if i woke up one day
and we were made of water
you and me
and everyone and
everything,
if we were all just liquid that held its form
if we died in a splash and were born in a storm,
held in place by a force (that didn’t conform
to any scientific or common-sense norm)
that held the water
in a human shape
and never ever spilled;

if liquid and gas were all that existed
if instead of crying we just kind of misted
from liquid eyes down liquid cheeks,
drove in liquid cars down liquid streets,
sat at liquid tables with liquid seats
slept in liquid beds
with liquid sheets
walked through liquid forests with liquid trees
and liquid leaves that fell
on liquid grass;

if it were liquid knees we had to bend
watery letters to stamp and send
fluid hearts to break and mend
a solution of time to save and spend
and not for out lives
could we comprehend
the meaning of words like “shatter”
and “solidify”;

if i woke up in a world like that
i’d run the 12.3 miles
to your flat
and open the door
like a hurricane
and throw my liquid arms around you
like a safety blanket or a scarf or
like some kind of human sweater
or something

i don’t know
i just really want to feel
our internal oceans
move together.

you’re not close enough
i’m tired of solid touch
i want to be everywhere
i want to encompass you
like a river i want our skin
to meld and mix
like food dye
to create a new color
just for you and me.
i want to be
forever changed
in every place
you touch.

it’s a curious thing
because i’m not much older than you
but your eyes are closed
and your lashes are such
that they look to be drawn
by some artist’s brush
and all i can think
is how awfully much
i’d like to read you to sleep

and all i can see
is how each time we touch
the pain gets a little less deep

you feel like a child
you feel like you’re mine
i feel like i’m yours
so pass me the twine
and i’ll tie your left hand pinky to mine
so no one can make me leave

You’re so **** pretty
and I don’t just mean
your long eyelashes
or your majestic flowy hair
or the way your eyes go all crinkle
and your face goes all squish
when you smile,
nope.
You’re just
you’re so **** pretty
just as a human being
just in who you are
and how you try
and I just can’t think
of any solid reason why
you have to deal
with so much ****.

Bad things happen to good people,
sure,
and I’ve always known that the world
doesn’t always operate based on
common sense
but I guess
I never fully understood the full scope
of that concept
until I saw you cry.
Because when you walked up
(it’s no exaggeration to say)
you were glowing.
You literally
blinded everyone
but you kept insisting
that you could only absorb light,
not emit
and I just don’t get it.

My parents are doctors
so believe me
I know very well that the heart
is an ***** the size
of your fist,
no more and
no less.
I know it,
I do but you’re just
going to have to believe me
when I say
that there are times when I’m
talking to you
when my own personal
fist-sized *****
just swells right up
and expands
to push against
the sides
of its ribcage,
because if it’s true
it it’s really true
that the brightest star
in all the universe
might look in the mirror
and mistake itself
for a black hole,
then surely
surely no natural laws
no physical properties
no rules or
biological normalities apply
to the human heart?
Surely.

There aren’t many things I can say
with full confidence.
The future frightens me
the past confuses me
and I frankly am not sure why
I’m still here
in the present (???)
but like it or not
here I’ve been
for eighteen (better or worse) years
and in that time
there haven’t been many people
that it often bothers me
to be in a room without
(which would be totally irrelevant
if it weren’t for the fact that I walked
into Westminster Abbey today
and just wished
the mega-posh British security guard
was you)

i need a distraction
something to be heard
above the perpetual
electric buzzing,
human eclectic
humming,
cognitive corrective numbing
is my mind running
straight, or am i becoming
a paradox?

how many distractions
can possibly fit in
before i finally
get enough
to distract
from all the distractions
i never asked for?
millions of distractions
(from who knows what place)
but i think
i think i need to make the space
for just one more
to add the the show
because i really just don’t know,

i don’t know what to say
when asked
about the weather.

i need a distraction
but please
don’t give me something
that tries to be heard
by screaming
a half-pitch higher
than all the other screaming screamers
because i spent years holding
my breath
when my mom
drove over bridges,
my dog never stopped barking
when you yelled and
as many times as i’ve tried
i’ve never been able to write my name
with a sharpie
on my frayed black leggings
in the dark
so i know nothing works that way.

distract me
(yes)
but do it with a whisper.

because i agree,
it really is,
it’s a kicker
that the sunshine fits her
so well
but won’t fit us.

but it would never fit you or i
that’s not who we are.
(we’re just people that cry
when we look at the stars,
just some kids with souls
that hold black holes
and whisper lies
in the dark)

but we’ve still got a chance.
our dark could defy
what her sunshine denies…

but i guess it must make me sick to think about
because it is exactly why
i need a distraction

because i’m always thinking
so i’m always sick

because there’s a black hole just
of thought
inside my tummy
and it hurts sometimes
because if i look inside
myself
I’ll be ****** straight in
and all i’ll hear
is the numbing din

because my brain
won’t stop growing fuzz

because it is all mossy mountains
and nebulous fog
when all i want
is a big flat lake
and a clear open sky
but in the wake
of this motorboat mind
i guess that’s kind of
hard to find

so please
until i do find
something of that kind
i need a distraction

and though i might not be willing
to get lost in my own brain jungle
i’ll get lost in you
any day.

distract me.

good things are twisted and reversed
in my mind and I don’t understand why
my brain poisons purity.

a compliment turns into
sarcastic pity,
a one word reply
a hateful confession
against me.
labored breathing,
no matter how innocent the cause
and I am back
to blurry blue bathroom floors
and a heart 300 decibels too high,
a heart that cares too much,
a heart so easily broken
that no one dares to try
to even get close anymore,
maybe for fear of breaking it
but much more likely for fear
that my poison
will leak
and every sweet situation
will be soured
with my apparent inability to function
the way I’ve been told I should.

