Of all things unknown,
easily a non-denumerable infinity, very little will drive a person to the precipice of madness like the insignificance of a statistic - say one in seven billion,
a statistic that unhinges the mind, dragging out primitive insanity, catalyzed by spurned desire,
an insanity that is raw-
raw and sick and hungry-
feeding upon itself like an epidemic, an acid that reduces one's existence to a longing for a hypnopompic eternity, some twisted fascination that becomes an elegy for the ******, one where the past with holds the future, laughing at the heart's bipolar fluctuation between absolute paralysis and pure agony, a grey stillness to a light switch flipped off and on and off and on and off and on and off and on and aren't you tired yet? Are you not chilled by truth's cold whisper, shaken awake by logic's steel grip?  
It is a rare prison we build for ourselves-
trapped between what we know and what we wish,
these non-existent walls of unrequited everything,
where melancholia acts as our shackles and we sit in complete silence,
content in our discontent,
because we know,
we know that escape is intangible
when you are both jailer and
captive.

I do not claim to know much
Though I'm told each day is a lesson
Yet every hour seems
To layer question upon question
I find it sadly strange
That by a truce I'm worn thin
My heart finds itself confused
With nothing left to win
That night I walked away
One thing I should have said-
You were nothing more
Than a warm body in my bed
Maybe then I wouldn’t
Have to watch your hands entwine
With the silk palms of another
While I stare emptily at mine.

We lived in an abattoir
On the edge of our abandoned world
Come darkness we would draw
Into cages made of pearl

We swam in blood of beasts
And of each other we ate
Each night, a divine feast
Your heart upon my plate

Though we lived in death
Our appetite would claw
For the other's fervid breath
Within the abattoir

the only thing that kept us together was rock n roll
but lou reed died today
and now we are that much more alone

I carry you like a badge of dishonor.
You rest on the left side of my chest, fastened to my skin, causing me to bleed. My scarlet letter of wrong. I am avoided by the parenthetical deeds of day. I am oppressed by the dense solitude of night. A crowd is nothing more than an overgrown forest. Silence. There is only silence. Once there was laughter and arms and warmth to call home, though now I cannot keep my eyes high enough to search for a wandering smile. I grew a new pair of bones in your absence. They are brittle. They need to strengthen. They keep breaking. I tried hope to calcify them, I tried love to mend them, I tried tears to set them. 
I am still crippled. 
Each time I stand, trembling, the sky shakes and the earth moves and I fall, again and again and again until I am looking up from the mud in the ground. I cannot open my mouth to question or cry out. I endure. I lie until I am entwined with the path itself, until feet cannot distinguish between dirt and flesh. I watch you fly. I try to accept the ache of emptiness. 
I cannot.

my ghost, my ghost
my darling ghost
tonight, like most
leaves only sorrow in the sepulchral depths
of these quiet sheets
my heart, my heart
my foolish heart
will stop, then start
no matter how much I despise the sound
of those steady beats
my one, my one
my only one
like winter's sun
slides deeper behind the clouds above
-i must release
my hope, my hope
my endless hope
cannot fade, though forced away
for your peace
my ache, my ache
my lovely ache
i cling to with a child's fearful grip
unable to let go
my ghost of hope, my aching heart
my only one
you have shown me who i must become
and for you it will be so.

How I wish that my eyes shone
Like a garden of delight
Free of time I've spent alone
And every stagnant night

There are times when I am she
Though such perfection tends to fade
Know that I cannot always be
This woman I have made

You remind me
(twice daily)
of your existence
As you ride low on your
motorcycle
               Problem Child
Wild in our street
Exhaust clouded lungs
choking me (up)
Memories collect
in my wrecked collar bones
Little pools of oil,
where you used to park those
dead lips


                                Silence


has never been so deafening
I loved thy neighbor
but faith is no substitute
for fuel
I am broken down
My rusted engine heart
refuses to turn over
But yours, yours
seems to be running
fine

We are the wretched broke down souls
Running through the boulevards
Though the warning bells do toll
We are hunted by our cards
Unfairly dealt, but the game is done
It is never us who won
We know who we are
Our eyes of shattered glass
The asylum is never far
And neither is our past
But still we sprint until collapse
Little pieces, found and captured.
Our minds have veered off the map-
Us of the mutual psychotic rapture

