i.

Experience is subjective, but maybe it's like Jung said--
our collective unconscious shares our pain
even if we don't wish to do so.
Maybe we're not as perceptive to the hive mind in the duration of normality
but sometimes I feel it, I understand it,
the connections in my dreams.
we're an inversion to the universe,
one of many indefinitely,
Observing in our pocket of humanity--
trying to find a reason to be
that doesn't have a clear outward
manifestation.

ii.

I don't believe in purpose,
that's something we made up.
fate and destiny are not at subliminal lines of a universal intention
but what culture wants us to think.

iii.
I'm a cosmic accident, but I don't mind-- even accidents can do good things.

margins are|_________________
home  ­         |________________
to day-        |________________­
dreamy       |_________________
doodles  ­    |_________________
and  ­           |________________
cavalier ­     |________________
corr­ections|________________
or­ some      |________________­
times          |______________­
home          |_____________­__
to my         |_________________
empty   ­     |_________________
word­s        |________________
­and            |_______________­
prettily      |_____________­__
penned      |___________­___
lies.            |_________­_______

Can they read my margins,
see between
the lines
and cut into the edges of
my
conflicted
pages?

                   {I'll never know}

slamming doors still sound
like fired shots
and
loud voices still sound like
grenades--
warfare is something that never quite leaves the mind
it's a trigger pulled rifle or a trigger that pulls me
back into the past
where I am afraid and alone
and where I am held against my will.
shouting rages have a way about them that
feels like broken shards of glass piercing my ear drums or my mentality
and if hands are not anything less than gentle,
I grow cautious and cowardly.
I never quite outgrew the habit of ducking my head
when I hear hateful words and could never quite fathom the idea that the sting of sharp curses could be used jokingly and not with ill intent.
while most people live to fight, I live
to forget my battle wounds...
because it's easier to admit
that I can heal
than it is to admit the bullets to my fragile heart were fatal--
blood isn't the only thing that's bleeding out of me.

This is a portrait of abandoment:
rusty spokes, faulty breaks, and negligent owners.

(I'm still lying on the sidewalk too, waiting for a reason to shift gears.)

i.
I have a bad habit of flirting with thunder and lightening.
but it seems you don't mind, fellow storm.

ii.
You might consider yourself fluid, but what about in the sheets?
They say the largest bodies of liquid are pulled by the moon's magnetism and honey, we are 90 percent water--
I guess that makes us pretty wild. Let's converge.

iii.
Weave me like you weave your words and I swear I'll set us both free.

Red,
Paint me red
The color of our passion, dear heart--
Until I realize you that you painted it
The color of rusty hinges.

Yellow,
Paint me yellow
Because I thought yellow was sunshine
And happy
Or maybe windswept afternoons
For dandelion wishes--
Until I saw that you painted me sickly green pale yellow, the color of hospital rooms and body fluids.

Paint me blue
A soulful sky blue,
I thought that you couldn't go wrong with blue--
But now I'm an indigo mess, very sad
Drowning--blue, I'm blue.

So paint me black
Like hateful ink
Or skies with no sun, no stars,
  I'll be a masterpiece then--
Or maybe I should've realized you're no painter, and I'm not a clean canvas anymore.

Teeth,
grasping at straws,
grasping for words
but I'd rather they grasp
at my flesh--

Hands,
gesturing while speaking
but oh, if they could
make gestures on my form--

and Minds,
thinking deeply,
but do you mind to
let me forget my sins on your skin?

Let me take these little pieces of you,
let us immortalize not in words, but in
feeling.

my wrists still hurt more from your rough hands
pinning me to the floor,
than anything I've ever done to them before.

my head still aches more from screaming,
rather than by an old concussion lingering.

my eyes still cry and leak over,
but I'm not sure why anymore.

But as long as it's don't ask, don't tell,
I'll be fine.

the mind is a vessel swimming in ideas, until the break into reality--waves are receding from the shoreline of thought,
crashing crescendos of melodies
that ached to be heard
And
words that longed to be written
And
memories that once resurfaced--

All gone.

Dreaming is a poet's land and
I ache for eye sight and control and the free flight of my subconscious.

