I wouldn't call this poetry
I wouldn't call this poetry because there is nothing beautiful about wanting to die. There is nothing lovely about hurting yourself, nothing symbolic about deaths kiss that I wish would kiss my entire soul.
I wouldn't call this poetry because it isn't.
I think really living is a lot like knowing there's demons lurking inside your head but checking anyways.
I think it's like getting home late and pulling back the shower curtain checking murders
even though all you have to so is pull back your own eyelids and see the very thing that's killing you
I did not sleep last night because I was contemplating ways to die while also telling myself not to do it
I think I'm in a paradox.
I wouldn't call this poetry because there is nothing moving about this.I long for safety like a deaf person longs to hear.
But how can you long for something you've never felt?
I've been applying bandaids to my heart except it's words and the adhesive they provided just doesn't stick in my mind anymore
Everyone wants to knock down my walls but I'm missing the safety the cemented in bricks provide and I promise you
Oh god I promise you
You don't want to come through my walls

You always leave out the end.
The part where the dream turns into a nightmare,
When the bodies turn to dust in your hand
Where what you thought were clothes were just threads.
The one where everything shrunk in the wash and all your favorite shirts are too tight on your ribcage.
You'll leave out the end
Hoping it won't come.

I never told you I live a synesthetic life
That we see red differently.
What appears to you as the fires of passion,
I can only see as a burning flame.

You skipped class on all the days a girl came in crying.
You keep drowning in waters that were never meant to hold you
And reaching for the first thing that looks like a lifeboat.
You pretend not to see the cracks in my hull
As if your broken words could ever heal my broken frame.
I pretend not to see the way your eyes still light up at the sound of her name.

Didn't anyone ever tell you you can't make homes out of people?
Why did no one warn you about the danger of resting your head where it cannot permanently lay?
You were the ropes I tied myself to the train tracks with
But all you could see in me was the beginning that the ending of her erased.
 And how can you tell me you understand
When you've only ever looked at me like a paperweight?
I'd hold you down until you were ready to let yourself be used again,
And then you'd leave me to sit and collect dust with all the others who were never enough to put the pieces back together for you.

Someday the end will feel like an accustomed coffin
And though you'll never quite fit comfortably,
You'll let it bury you,
Sitting dully in the dark of the Earth,
And you'll learn to only see the stabbing edges
As another numbing pain.
The apples in your garden will have all turned to snakes.

Roll my body in the rug or bury me under the floorboards.
I'll listen to your footsteps
Like a Heartbeat you swore would mean more if it stopped.
I'll sleep below
While the radio static sings lullabies only you can hear.
Lay me to rest under the floorboards
A funeral for a love never destined to last.
Lay me to rest under the floorboards we danced on,
But don't you dare drown me.

there are invisible children hidden behind
miles of above ground swimming pools
and wooden swing sets. they've seen
life sized doll parts scattered across
their front lawns and were taught how to
take their first steps
as though they were being sent off to war;
knees straight. head tall.
don't flinch at the sight of blood.
a few weeks ago i turned on the local news,
the upcoming story took place in the west side of Detroit.
a photo of a young, colored girl wearing
butterfly shaped barrettes in her hair comes up,
the headline at the bottom of the screen reads,
3-YEAR OLD SHOT IN FRONT YARD
the news reporter talks about the situation
as though she's being forced to discuss
the weather in the middle of a heatwave;
it's the same. ****. thing. every. day.
i'll tell you what no one pictures
when they hear about another ******
in the same city that might as well
start building their front doors
like cemetery gates.
picture the mother
trying to sell a cradle so she has the money
to buy a 3-foot long casket. picture her
walking into her daughter's room
to tuck her into bed & remembering that she's
got nothing left but empty hands.
dear america,
tell me why some of us were born
with targets sewn into our backs, tell me if it
disturbs you at all that there are children
who want to chip off their skin, that want to be painted
a new color because they want to see if the light
will hit them in a different way,
& make them less invisible.

Breathe life into
the skeleton of my soul,
I want to taste
your smoke lips.

I like it here
in your ocean,
quench the flames of my pain
in the midnight
of your embrace

They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over, hoping for a different result.

So I guess I've been clinical since the first time I let myself believe you could love me too.

Life is still worth living without you

And I'm not surprised by that anymore

The sun still rises and disappears

Just like your love disappeared on me

The fields of flowers are still beautiful

But I can't help but think of the ones you bought for me

Music is still alive in my soul

It only plays your favorite song

And even though the earth moves on

It is a constant reminder of your ghost

The sights

The smells

The sounds

So how do you expect me to move on

When the everything around me 

Can't move on either