I do not have to be sorry for
Just standing in the mirror,
Searching for the hole i can feel
Tearing through my skin I don’t
Have to apologize for sitting
On the tile way too fast and
Way too hard I don’t have to
Spell your name the way I
Heard it the first time because
Suddenly it’s different because
Suddenly it’s wrong i don’t want to
get up I don’t want to lift my heart again
It is buried in my hip bones it has
Weighed me to the floor I cannot
Speak about the bruises that left
Foam beneath my shirt
Screaming at each other til they
Snarled like dogs and spit

I stood in the field fidgeting with
My dress there was a blue stain on
My sleeve
I rubbed at it while they
Carried him by and wanted to laugh because
My uncles were making silly faces their
Eyes were big and red like the
Horn on my old bike my
Mom grabbed my wrist and
Forced a rose into my palm I
Wanted to keep it for myself but
Everyone around me threw theirs down black
Ghouls staining the morning sobbing
Staring at
The ground, each with a different reason that
“It’s really not his fault”
My father never gave me flowers he never
Even tucked me in but I
Remember hoping that the thorns would
Wake him up as I
Let go

I stalked through the gray hallway with my
Books close to my chest
A hauberk for the rumors and the
Guesses that they made I
Slammed her head into the locker when she
Looked up and saw me sob it’s just I
Didn’t want to tell her that
There was so much ******* blood
It soaked into the hours that I
Just stared at the wall
Hoping someone would just ask me
So I could
Keep lying to myself

I don’t know how to write about
All the things I wish.
I am
Ashamed to want to know him I am
Furious and cold
I don’t know how to love only to
Throw myself away
And I know that when I meet him I will
Want my flower back

I can't focus. This is in the footnotes of an essay I have to write but I cant write he's sitting fifteen feet away from me and there’s nothing I can do about it because he doesn’t understand what his heart wants or even what his body wants and I don’t think that is fair and how am I supposed to write about time and immortality when the only thing I can see lasting forever is this burn behind my rib cage and his eyes inside my dreams. I don’t want to wake up or go to sleep or walk to class or feel another boy’s kiss against my lips or on my hips or between my legs I just want to play with his hair or sing him to sleep or wake up in his world but I cant and I wont and it aches aches aches but I have to sit here. I have to write an essay. I have to go to school. I have to go to sleep; wake up; carry on. With him fifteen feet away.

It's like a glass floor in the sky. I can see down. I can see out. The clouds, the light. My feet are warm; the Earth breathes below me, blurry but there. I'm not sure if there's an edge. I've been walking so long and I don't know whether I should run or crawl, if I'm going to fall does it matter if I try to take my time? The scene is so breathtaking that it's easy to forget--I'm alone in an oblivion I'm not sure I can escape.

I have a friend who has an eating disorder. She's tiny. The wind sets her off balance. Most days she doesn't eat. When she does it's just the sweet stuff. Cookies, cake, candy. Today we went to a bakery. We watched a big man make a small cake, all with butter and dough and fistfuls of sugar. She was standing next to me, eyes on her toes. After, everybody got a piece, soft and warm and wrapped in paper. For the rest of the day I watched her hold it. She switched it between hands, put it in her pocket; set it down beside her. I tried not to notice when he hands shook, or when her stomach complained beneath her sweater. As we were leaving the city she threw it away, and her whole body relaxed. I hadn't noticed how rigid her shoulders were until they eased back into place. I think she's stronger than me. Than I? Whatever. I mean yeah the wind can push her--I'm more certain on my feet, but she has this **** addiction and she held it in her palm. There's something I don't understand about that kind of power. If i wanted to prove that I don't need him I don't think I could. There's this prison made by daydreams that won't let me decide between aching for another heart or trying to mend my own.

the soul is like a garden
that blooms on midnight's breath
ethereal and gentle, cautious gold after the rain
whispers between newborns
who haven't seen sunlight
their skeletons lay hidden
under roses raised in blood
the garden grows, grows, glows
on midnight's breath

It's just you come and go like the ******* tide
I hate salt water it burns my eyes
I clutch my ribs so late at night
Aching and cold beyond the light
Less than nothing between us now
Lowered eyes; a furrowed brow
Those baby blues could tear me down
Passion lost but not yet found
It's just you ebb and flow like a summer wind
Sometimes you caress and sometimes you sting
Sometimes you scream and sometimes you sing
You play with light and you play with wings

I didn't see the pattern I was bruised
Dreams suffocating all trace of you
And so I sat here
**** it I'm still sitting
I saw the end from the beginning

My heart races when I brush past you
Recognition of a passed you
Who used to stir up all my thoughts
Who used to show me what I'm not
My palms will shake like a failing roof
My lungs still struggle it's nothing new
Don't think I ever looked so close

Than when my lashes kissed your nose