Your mind is an archivist's *******, I'd like to spend an indefinite amount of time there and observe the inner workings
like a astrologist, seeing your constellations of thought...
it also doesn't hurt that your stubbled jawline
seems to speak volumes, and I wonder
if it's chiseled proportions would mind me using them
as braille.
I'd like to know the caverns of your mouth
more intimately--
please whisper prose on my collarbones...
and I don't believe in love at first sight,
but maybe, love at first poem.

Love me for my destruction, for my mayhem --
after all, loving you isn't so much different,
I could have chosen cigarettes, smokey ashtrays over your
smokey eye make-up,
Or maybe alcohol, sip at lukewarm beer, and become embittered by how
your lips are stained elegantly wine,
and then again, I might've had the opportunity to inhale car exhaust
but your breath is much heavier than monoxide
and much more deadly--
turns out nuclear warfare is much more easily attainable by
your explosive needs
for genocide -- you love those broken hearts,
you little radioactive succubus.
Knives, I could have made love to a knife, but I guess your nails served the same purpose, you've left your mark, okay?
I have a target in the shape
of little crescent marks on my back from you and
people keep
staring.
And yes, I could've injected myself with something stronger like morphine, but
you're already running through my ******* veins --
I looked up "infatuation" in the dictionary but the words kept
blurring because all I could see was your blushing expression
when I used my fingertips like paintbrushes
on your cheekbones.

this house is cool and dark,
occupants in the meleé of sleep:
outwards, peaceful;
inwards, facing demons and dark fantasies.

Morning light ushers through glass and open panels, gently probes,
but to no avail....they lay rest in quiet.
I greet her at the window with a tired smile.

we know each other well.

awake, I am.
dreaming, I am not.
but who's to say it isn't an illusion
since no one else can tell me so?

stuck at crossroads. urge to feel and  taste outside air.
Morning and I will leave the quiet residents to sleep in,
and I will run my restless bones
until I know the world once more.

• it was always you-- until relatively recently
• you're not the epitome of romance so you say, but why did you hold me like you want to romance me
• i was sorry if it seemed like i moved on the first few months -- i was never good at being open
• i could've let you help me
• did you like being undefined or did you want something more concrete because i felt as though i was the one with a happy broken heart and you found something perfect for you
•i miss you, always missed you and will miss you if you leave again

She's every thought you ever shunned out of horrid curiosity, every flower that you couldn't bear to pick up because you were unsure if it had thorns, and every book
you've ever wanted to live in
bathe in ink and paper and drown in words
just like I want to drown in her mind
but I can barely skim the surface, barely
penetrate the depths,
and I guess my thoughts aren't heavy enough to carry me to the bottom.
Her fingers are cold and timid -- the way the first snowfall flurries down, unhurried and forlorn -- if they ever traced my skin I'd get more than frostbite, but
chills are okay as long as they stem from a place
that makes goosebumps a sign of anticipation
and not fear --
but I fear the way this makes me feel and I can feel so much already --
it bursts through my ribcage stronger than a heartbeat.
The eyes she has -- I can't tell if they're more full than mine, full of light and rapturing blue, or less full, empty like oblivion, and I just look and think and die and suddenly -- it's like she was never there,
she smiles and looks my way, but it's not a true smile,
not the kind so sweet that it will make your teeth ache,
but the kind of smile that's half-hearted like a shy blossom in spring or a polite stranger in an elevator on your way to a tenth floor cubicle, but ******, I'm not a stranger, --

I'm just trying to find the reason
why all of her "hello"s sound like goodbyes.

it's simple really, nostalgia is buried in a melody
the same way humans are put in coffins--
deliberately heart-wrenching, a science.
an old transistor radio climbs lazily in the background,
buzzing, humming but then hear it--
blank stares as the road carries on, gradually,
slow mascara rivulets kiss cheeks like the intimacy long forgotten only to come rushing back--
songs that we said were ours were never ours to have,
an old familiar lyric that we claimed to spell destiny,
auditory memories that taunt and torture:
the chorus only instigates barbed thorns to lonesome hearts,
major chords aren't happy,
but cause discordance--
clenched fists on the steering wheel, you must pullover--
you can't pause or rewind, you can't stop--
yes, change the channel--
but the music still plays, and the riffs hang in your head,
remembered and reminisced over static--
but nothing is white noise when the final notes linger on your auditory palette,
the taste like the stare of a cold gravestone...

but even colder still,
the empty seat next to you.

