Everyone I touch
Leaves me
And I love them

There are no strangers
To have a coincidence
No one, not them

If I could be the starry skies
Or the freeway
Busy, all night

I could be the overpass
No one to listen to
Nothing to fight

I'd wrap myself in dandelion
Or whispers...
Endless pearls

I'd miss the morning
The next day, and ending
Of the world
__

Kiss me
Like morning light
The fabric of the sky

Like little diamonds
Precious pearls
I fashion from bone

What's here is no longer
I must have thought
I'd see the final blows
__

The world is rebelling against me
I must cradle myself
Hold me throughout the night
Red, lights, blue and white

I must wrap myself up
Place me in a glass bottle
Where none can touch
Just shining, shimmering, look-

My hair tangles and falls
Ditsy strands by the handful
In the same clothes as yesterday
And the days before that

I only exist to echo back out
I only drink if I intend to black out
I only wanted someone to notice
To find out ...

I no longer let my lips chap
Even when I want them to split and crack
I no longer curl my hair, or paint my skin
I don't starve my body
Or look everywhere for harm

I just imagine the steps to the overpass
I think of the glock, my guns
My childhood, on repeat, his arms

The last decade on the edge
When I could make no plans
Because today might be my last
In trash heaps, no friends
Wishing, wishing, wishing,
I could
The end

He can touch me
Like I am a statue in his garden
To visit on every idle Tuesday, or holiday
Everything will turn to time

So I will let him feast on me, fearless
Wild, swinging vine to vine
Tearing smaller creatures apart
With just his teeth

We met at my weakest moment
And his highest pride
I am magnificent as a rainstorm
And just the same to ruin the daylight

I promise him nothing
But all of my nothings are cursed
To be sweet, nourishment
I am always so eager to fill his cup

I am only silent when I am too scared of the sound

I lost the only man I ever had
He looks me in the eyes
To say I’ve never had him

I once had a dream of a handsome man
The kind with timeless, tired eyes
Four piece suits
And hair slicked back
Moustache



But now I fall in love with every glance
Every moment, each memory
Repeats into a cascade in my head
I was never as bright
As I was, as I shined
Every single weekend night

All of my attractions are unaffected
By my presence or my fantasies or my rage
I am the devouress
The success in making my smiling face
Less of a menace
More, say, pleasant

And the anxiety won’t eat me up this time
Because I’ll live in sorrow, ignorance
Lay all my letters in a notebook
Where I scream between the lines
I never told the crime
And even though it’s not, it is mine

I don’t think I’m the type of person to be loved
I will always do the loving
Only my tender sighs
Gloss curtains, silk
Brown hair, tattoos
Muscles and uniform
I fall again and again
For everyone and for you
And it never matters
Even when I need it to

I can feel him
Like the ghost of a touch
The breath on a glass
Long forgotten

A temperature cradled in silk
After I’ve left the bed
That only holds
Until the room absorbs it

That’s him
Left in the last swallow of wine
Who you imagine
In the pages of the books you read