Please take note:
1. Give your heart to the boy with the crescent moon smile. Make sure it appears whole and perfect.
2. When he breaks it, tell him it's only a scratch. Polish it and hand it back to him with a smile. Do not hand him the magnifying glass. Do not let him see all of the other cracks. He has too many of his own, and you'll spend your time wishing you could fix them.
3. When someone lets you see the rough edges of themselves where the seams have been ripped and re-sewn, give them a hug and a smile and tell them that they are loved, tell them that you will listen. Talk to them like you would talk to yourself. To do this you will need to pretend you are normally honest with yourself. Do not ask them why it happened -- it is over now. Do not try to erase the scars -- they are there for a reason. They are scars for a reason. The body has healed them. Do not try to fix something that has healed. You will say too much and regret it.
4. When the boy asks you if you are upset tell him yes. Your smile is not strong enough for him to believe it. Do not tell him why you are upset. You are too strong to let it leave your lips. Do not let the cracks show.
5. If you are afraid or upset or lonely, write it down. Your words will seem silly in the broad light of day, but the feeling of pen on paper or fingers on keys will put you at ease. Let yourself be at ease. Listen to something beautiful and let yourself get sleepy. Let whatever emotion you are feeling come out as a sigh before you shut your eyes. Let sleep and music and words written be the charms that keep it away. Breathe out. Do not let the cracks show.
6. When you cry at something that should make you smile and your friends look at you like you're crazy do not explain. Tell them that you just can't contain your happiness. Do not tell them the way your heart feels hard and heavy in your chest and that the gift they sent you or compliment they paid you took the burden of hiding your emotions from your face just long enough for your eyes to let a few tears escape. They will not understand. Do not let the cracks show.
7. Finally, when you are alone and the door is closed and every living soul is gone and every emotion is pushing on the cracks from the inside out, let yourself be broken. Pour sadness and anger and hurt on the floor like a broken glass pours out wine. Look at everything you have spilled. Feel the shame from the first time you were broken and then feel nothing more. Grab a mop and clean the floor. Grab a towel and take a bath. When you are empty and naked and still alone, pick up each piece of yourself from the floor. Glue them together and smooth the seams away. Paint them to match your skin and polish them until they can't be seen. Get dressed. Fill yourself with food, music, writing, and smiles. Do not let the cracks show.

There's a box around my heart,
and my heart is screaming,
and my brain is listening,
and I can't find the words.
And you are the box.

we stuck out our tongues and rested the pills on them
like a congregation receiving communion

then we looked up at the stars
and smiled like we had finally found God

it scares me that you're ready to jump
when I'm not ready for you to fall
what if I can't catch you
and we both end up broken on the floor?

I just feel like I'm just waiting for an explosion
and time is tick-tick-ticking by

How long can I stand here
before I run out of time?
When should I leave
if I want to avoid injury?

It's Monday night
and I'm floating again
in the middle of an ocean
and I can't see the shore

I look up at the stars
(I can see thousands tonight)
and I'm not sure
I'm in the right place
anymore.

I'm grasping at anything
--I have to move somewhere--
and it's slipping through
my fingers
I just can't see the reason
of staying here anymore
when surely I'll drown
but I can't go anywhere else
so I wait for the current

It's Monday night
and I'm floating again
but this time I'm stranded

last night, I pulled out all of my fears
every worry of mine
every thought that keeps me up at night
every piece of doubt

and I watched intently
as they were set on fire,
as they turned to ash,
as the smoke floated freely

and I took deep breaths
and everything is okay

somewhere in the dark
she found his heart,
lying among the others in the storm
bleeding but beating

she took it in her hands,
carefully wrapped it up,
and sheltered it
in the safest place she knew

the next morning she set to work,
stitching the wounded pieces
until his heart was strong again
it beat hard and happy now,
but it was useless without its body

she set out on her journey to find him,
the black clouds rolled in,
she dodged trees blown over by wind,
she dodged flashes of lighting that
appeared just before her eyes

she was just about to save him
when she felt a famililiar pain in her chest
it felt as though a knife was stabbing her
in and out, in and out, in and out
she felt the blood pour from her heart
into her chest
and she fell for the first time
in a long time

she looked over to find him lying on the ground
and whispered her apologies
because one mended heart has a will to repair another
but a broken heart is useless in the darkness

your name is a poem and a prayer
and I spend hours reflecting on it
and reciting it before bed
whether I hope to memorize it
or use it as an incantation is unclear
I write it out on notebooks
I write it out on scraps of paper
I almost tattoo it in permanent marker
all over my arms
instead I type it on an otherwise blank screen,
checking it for something I missed before
I've read it backwards several times
and I've moved the letters
to spell several phrases,
none of which compares to the original arrangement
I've analyzed your name for just one hint
of the person it labels,
but I find no warning
for a boy with bright eyes
and a brighter smile
who once loved a girl with a now-forgotten laugh
and a freshly wounded heart
I close my eyes
your name is the sigh on my lips
as I finally give in to sleep

Sometimes,
perfect timing
is more important
than a perfect match.