They said this year, Saturn
will leave my house
In retrograde
Trailing jade silk amongst
the black trees
But still, it snows
and still, I ride
On this ghost train
to the coldest hell
Couldn’t you have left a star
to gaze upon?
While my lips drip ice
and my eyes stay
open
To see the mess you
made
For me to clean in
darkness

O nightshade! My enemy!
Tempted by chronic ennui
The day's control has dissipated
And the slender body created
Comes in waves of illusion

A cavity of emptiness bites
The mind lies and fights
Diagnosed, and very often
Do not let the form soften
The rules of hunger

It was raining and it was morning.
They sat in the car underneath a tree, upon a hill, overlooking the vast cemetery below.  Clichès still have the potential to be beautiful, they know. Intellectual awareness allows for understood symbolism, the death of that which dies at a cemetery, the emotional downpour demarcated by rain, the interstitial distance of looking forward and down.
Silence and language working symbiotically as a stratagem to both hide and reveal vulnerability.  The clichè of their location works with the conversation.
He is sad. She knows.
She knows the emotional location he lives within, she purposefully disregarded his eyes, those eyes that have always stared at her from the mirror, her eyes. The eyes of those with hollow love for themselves. The selfishness of selflessness, the facticity of unfortunate neurological tendencies, the self-imposed limitations.
They speak. He speaks.
She hears him speak, she who is devoid of empathy, she reaches empathy through his words, she hears the thesis of her own thoughts, she cries. She cries because he narrates her perception of herself, through narrating his perception of himself, and she knows the meaning of it.
He cries because it is his.
He looks away.
He says I don't want you to know the things about me. The things that are disgusting.
She loves those things. It's not enough. She knows.
She talks to herself, she talks to him.
She takes his hand, they cling to the ephemeral union.
It stops raining.
They walk into the chapel, the ashes of those who lived resting upon glass bookshelves, behind glass cases. They sit upon a couch in silence. They collapse, against each other.
Two women observe the marble of the mausoleum.
They arise. The women are startled. The women didn't see them sitting; they were three feet away.
He takes her home. They fade into wordlessness during the drive. They look at each other with desperation at a stop sign.
She says goodbye. She walks away.
They walk away.

It seemed like a good idea at the time
Clear liquid with a scorpion, asleep
At the bottom of the bottle
But oh how those feelings creep
Up, blurred and spun
As people turn to ghosts
And shadows start to run
Towards the music, loud, so loud
And I lose faith in my feet
Swept up in the crowd
Mouths and bodies meet
And sweat drips down, down
My neck and I’m dizzy and twisting
By the records, by the fire
And inside I’m not missing
That loss of desire
For once, a mental break
The one-night vacation
I needed to take

once again, I am seasick
over the railing (but never into the wind)
twisting and heaving
all because you were leaving, away away
back to the land and light of day
which i have none of, only one of
forever is lonely
like the line that separates the ocean and sky
here I am
seasick, once again

I used to drive my nails into
Your skin, some type of ******
Crucifixion
They say pain before pleasure
But I know that aches
Are often felt months later
When paradise has become
Past tense
Like the scars on your back
Fading

I have reached the point where
the imprint of my body stains the couch
Refrigerator and shower find common ground
in their abandon
The last time I opened my door was
three days ago, maybe four
Dust swims in one shaft of light
That ******* crack that sneaks
through every shaded window
I would ask for help
but the only person that could
won't

Predictable, like an afternoon breeze
Gently touching the hazy sky
This heaviness in my heart grows
I need more, some insatiable thirst
For a drink not yet known
No matter the happiness I have
Nor the possessions I hold
I am not satisfied, and I know
Deep down in my broken soul
That I will die without tasting
Serenity

The owner bites the dog, I bit myself
I think
I ate my leash
My psychological hand pulls the chain
from my stomach, leading me into the kitchen where
You are making coffee

I wake up in the morning
and curse you
that bed, that old vessel of human broth
I make it
Repackaged, like new,
let’s consume from within –
Crisis averted

Last night I dreamt of islands
chasing me
And I was afraid
because I had deserted them

You
Pour me a cup of coffee
I accept
offering you a smile, but
no gratitude, or hope
While my mind gnaws
at the memory
of love.

