
To try and mend something
That was broken to begin with
That has always been chaos
I am
Perfectly content
With the clutter
And I
Do not need
Fixing.

I still look for you
Everywhere
I am looking for myself
Too.

There have been mornings
Where I have awoke in my bed
Unable to recall any semblance of how I got there
Yet so incredibly relieved that I did
That somehow I had made it home
In one piece
I consider myself agnostic
Yet some nights I found myself thanking god
That i managed to make it out alive
Too many times have I been a passenger
To drivers with weary minds
I still feel guilty knowing
That it's the one thing my father told me to never do
That my life could be ruined
By just being in that car
But more than once
I have found myself shotgun
Next to friends with more alcohol than water in their blood
How I am here today
I do not know
I do know
That my past would prove
That I don't deserve to be
I have made countless haste decisions
Been thrown in the bullseye of bad situations
Played russian roulette with beer bottles and pain meds
I have put my life on the line for the sole purpose of momentary excitement
Pushed myself just far enough over the edge to feel the thrill
But not far enough
To fall off
I have come so close
To falling off
And somehow I am still here
Somehow
I have cheated my way out
I have found loopholes in the same rope that so many others get caught in
What I have learned from this all
Is that most things happen
Without a reason
Therefore I will call it
Luck.

2 days
It took two days for me to fall
And far I have fallen

See I've always been careful
Watching every step to make sure I don't walk along a crack
I'm superstitious in that way I guess
I've always been one
To keep my hands out in front of me
So that when I do trip
I can catch myself
Hands over my heart
I do not do trust falls
Do not let myself lean backwards into just any pair of arms
Do not have enough faith in humanity to do so
But every now and then
I let my guard down
Do not mean to
But I do
Security is hard enough as is
Keeping unwanted palms off my body is a kind of routine I have come to know well
Putting up a barbed wire fence along the circumference of my skin
I have been touched too many times without consent
Without invitation
I have learned to flinch at a man's touch
I have been conditioned to stand stiff
To stay still
So
When I finally let myself go
Let my arms fall to my sides
Close my eyes and descend,
I hope for the best
Know that I do not do this often
Do not do this lightly
Do not melt with ease
My bones are not made of wax
My limbs are not candle sticks
Instead
They are iron
Titanium built
So when I get weak in the knees
Know that it is a rarity
That vulnerability is not a strength of mine
Baring my soul
Is the most naked I could possibly be
The thing about me
Is that
I have an addictive personality
But regardless
Of how much I smoke
I will always find people more addicting than nicotine
I do not usually think things over
I am more impulsive than anything else
But know that you are an impulse
That I would be happy to wake up next to
Know that you are not one of my spur of the moment tattoos
I will not regret you in the morning
See
I am trying
So hard
To let my parachute open up
Trying so hard
To float down gently,
Not worry about whether or not someone will catch me
But I am still holding on
Just in case
I hit the ground

I am willing to take risk.

There is so much blue
In my life
It is the color
That I cannot stop seeing
It is in my eyes
It is everywhere
Blue
When you left
It was out of it
Blue
I panic, forget to breathe
And almost turn it
Blue
My veins scream it
But I still bleed red
Blue
My skin from his hands
I cannot shake them off of me
Blue
There is so much
I want to drown in it
The ocean
Looks especially blue today
And so does my heart
I did not know
That color could be felt
But I feel it
All over
It is blue
All over
And nobody can see it
But me.

There are bits of poetry
And parts of lyrics
That slip out passed my lips
Every time I open them
There is so much beauty in voice
In language and in speaking
But there is also a magic in silence
In the up and down of chest to lungs
Air is the melody we all know how to hum to
My breath is the sound of crickets chirping
Even with my mouth closed I am singing
My pulse beats with a purpose
To remind me of the rhythm that is engrained deep within
My hands are always moving
Fingers never still
They are tapping to a song
That nobody else can hear
There is no stopping the music-
It is alive in me.

I am still waiting
To be able to make it through the day
Without thinking of you
Once.

You are the poem
I have been writing for years
I do not know
The ending.