Drive me
to the
moon and back
and maybe we can
take a detour around

the big dipper
and get lost in {the}

s         p      a        c           e

between us...

He's concrete and
I'd love to be sidewalk chalk --
wash me away with rain,
but first let me lay a brief mark of my own
on all of his sidewalk cracks and all of his
broken pieces, the little slabs and pebbles that
weathered off from storms -- let me spill drawings there
with neon bright color
that are almost obscene in their hue.

Yes, I know it's temporary, we're temporary,
but maybe that's what makes it so
magnificent.

it's been nine summers since we left last off,
i never wanted to associate anguish with your face
but it hits me that there are certain things
i can never forget,
i cannot forget,
i will not forget,
that you made me,
shaped me in your delicate hands,
wove me under a spell that i have yet to
get out of--
you know you gave my childhood magic.
we lived in a kingdom of treehouse stories
and secret handshakes, our domain behind
white picket fences. we left our child selves
in your yard, remember?
i picked up the pieces of half
drowned memories, and put them by your bedside,
in case you thought to look and perhaps it was presumptuous of me to say you felt the same way
when i am the only one who is overdosed on nostalgia.

i'm sorry.
i am homesick for the arms i am not privileged to
be held with, homesick for the stairs that
creaked in your house, homesick
for a love i never deserved but always wanted.
i'm the old pick up truck your father threw away,
the ramshackle closet that got replaced,
the old curtains, oh god, oh, but this
is not about me,
this is about us.

we both agreed that we always hated the small town life
and planned to run away
but why is it now that i'm still holding onto spider webs
and your packed suitcase has flown you across the globe?
is it sad to say that in my dreams
we're still waiting in an empty parking lot,
and your head resting on my shoulder, the lights on the pavement,
it's already over, it already passed and the cars aren't there,
and the moment is gone.

maybe it's not the saddest thing in the world
to lose your best friend when the love
was never meant to be,
and maybe it's not the saddest thing to love
someone who will never love you as a lover,
maybe it's not the saddest thing to lose
someone who promised forever, even
if forever was only until we parted ways,
maybe it's not the saddest thing to lose
the first true friend you ever had,
maybe it's not the saddest thing to
never be able to walk up your front porch and have you come running
out to see me of all people,
but
it is the most painful happiness to see your smile
and knowing that i am not the reason.

around you, I'm all ellipses. My sentences still make it through though. And my teeth are no longer fragile because I have let many of my secrets out when they threaten to spill over like tea time at noon. I was never an expert at lock jaw but it came as a surprise to find that I am still unlocked around you. There is a certainty now my gullible mouth won't break under the pressure of my past.

I am still trying to break down yours without a battle cry.

we build our characters. your body is "ex lovers, bruises and barriers." your hands are "loose change, determination, extra joints, destruction and creation." your eyes are "newly copper pennies and the season of spring" . I still don't know what I am somedays.

Outside: it is scary, mean and cruel,
but don't worry,

this is a safe place.

Outside: it can hurt, and bite, and fool,
but don't mind it because

this is a safe place.

under covers and warmth, you want to erase my nightmares for a while. let us kiss away fears.  take my demons. hide our bodies and whispered sweet nothings
dwell in this fort of blankets and sheets,
since

this is a safe place.

Bury our love here, let this be not a graveyard, but a garden to remember, a haven of our romance,
don't cry,
don't fret,

you're safe, this is a safe place.

we are the raging portrait of lust, tangled in a mess of sensation, kaleidoscope of color and melodies of sanction--
we hum with ancient urges and vibrations.

fingers and hard planes, bodies like constellations, lips that are stained in stardust--
flying comets, gravity is our force.
we can't deny physics, we can't change our course.

worship, cherish, release. over and over. til i hear nothing but your name emanating from my throat, enthralled.

darling, love is luminescent
and we are its very stars.