Be patient with me.
It’s dark where I am.
I know
you want to help
but please,

this is my journey.

You shouldn’t feel bad-
how can you save me
from an invisible ocean?

It must be hard for you
to watch me strain
against water you can’t see.

I’m sorry
I’m not good for much these days,
but it’s like I said-
it’s dark where I am,
my sea extending
in all directions.

It’s thick
and black
and violent
there are no ladders,
there is no calm,
and with every wave
I’m closer to drowning.

I know there’s light somewhere
(I catch glimpses sometimes)
I know there’s a way out

it’s just that
all the waves here look the same,
my navigator seems to have left me,
and I’ve never been particularly good
at reading maps.

your mother told you
when she sent you away to learn the dance;
she said to always tell the truth.
her words may seem wise to another, but you know, don’t you?
you know from your short time,
it echoes in your head
brushes across your chest
whispers:
pretty words don’t hold up
in the dark.
because you have eye bags that would never pass airport security
(“it’s genetic”)
how will they fly you out to your dances?
your face is always blotchy. you don’t wear makeup and you sniffle a lot.
(“just allergies”)
no stage eyeliner for you.
tell me, ballerina boy
did you really stop dancing
because
your feet are sore?
or is it perhaps because
you’re ready
to retire your shoes
forever?
did you really sprain your foot?
or did you break your mind?
you, my love
are full of lies
because you and I both know
that the critics don’t matter.
but what of your faithful fans,
what will they say?
who will take your spot
in the dance,
who will take over the role
that was created with a sole purpose
of you playing it?
no one will, my love.
that role was yours alone.

i’m tired
and it’s not because
i don’t sleep or because
my days are long or because
i need a rest
or a break
or something
it’s just that all this nothing
has made me numb
and I ask
that you please don’t inquire
as to why
because I really don’t know
how it happened
but i seem to have misplaced
the very last
of the last
of my reasons to live
and it’s strange to me
because there was sunshine once, I know
there was.
there was sunshine
and when some trees grew to block it
it was horrible,
but at least then
I knew.
I knew.
but as I stand now
in an open field
devoid of any tree that might try
to keep my sunshine from me
I don’t know
I don’t know why
but all I can see is darkness,
all I ever see
is darkness
and I just find it strange
because I’m still so very used to
the way things used to be
when the sun was gone,
back when I would lie in bed
and hear my heart beat too hard
and feel my chest press too tight
and listen
as every single toxic sob that caught
on every single bitter breath
dissolved its rhythm
into familiar chaotic spasms
that shook
and echoed
in my head
and clouded my perception
for days after.
i can so easily
fall into remembering a time
when it was normal
for me to feel myself breaking
when it was normal for me
to let it happen,
back when I would
squeeze my eyes shut
and watch the night swim,
but all of that
it just seems so strange to me now
because all I do anymore
is stare at the ceiling
hearing nothing,
feeling nothing, trapped
in nothing
and all I ever see
is darkness
and I don’t know,
I don’t know whether
my sun is coming back
and that’s
not
even
what’s
scary.

what’s scary is that
I don’t know whether
I want it to
you see
I’m not quite sure whether
I care.

this journal met me when i hurt.
i took it out of my bag with shaky hands
breathed ice on each page
and wrote each word
detached
separate
(and tired,
*******
i was so tired).

this journal felt
my 3am bloodstains
in every pen stroke.
it watched me close my eyes
and furrow my brow
and saw just exactly how
lost I was
in the fog
(much too lost for poetry logs
and remembering historic dates).

and you can be sure
that every pencil tip that broke
against this journal’s lined sheets
shook
like some sort of sign shooting
from my heart, an electric line routing
through my fingertips
and into the graphite,
allowing me to hear the soft
crack
of the lead
and recognize
somewhere in my foggy head
that we were the same,
me and Number 2.
apply enough pressure?
we both snap in two.

it’s funny
because i learned to love you, but
i never learned to love or hate the dark
and i don’t understand why
because you are so much alike

there’s no start
no middle,
no ending
to you
and therefore no mending
for me
in my head
because i keep trying to hold you
to get a grasp on something
to make it
make sense
to try to feel even the slightest bit less
dispensable
but you just keep going and going and going
and going and going
and going
and i always fall short
no matter what i do
there’s just no holding on to you

i don’t know how to proceed
i don’t know what the darkness needs
from me
or what i need from it
or how to fall asleep
without the upstairs bathroom light lit

it fills in all the holes, I guess
that’s something.
all the rips and tears
(and other types of tears)
and the peeling paint chips
and broken pencils
and crumpled diary entries
and breaths full of anything but oxygen
and phone calls that ring and ring and ring and ring and ring
and ring and ring
and ring

it’s ink (the dark)
it’s thick
hard to move in
and the stains don’t come out
of my clothes and skin,
its blotchy evidence
forever dinned
into me,
into who i am
but I’m not exactly in the interest
of giving a **** just now
because it fills the desperation,
doesn’t it?
all the stupid aches and
intrusive emptiness
that have been shredding through
this tired little room
at least three thousand
nine hundred
and seventy two times a day every day
since you left
(what with all the tiny gaps and chinks
and leaks and cracks, despised
because they could have otherwise
been occupied
by you.)

it’s ink
it comes and it goes
and when i wake everyone knows
because it’s caked on my eyes.
everyone sees the stains.
they might not notice, but all the pain
they see in me is reflected
in their eyes
when they greet me
and i just want
the dark to come back
so i can at the very least
be surrounded
by something that knows me.

i wish you were here
you know i do,

but you’re not.

so i guess the dark will have to do.