and hear me this
you wake to me
you sleep to me
you die to me
i am grief
and from my throat tears
the unencumbered rattle of
despair.
i am grief
a great beast
with dripping teeth
and souls to keep.
i destroy the ground
beneath my claws
and the flesh between
my crushing jaw.
i am grief
the notches in your door frame
and the smell of him,
untamed.
hear me this,
you wake to me
you sleep to me
you die to me
you fight to me
and cry to me
i am grief,
i am you.

i am you.

i used to focus on all the things that hurt
knowing that's what most people do
i felt more justified
i used to jump out into a sea among
all the children who had more than enough to eat
and a bed big enough for their egos
to rest alongside them
they seemed to fear those kids who
lived on food stamps and played on
imperfect lawns
but somehow hated those kids who had bigger beds
bigger houses
bigger egos
they told me i was lucky to have two homes
even if my mom didn't love my dad anymore
even if no one is there?
they told me i was lucky to be that skinny
cuz they would die to look that way
and aren't i hungry?
they told me i should be thankful
that my daddy's rich and at least i don't
look black,
how awful it must be not to be able to
wear your skin like a trophy
they said who cares if you were scared
you're lucky you have someone who wanted
You.
who couldn't keep their
hands of you.
Are you even listening?
Don't you know how lucky you are?

the truth about life is that
there is no truth
truth is just reality
of which there are 8 billion
possible perceptions
conceptions, deceptions
8 billion possible ways and misperceptions
to live and love and hate
the truth about life
is that the humans are always
living, loving, dying
hating and creating
fighting back
biting back
moving forward and left and right
but never backwards
predisposing, decomposing lives of
salt
the truth about reality
is that we take comfort in
the niceties of bright cities
in the shouts of 7 million men
because we cannot stand the sound of
our own voice
the truth about reality is the
commonality between brutality and love.
the truth is a girl who is berated by the blacklist
just because she kissed her
that Love is not allowed
her fear becomes a cloud
as she walks into a crowd she knows can ****
the truth is the black man who is handed a gun
told by the cowars who never see the sun
end it all to get the job done
Handed the best key to death and told to have fun
"places like that are for people like you"
society works in one mind
Blind to scripted history
Back of the bus was so 1960's
lets have em go to hell.
Color created the hate people think they need
to win
the black man could live in a house of gold
but it only matters the color of his skin.
the girl could find a cure for cancer
but she doesn't get the chance her
mind is sick.
The truth about reality is the commonality
between brutality and love.

sometimes when i think of
living with depression
i think of my aunt
who is living with a dog
that jumps on the bed
and children who never stop barking
its kind of the same
depression is a bit like a fly
that's been in my house for as long as i
can remember
buzzing and humming and
right out of my reach
and when i try to swat it,
i end up hitting everything other
than the **** fly.
i spilled things, i broke things, i smashed things
and destroyed things and i tore
apart my house but i didn't
ever manage to get it
but never did it occur to me
that eventually
flies die.

and you
you think you see snow
over those ridges
but its really government factories
churning out the next shiny thing
but no, my friend
how blind can you be
not a single planet
not a single moon
not a single stare moves for you
you see,
perhaps you don't
that we are just rats in the ever
changing churn of a system
a system that clamps down
on our will
that thing inside you that no
matter how hard you search and
scramble,
you might never find.
it clamps down and never lets go
it chews through your soul
right to your core
right to the bone.
and you,
my friend,
there, chasing the whitecaps
braving the wave
the great, unbearable
crushing wave
i think one thing:
there is beauty,
collateral beauty in you,
your ignorance
your bliss.
and you,
you think they'll help you
you think they'll stay.
and i have just one thing to say.
they never, ever
stay.

you've kept me up most nights
nights, bleed into day and day's end back again.
you've kept me,
surrendering into the nothingness of sleep
wrists and ankles bound to dreams
like you did to me.
she taught me to nod a yes instead of screaming no
instead of- help me, help me please.
i try so hard to remember anything, but you see
with a mind like mine the body is the brain.
i scream out only to realize
my lips have not even parted.
and that song, it sounds like the color of her house
forgotten love from lust only the love is a child and
she's crying out and nodding yes.
when i am broken and
there is nothing left of me to
touch
to hurt
to choke in your fists
maybe then they'll all realize
im just a little girl,
with a thousand ways to
die.