I'm afraid to eat
because I won't be able
to keep it down

I'm afraid to go to bed
because I won't be able
to hold my tears in anymore

I'm afraid to sleep
because I'll only dream of her

I like stories that start out small.
A few words.
A breath.
A feeling.
It's enveloped in front of you
on the delicate pages,
blooming up slowly and luring you in
and before you know it,
you love.

It is like this and
this is how it is.
The sun rises and
the sun sinks
but the moon is
consistent.
Don't fear
falling in love
because love is
forever.
Rather fear people
beacuse people
change.

Sometimes
words come out of me and
I've been looking for somewhere to put them.

This is my
first try
and across the street there's a man
hanging out through his window
and I'm not sure what I'm doing
but I know that
(I don't want to be your
first try,
just your last success.)
when the sun comes up
I'll have a new chance.

It started out without my knowledge
with tight hugs and
shared coffee mugs
just friends, though
I never wanted our talks to end so
one thing led to another and
hugs led to kisses to touches to
so much more
and that one time
in the beginning
in that packed broadway bar where you never went
but this time you went for me,
spent money you didn't have
so you could spend more time with me,
that one time when you ended up
pushing me away and wouldn't meet my eye
because this was all so sudden
a second ago I was my own person
now I knew that I was yours because
it broke my heart not to see you smile
had I been in denial?
I just want to see you smile
I want to be the reason for that smile
love is just a chemical reaction

So you left yours and I abandoned mine
but is that really a good foundation
for a functioning life
together
I hope so I hope so I hope so
because I don't think about my past
but I can't know where your thoughts go
so I'm going to trust you
and I'm going to ignore what might be the truth
that you still talk about the last one
and you still talk to the previous one
and you still bump into that other one
you see, my chapters are read
I have seen, I have said
that I won't let them affect me
so how hard can it be to
not let all of yours affect, well, ours

You know, one day when I woke up in your bed
eyes still full of grit
nice thoughts in my head
your back turned on me
I accepted the role of the big spoon
her texts on your phone screen
before we'd even said good morning
made a shitstorm out of my good dream

I'm at yours alot, I know that
I write most of our conversations, guess I don't mind it
I feel slightly (very) inadequate, though
when I think of what you might say to her back home
when I compare myself to every. girl. you've. ******
and
every. girl. you. might want to *****
and
no one can undo a cherry they've plucked
because that's the way time works
so it's really not you, it's really just me
and you call me silly for thinking such things
and I know that I'm silly because
because I know you wouldn't just mess around with me
because you said so
you don't think I'm in the way or just
generally annoying to always stay
but I know that you make jokes when you're hurting
and I don't want you to hide from me
because that's burning me

Have you ever thought about that small moment right after you wake up? That tiny space of time. The neutrality just before the memories and the feelings catch up with you. It is a relief and a break from everything. Until suddenly it hits you like a brick in the face and the nauseating hurt creeps back. That memory you so wish you could forget. That thing that happened that you wish you could undo somehow. And you know that you need to get up but you just... can't. So you close your eyes again - if you ever even mustered up the will to open them in the first place - and you turn over in the comforting heat of your protective bed. Falling back asleep so that you won't have to think thoughts and feel feelings.

I'm not old
I haven't been here for long
I have no profound wisdoms
I haven't yet learned all that a person can learn from life
But my heart is tired
It's sad and bruised
Dried out and hollow
A few years ago I had the ability to fall in love easily
Now I don't know how to love at all

I never thought you'd do this.
I never thought it'd happen.
Pretty sure Shakespeare wrote something of thee.

I never thought there would come a day
when I'd look at you and not recognize
the person in front of me.

I never thought your fear of losing me
would turn to nothingness,
all 'cause you lost your high.

I never thought I'd meet your stare
and find the love
drained from your eyes.

But you did it.
The day came.
It happened.
I saw it.
And that's what has me scared to death.
Right now.
Twenty-seven hours later.

If something so sure
could die
what of all else?

I had to stay the night;
my train wouldn't depart for another
twenty hours.
It killed me
to have to sleep in your bed
one last time.
To have to feel your scent
in your sheets.
You took the couch.
I gave in to tears
and the blackening hole in my chest.

When I walked out
I put up a wall.
I bet you saw it
because you cried.
I couldn't.
I couldn't look at you anymore.
I couldn't look at you
and not see our love
where it used to be.
Where it ought to be.
Where did it go?
Where did you go?

I hope he's worth it.

My head's a mess. It is. I've been compromised. I've been broken. Like a puzzle where none of the pieces match. None fit. I've realized mine never will either. Because someone has taken away a few and thrown in new ones. And I'm not even sure if I can blaim anyone else but myself. It's chaos. A mess. So I've given up. The fight is over. Leave me alone to curl in the dark corners of my bed. Please don't make me open my eyes. I don't want to see. If you try you will only risk getting your own puzzle shattered. That's what I am now. That's what I've become. The very essence of "you only want what you can't have". Reluctantly indifferent. My heart is off and the switch has stuck. Not wanting to be alone, but deserving it. I'm a safety hazard. Dangerous. I can make you fall in love with me. And that's what I crave. But I have forgotten how to love in return. You think I give and give and give. When all I really try to do is take, take, take to fill myself and switch my heart back on. If it's even there anymore, in the sinus of my chest. I can't tell. I can't feel it. So leave me alone to curl in the dark corners of my bed. Please don't make me open my eyes. I don't want to see what I've done.

A girl once went on a train with her father.
She asked;

"Where does the sadness go when you stop crying?"

He never gave her an answer.
Imagine how she'll grow up to realize
it never goes away.