I miss you
Like the secrets I whispered deeply
Into my pillowcase
Just before the house caught fire
Those evening tales, lost
With the photographs hidden beneath a loose floorboard
Paper and ink curling into nothing
But lightly falling ash
Kissing me softly as I watch from the street
Until the embers cease to glow
And morning light reveals me
-A silent statue of grey

In the town's square I sit as a fool
A  steel mask upon my head with ears of a rabbit
Robbing my sight of whom approaches this stool
Their weapon- a stone, as is the lottery's habit

I hear not the assailants, though their strikes hit true
Eyes closed, eyes open, the view is the same
In the weakness of pain, I cry out for you
The very one who enabled this display of shame

The blows come harder, the silence grows loud
Through blood I beg for mercy, no more can I bear
Until phantom hands release me of this shroud
Dazed as I gaze upon a deserted square


No stones, no blood, no mob I see
There is not a soul but me

They say
It all will be okay-you're beautiful
As if those words can draw the line
Between bravery and slavery
And clear my back of scars
Left by the lash of sacrifice.
Every choice I have made
Has been a step away
From love, from freedom, from home.
For in this maze of concrete and steel
I must be alone, and always composed -
There is always someone watching
So I keep a steel rod in my spine
And walk towards the end of the city
Pretending I cannot feel passer-bys stare
Sizing me up
Feigning deafness to the murmurs of my pronounced bones and sharp features
All I am is a hanger for clothes
A display, a game, a gamble
They want it to pay off
So they tell me it will all be okay
Because I am beautiful

It's a sweltering night, a sweltering morning really, and my body is tattooed with spider bite kisses and bruises.  I smell of park grass and chlorine and someone else's sweat, my lips are chapped, swollen, my eyes encircled in crimson undertones.  The people on the street stare- I am blonde, a dead give away, slighter and taller than the locals.  Men are confused, women are scornful, police are helpless.  My legs cramp with the dawn as I walk back to the apartment in my hospital-gown green tunic, sobbing openly, hair tangled with twigs and dirt.  It's still dark enough for that, but too quiet.  A milkman stops his work to look up at me and whisper ciao in the most kind and gentle voice I have ever heard, especially here, and I want to throw myself into his arms and sleep and scar his white uniform with the black stains of my tears, though I restrain myself and nod, shuffling forward, shoulders slumped, no eye contact, his gaze a hand stroking my back like the father I never had but always wished for, and I cannot help but cry harder, though I try harder to restrict each sob until I sound as though I'm gasping for air, but I would rather seem asthmatic than week, rather be strange than pitiful.  It is always better to be unknowable, much more simple than openly vulnerable in my experience, though my experiences are drunken from the bottom dredges of a half empty glass, so truly I do not know if this is true, and and every day I understand Hamlet's letter to Ophelia just a bit more, because every day I doubt truth to be a liar just a bit more.

Still, there are some things I know, enough to be called intelligente by a man named Simone, whose eyes shone with solare during the day, but at night became dark and hungry.  I know now why my friend chose to fly off a building in Spain without his wings.  There is a disconnection abroad, no sense of security or protection, demons are awakened and restless, dreams colder, and more cruel; the heat drains one's essence, melting the glue that keeps us who are broken together.  I know that expectations are sad reflections of desires, shadows of my own inadequacies.  I know that I am afraid, that heaven and hell are not places but permanent conditions, that my head is the prison guard of my heart.  Blame and guilt come easily.  There are no distractions, just meaningless directions, and I seem to have forgotten those I brought from home. Here, I am concerned with physical threats, trauma that can be shaken off with a block's worth of strides, yet I cannot seem to lose my naked shadow between the buildings.  I thought I hid it well behind frozen gazes, but the mirrors say, no, no, they know you are all wrong, you foolish girl, you poor little lie, they see through you, they sense your fear and feast upon it, you ignorant child, you are as small as the motes of dust drifting through the beam of a forgotten projector, the film torn and tangled, the screen stuck on one frame

I should have stopped when the milkman spoke. He knows that it is not mirrors who lie, it is us.

the window of your house
is like a television screen
for those nighttime walkers
they gather around
faces pressed against the glass
trying to catch the scent
of us
when our show ends
i will be like them
so hungry for you

Torn from the wallet of the eye- a tear
Shunned for coming as it come
The cathartic shame of soulful slum
A derelict ship of the fleet of composure
A captive buys casket, but what of enclosure?