When I see you fall asleep,
closed eyes, expressionless face, sprawled form,  I hold my breath until I see you breathe again-- it's true my heart doesn't beat 'til you inhale. you are the most handsome face of death, asleep. I'm afraid if I try to wake you, you won't wake up. and even more afraid that when you're sleeping, you're not really asleep at all.

2. Your hands are not cadavers,
and I know this fact because they are torn and callused. funeral hands are pretty and funeral faces are powdered. make up is not an art for post-mortem, but a sad reflection of what was. I like you a little unkept because that means you're not 6 feet under.

3. I refuse to wash the sheets**
because they smell like us, throes of passion, loving contact.I can't easily let go. all i can remember is clutching them like a lifeline and then clutching you. safe as a cradle, we'd drift off in languorous sleep-- twisted limbs and all. no matter what, we are somewhere in that bed still. and I don't know if I ever want to climb out.

all i ever do is ache. there are places where the color in my cheek blotches and it is in those spots that resides a quiet desperate yearning for the touch of your lips--

tears leave just as many wayward streaks as dripping paint on canvas, only i'm not art.

how can I miss the hands that I never even got to hold?
i'm pretty sure palm readers know more intimacies than any soul on earth. i have yet to discern a single line of yours. or our lines. where do we begin? lines are infinite but existence is but a piece. does that make our love a line fragment? or are we more substantial than that?

how do i miss old places that i've never been to? i can't remember if color value was the same as valuing us. One can only make shapes when there is light and shadow but i'm not sure how to shade us from impending erasure on this page. how can i reminisce about the touch of your skin when all I got was a brief glance off your arm? i swear it made a mark on me but i never once could find it. my bruises still linger though. darling, is it possible to love without letting go?

these are the things that consume me.

"I'm broken in places people don't even have names for. I'm sad. I'm nothing to romanticize. God, I'm falling apart, I'm in pieces, why can't you see?"

"You're beautiful, even when you're in pieces."

fall asleep, the rhythm and
the sway-- breathe quiet and slow.
inhale.
exhale.
inhale.
exhale.
The motions are
a smooth, slow, steady delicacy--
the touch of air like butterflies over bare skin.
the sign to be close, mingled breath and entwined bodies.
how we can care, open the kinder side of a heart, arms and embrace enfolded.
tuck each other's limbs in each other:
just make sure that all the
stray corners hold.

the desire for all new edges
shape us--
the places we left
are just fine without us,
they don't need our words or time.
all harsh breath clawing out, whoosh
sharp and crisp the sound together
entwined, mesh of
lips, neck, throat,
clenching the sheets that wrinkles haphazardly,
screaming, "oh, god."
the pieces fitting so well
we'll never move again.

there are moments when i can’t decide if i
want to die                            sooner or later.
and some days it’s like the        first regret,
the first time you hurt someone;   but then
you do it on purpose, revel in a   sickening
way, the manner in which you      discover
that empathy is a             two-edged sword
and   drowning       sounds            less than
gruesome and                more of a    fantasy.

i didn’t know how to hurt you until i hurt so much myself.

i learned slamming doors and  altercations
with the mirror from my mother           and
that’s why my fists are     bruised    and my
insides are   tarnished with      self-loathing.
to “forget” to look both ways before i cross
the street is as much a     bad habit of mine
as the tendency to     bleed   for people who
don’t           deserve         my             wounds.

i never thought i’d make it to my 18th birthday.

the real purpose of changing my pillow cases so often
is not for       cleanliness                but because I figured
my     nightmares        were multiplying on my sheets.
i haven’t had as many lately         but I fear that they’ll
come back, so i keep my                             superstitions.
i cannot figure out a way to tell you how often     sleep
felt like i was                            practicing for my funeral.

if God embodies the     clock work theory, then    i am
the first     rough draft                         of a masterpiece,
the intention was supposed to be                        poetry,
but instead I leave my   love              on ***** windows
and use   stolen    ink to                                 write down
all      of              my                                    bad intentions.

does this confession count if i address my diary to a deity?

if God is an                  artist
He must be          frustrated    
with His                 creations—
screaming in the       echoes
of                  space         time,

“when will she learn that
   breaking every pen will
   only stain her own hands?”