Why am I crying?
Am I still denying?
He taught me to shut people out;
don't let them see - pent up your shout.
Now you're my light,
for the first night
in so long.
Teach me love.
Again.
Teach me love.

I shook her hand
the way you do with strangers,
before I even knew
you used to kiss it.
(I get jealous.
Please don't make me feel this.)
I smiled like her lips did,
politely,
before I even knew
you used to kiss them.
(I get jealous.
Please don't make me feel this.)
I froze when you told me about her,
casually and with a laugh,
and that was when I knew
you used to kiss her.
I get jealous.
Please don't make me feel this.

It's time to sleep, the absent sun tells me
but thoughts are running freely
across the street behind my house

Do you ever really miss me when you're drunk?
Maybe you're this way with everyone
and I'm blowing us out of proportion
Is it only desire?
I can't decide
I can't tell
But you would have let me stay with you
hadn't your apartment been crowded
filled by the eyes and ears of your brothers
You told me so
before you kissed me

I wish we weren't what we are
one step furter but not far enough

Please let me in again

Tell me you want me still

Let me have you
I'd be yours in a second
Let yourself let me have you
It's not a demand
it's a hope
and there's not alot of that around these days

Do you ever only miss me when you're drunk
or is it just harder to hide then?

A girl lost her father to cancer
at eighteen.
Tell me what that means,
what that was good for.
Because she lost herself too that day and
she's not back yet.
She pleaded; dear sickness,
let him see me grow up first.
They got two weeks.
It's been one year,
seven months,
thirteen days,
eight hours.
So tell me who you are to say
she's not still broken.
When her mother was abused
and her boyfriend had a child
with someone new.
Tell me how she
should have seen it coming.
When she was interrogated about her
sexuality, and
in the papers they spoke of hellfire as
a cure for natural desire.
When her female friend
made fun of her weight
and she hit herself for believing it.
When her male friends
violated her at parties
even though she said
no.
Tell me how she
should have spoken up.
Tell me how she
should have been sober.
Limbs itching, nails scratching
until imagined flaws become real scars.
When she eventually confused
closeness,
***,
with love - her comfort in being
alone
dragged good people down with her.
Tell me how she was to blaim.

My girlfriend is a brunette.

Still feels weird calling her that.
Or him - sometimes she's a he and
that's fine.
She's not a gender to me.
She's a person.
She's my person.

But as I've said before,
carving it out with black on white;
I'm broken inside. I'm broken inside and
I don't know how to
feel.
Am I scared or am I
emotionless?
What is that sinking ache in my stomach?
Would my mom look at me
differently,
blow it out of proportion,
if she knew?

If she knew
I loved the girl next door when I was eight.
If she knew
I drew a picture of our wedding and hid it
because even when I was a kid
I felt like a disgusting disappointment.
If she knew
I kissed a girl in my class when I was in the fourth grade.
If she knew
I've been this person all this time.
I'm not different. I am the same. The same person I was three months ago. Before I had figured this out. Before I had figured me out.

My girlfriend is a brunette
and her sweet-tasting love is
all I've got
spinning around in my head
right now.
It's all I can think about. It's all, it's all I can think about.

Take a seat. Far in the back. Yeah. That's right. Right there. In that end of the wagon where you can barely see out through the rounded corner of the window next to the seat in front of you. Perfect. Be invisible. Only look at another human when you show your ticket. You bought the cheapest one you could find. You don't even have a seat. Not really. Someone could actually come and claim the one you're in. The risk of being forced away feels all too pressing. Any second now. You pause your music but keep your earpieces in as you listen for every sound. You steal glances of every by-passer in the corner of your eye. You check the clock on your phone. It's one minute past the departure time. The train should be moving by now...

Someone sits down next to you. You notice that it's a woman but you have no idea what she looks like because in this country we don't look at each other. We don't invade each other's personal space. Very important. Sharing is not always caring. We can seem cold but that's not our intent...

The train finally starts rolling. Four minutes late. You're hoping the woman next to you isn't bothered by the sound of your chewing gum. The sound of your teeth touching. The sound you make when you swallow. The sound of your breathing. The sound of your existance. You crossed your legs a few minutes ago. Right over left. Now your left foot has grown numb and your right leg is starting to ache too...

You didn't want to go. You didn't want to leave her. But real life called and forced you back to it. They lied to you when they sold the idea of adulthood as something... Yeah, what? What did we expect? Why were we itching to grow up so badly? For all the obligations? For expensive loans? For complicated papers to fill out, food to by and a roof to somehow keep over our heads? For leaving? For abandoning love and happiness in order to do what needs to be done?

I don't want to go. I don't want to leave her. But real life called and now this train is taking me back to it.

It doesn't take much.
She hasn't seen him for a year,
or ten months and a day
to be precise.
But when she entered the store
two minutes earlier
and hurried to the aisle with
hygiene items and perfumery,
she hadn't prepared for this.

It doesn't take much
and with something as small as
a single turn of her head
their eyes meet.
It's unfortunate, deplorable and
a wave of electric pain shoots through
her.
Before she has barely seen him see
her
she turns her stare back to the shelves
packed with makeup and shaving cream.
She need not see more of him to know
he looks the same.
That dark, tousled hair.
That soft look in his dark eyes.
That olive skin she used to caress.
That scorpion tattooed on his neck.
The electricity in her chest caused
her heart to jump up in her throat.
She feels sick.
Why does he always do this?
This isn't fair.
She hates him.
And his unexpected kiss last year
means ****
considering his girl and
their newborn daughter.
It's not fair
the way he influences her
when she can't even make him flinch
at the sight of her
the way she does.

It doesn't take much
and in the car
on her way home
she almost doesn't cry.