We fall to the silence of fear
Pile it high and bury it low
Yet still these mice of woes do flow
Over marble pages of black and white
Confirming the captain slipped away in the night

I buried a suitcase in the sand,
It's contents to remain unknown.
Although I wish to understand
These are best if left alone:

The interactions of two
Within a circle of three,
The meaning of You
Of I and of Me.

The silence that’s found
At the sun’s first breath,
A man that has drowned
Yet experienced no death.

The alignment of power
On painted lips,
The deadliest flower-
A rose with a whip.

The interstice between
Ribs and their cages,
Guardians without wings
And the gentlest rages.

Where land touches sea-
A transient mirror,
It seemed fitting for me
To bury it here.

The teenagers of the bayou look down to their pocket God, summoning validation through divine vibrations;
heads bowed they pray for the prey, for the sensations of meaning, refreshed each second,
filed and cast aside,
except on thursdays, or maybe fridays ‒
for these are the sacred days reserved for nostalgia, for last weekend’s cigarette taste,
for those cheap-gin glances, lacerated by and filtered through the teeth of crocodile tears,
for the lovesick night sweats and the mouth of another, for the break from chronic ennui,
all captured in thirty-three unearthly flashes;
The teenagers of the bayou look up from their pocket God and stretch their aching fingers upwards,
exhausted, habituated, unquestioning
of the heaviness of such emptiness
within
their starving hearts

Even in the darkness, the white teeth of the hill continue to smile
Ivy crawls up a pale house, wrapping around the words repeated with purpose, captured, then abandoned
Men who died a thousand different deaths flit between the lights of a cerulean pool,
Their lovers and wives and mistresses arrange themselves on iron deck chairs, one leg bent, lips curled up at some sweet secret-
How lovely they are behind cat-eyed glasses, calling out for their darlings with a velveteen song.

It is good to live here, in the eternal summer of one's heart, where moments are dispersed pre-wrapped in the golden threads of a beloved memory.
I dangle my legs in the water and try not to fear having little left to want, for every breath of wind is a delight, and every fruit tastes of innocence, and the sun shines for he and I alone.
We sit side by side in a warm silence, and the white teeth of the hill above us continue to smile.

this happiness possesses the fragility of
freshly painted walls, so easily marred
by an accidental shoulder brush, exposing
the dingy grey beneath, once white, like the balloons
we hung outside the house when we moved in,
but they fell, at the leisure of the wasted breath
I filled them with, though now, now it is just the stone
floors and I, and a silence that is not quite a silence,
more so the whispers of a church,
or the sound that a cloud makes as it drifts away,
there and then gone, without warning,
a glass figurine propped against a doorstop-
one hard push and it will crumble into glacial shards,
crystalline dust that I will piece back together, even though
the scars will always be visible, and that is fine,  wonderful even,
because it is so beautifully human, and
because perfection is a plateau, and
I would rather climb a ladder of rotten wood
because each rung unbroken is a step up, and
because I love the way my heart jumps anxiously
against my rib cage whenever I stop to look down.

In this house
Where the walls exhale softly
And the bed does my sleeping
Like the door does my leaving
Where the rain is my beating heart
And the roof does my weeping
I am little more than a fixture-
Collecting dust, a glass figurine
In this house

I am somewhere, maybe everywhere, but mostly nowhere.
Home is fictional; I am drifting in this city of strangers. Another night without rest, a candle burning, a boy crying, blood on the kitchen floor. I tried to buy cigarettes but my account decided it was empty. From the window on the fourth floor across the street, it might seem that I live a lavish life. I stay in Tribeca- I  even have an elevator. When I go out, I dress well. Beautiful people surround me and usually drinks are free. Sometimes they buy me breakfast or coffee or give me a place to stay. My weekends are often spent in East Hampton, in a three house lot that serves as a sanctuary. I go to nice places for dinner. I am not the one paying. I buy this with my silence, a silver tongue that keeps quiet when food and water are scarce. It's okay, it has to be, that's what I tell everyone who asks for help. How can I ease their wounds when mine are gaping, when I feel sick and weak and lost? I pay them with compassion-I give them kindness. I am exhausted.
I don't remember the last time I had money in my pocket or an answer I can stand behind.
This is what I wanted.
I kiss the man next door goodnight. I listen when he is sad. I carry the guilt of the woman I stay with in exchange for a corner to sleep in. My eyes are heavy with concealed bruises. My heart is heavy with the pain of others. My body is light with the heaviness of hunger.
This is what I wanted.
Will someone tell me what to do? Can I dream about a studio with a bookshelf full of my favorite authors and a man beside me each night? Am I weak if I walk away? Do I go back to school after a summer of travel and pretend that I am the same? Can I look love in the eyes and promise purity?
I am somewhere, maybe everywhere, mostly nowhere.
I am suffering quietly. I am proud.
I am absolutely terrified. I am alive.
This is what I wanted.

The greater of two evils is what I seek
Never the moderate, the wise, the weak
I prefer one with a double-edged core
Whose morals wage an unending war

My satisfaction is a sadistic thing
Wanting the one who with holds their being
Give me love and affection and trust
I’ve given up more, just for lust

Though I know of what I should
I'm drawn to the fugitive could
Perhaps it is those of a clipped feather
Who flock to their destruction together

Running wild, I knocked on the door

The hallway defiled, red dripped to the floor

Two bodies piled, one left with more

Lackluster child, forgotten - a bore

Well-mannered and mild, now just a *****

A girl in *******
Agony and rapture found
Through latex and blood

That day, I remember the sun
And dancing shadows beneath
The blue water in which we swam.
But tonight, there is none.
I do not bother with a light
As I fill the bath in darkness,
Knowing that it withholds your reflection.
I submerge,
Hoping to feel you in the ripples of the water,
Hoping to fall into your warmth,
Hoping to enter the world we constructed;
The one where a sated moon hung
Over that bridge, like an unrequited lover
from a tree.
It was there that I crammed each lung
With every passing second,
In order to prevent our last.
I am still holding my breath -
Though my chest cries out in pain
As time gnaws at each rib, starving
For ruin.

my greatest hope
is that, in time,
I will be able to look
Within
for resolution
instead of finding
the tired echo of

                          I do not know

but when
or if
this day will come

                         I do not know
                         I do not know

my palm tree heart holds your initials
and i sway, sway to your calls
an outsider's aperçu is such a pretty lie
behind the rosy haze of waterfalls

People speak to me about the "light at the end of the tunnel."
Some seek to reassure me, others confess their blindness.
I try to believe that the light moves as day and night do-
At times there is only darkness, yet we are assured that the sun will rise each morning.
Centuries have proven such.  Our lives are too small to perceive each blindness as passing.
Still, we put faith in time, in seasons, in dawn, in dusk.  We are the same.
Cyclical beings in a cyclical world with cyclical thoughts.
Know that your darkness is but a night without stars.
And that the sun must rise, a pale light that builds into a separate and most welcome blindness.

I see the darkness of the world
in my reflection
a devil in each iris, fire in each pupil
and every intention
I have had in my possession
has been cruel
has been kind
has been fuel
to burn and bind
and every breath of mine
gives to take
takes to live
lives to ache
for twenty years i have hung upon the stake
asking heaven why my creation
is
Perhaps it is His infatuation
with watching unbuilt castles slide
off cliffs into the sea,
swallowed by the tide
of what I'll never be

I do not count sheep
So little I care for sleep, instead—
Two windows of red
Pressed against glass
As those white cars pass, strange
The limit of domain and range
Die in my mind
But what of the mice,
When the cat plays nice? No bite
To provoke the nightly fight
Against my dreams
Though when I try to wake
For appearances sake, I think
Of what is brave and real, but
I do not wish to feel
Such things

I don’t really know why I’m writing this, except somewhere, to someone, to no one, I owe an explanation.  I also deserve a small rant.  The past two months have stripped me of everything I believed to be true, and all my perceptions have become a gallery of laughing spectators. This whole big thing we call life is absolutely insane and has severely twisted ways of tripping us up and holding us carefully at the same time.  All I can say is that I got a second chance at it, and the blows keep coming harder and harder but all I can do is roll with them, because giving up is not an option any more, and there is beauty underneath all of the suffering, and an exuberance that emerges in survival.  Every day, we are fighting, fighting, fighting to survive.  I’m not the right person to say if it’s worth it or not, or to give advice how to swallow the pills we’re given, or how to show humility, or give forgiveness, or find a little corner of happiness to hold onto when we slip.  But I know there is a reason why I am here, why you are here, and why time runs in circles, and why things happen the way they do.  We are both slaves to destiny and masters of choice.  We have an innate bilateral symmetry that manages to be both.  Someone told me there are no do-overs, but there are don’t-do-agains.  I may not care for this person, or perhaps I love them wholly.  I think it could be both.  When these scraps of wisdom float by, grab them and put them in your core, no matter who says it. It could be an ex, a professor, your mom, a stranger-it doesn’t matter.  They are giving you a gift. Try it all, and if it doesn’t work, move on.  Hurt people and get hurt.  Go out of your way once, and if it doesn’t prove to be in your best interest, walk away.  Do what you want, but don’t destroy yourself getting there.  Just keep walking in the direction you feel is best.  Everything is difficult, and it will always be difficult.  That is why this life is so ******* magnificent.  Each day we can celebrate that we made it.  There is nothing more pure, or more raw, than moving forward and understanding that no matter how hard things are, and how ****** everything looks, if you just keep moving, and don’t look back in order to bring the past with you, it’s not horrible at all.  Each rough patch is just a foothold to climb on to.  We all have to be up to get down, and down to get up.  No matter what choices you’ve made, or the guilt you carry, know that tomorrow you can wake up and check that baggage at the door, and simply walk away with a list of things you can’t do over and things you won’t do again.

bruises come with ease
when you find yourself pressed between
four walls
and concrete falls
over time, in little pieces unseen
despite your pleas
to bring them down
to keep them up
do you think
you are prepared to tread in open sea
with her winter bite
or will you sink
content, at last, to simply be
out of sight

When dark arrives, tears follow
Heaving sobs to a baby’s sigh
It comes so suddenly—
An iron punch to the gut
Until I am doubled over, writhing
And when it finally passes
Delirium ensues
And every object surrounding
Turns a violent violet
So I curl into a ball and shake
Begging for morning
To keep me from mourning
The little girl that wasn’t

1) It puts the peanut butter on its *****
2) Finna meat sum *******
3) Classical conditioner
4) Pavlov ain't russian in the bathroom
5) He would never steak his reputation upon his looks
6) He met his husband on meatgrindr
7) His creepy uncle
8) Pavlov rools dogs drool
9) He was tired of being confused with Sylvia Plath
10) He needed all the leverage he could get on Skinner

she despises december through march
the arch of endless grey
when her body fades to snow, and
the dreaded holidays
come in perpetual flow
unshed rivers, ****** behind
those tired eyes
her velvet voice is rarely heard
truly,
weeks go by without a word
all year she fears
that day of months
afraid this time
she
     will
            dis
                 a
                       ppe

                                  a



            
                                                        r

Like a ruse in a rose
And a bruise beneath clothes
                                                       (Of which I keep hidden)
You, too, are forbidden
For you perpetuate me
Towards wonder, sadly
It flees when you’re gone
Like the most glorious dawn
That can only be known
By birds who have flown
Too close to the sun

You don't know what it is to break
You think that I am made of stone
My home is what you chose to take
Reducing me to skin and bone
My poor child, rich in tears
I am the monster behind your pain
You do not count your golden years
As black and white fortifies your cane
You know nothing of what is true
Nothing of hunger, or rattling breath
Of sidewalk beds and bruises blue
The trembling that induces death
You do not weigh 110 pounds
You have never known fragility
You cannot hear those awful sounds
The silent anguish of instability
Have you ever been forced into the dark?
By hands larger than your waist
It's just a stroll into the park...
Until its blood and torn lace
This is why I must come back
To the home you took away
So doctors can silence each attack
Though who would listen, I cannot say
Ice or stone, whatever I may be
I am broken - there is no me