I'm too confused to turn my thoughts into poetry so I let them mix together like paint until I make a nasty, muddled mess. I'll glop them on a canvas and call it "Love, I Guess." I'd like to crack your skull open so you can feel this raw. Then I'd fill your head with termites and watch them as they knaw. I want you to feel helpless so you can understand why I'm so breathless. Why am I so loveless? Why am I so hopeless? Just feel nothing and everything all at once, or, rather, everything and do nothing about it. Maybe I'll feel nothing so I can do everything wrong. I'll dance a dance or sing a song and let rain fall around me without covering my hair because I just don't care anymore. I just don't care. I'm in like and love and hate and jealousy and loneliness and an unfailing passion to have everything I've never had before. Crack my head open and take out my limbic system. Let me be numb. Take out the memories. Let me be dumb. Clean it all off and put it back in. Let me feel whole again.

As the rain drummed quiet beats on the window,
I wondered what your favorite song was.

As thousands of books greeted me in rows and on shelves, I wondered if you read poetry.

As I laid in bed, missing your laugh and the smile that goes with it, I realized I don't know much about you.

But as you drove down the highway, windows down, music playing as I sat in the passenger seat,
finally happy,
I knew that I would spend forever learning.

I'd like to live a long summer just looking into your eyes.
They tell me things that your words don't
They tell me things that your actions won't
They whisper about midnight and the way the moon looks
They scream about every time you've suffered for me
And it hurts
But they reassure me that you took those bullets by your own choice
Your eyes look me up and down in a way that feels like they are kissing every inch of me
They smile and laugh at my jokes
They comfort me in my sadness
They tell me goodnight with the deepest regrets

Your eyes tell me the words you won't say
They do the things you're too afraid to
They are brave while you hide behind them
Yes, I'd love to spend a summer looking in your eyes
They are honest, and you lie

She said, "You make me feel like I'm in the wrong skin."

And as he sat there in contemplation of this newest revelation

She told him about Thursday
And how he'd kissed her that way
And how it made her feel whole
As if they were one being meant to be
Joined at the mouth,
But had snapped apart and were together
Again

She told him about the way her heart
Raced with anxiety
And her fingers shook every day
But when he kissed her everything went numb
And her brain thought slowly
And the world kept turning
And she wasn't afraid it would stop anymore

Finally, she told him about the skin
She told him that being away from him
Made her snap back to reality
But she had finally tasted happiness
And her old reality felt all wrong
She felt all wrong without him

She asked him if he loved her
She couldn't bear to leave him

He didn't hear a word

"But your skin is so beautiful."

And he leaned in and kissed her.

I miss you in your end of the couch, your side of the bed
There's just air where you used to sit,
But somehow I'm still struggling to breathe

I miss you in the drowned spider in the shower
You always took the bugs outside
Because I couldn't bear to look at them

I miss you in your old sweatshirt,
The grey crewneck that smells like you
I put it on sometimes, but I swear it's softer when you wear it and pull me into your arms

I miss you in the silence in the morning
I tried to play your old records today,
But I spent an hour looking at the box, waiting for your selection

I miss you most in the feeling you gave me
We created a world that was overflowing with happiness
And without you I'm just empty

she looked up at him
as if he were the center of her world
but he saw her as an endless galaxy
before which, he was just a speck

he was the only one who
could see through the black
of her eyes and find
the things she had meant to say

her eyes held words,
planets full of words,
but his held the sun,
and she just couldn't look away

His fingertips left trails
Of tingling nerves as they
Gently brushed across her skin
And she smiled because she loved him


Your nails dug into my skin
Leaving me scarred, damaged
Taking away even the smallest pieces of me
And I smiled because you were being kind tonight

The sun is so hot
It pierces my pale, pale skin
I am on fire

I don't think I ever loved my own voice
Until I learned to read poetry out loud.

My friend asked me about my conversation with you today.
I told her you must have run over me with a truck.
She was confused, and I explained that you left me speechless.

I had always thought I was seamless until now
that my skin was smooth
that you couldn't see the lines of my personality,
only where they should be

but the other day I could swear you pulled a string off my shoulder
and it never stopped unraveling
I'm quickly falling to pieces
just a pile of thread where there once was cloth

I'm just a pile of wool thread that used to be a beautiful sweater.

You unravel me
and I can't make it stop.

She walked on through the trees
The branches stuck out menacingly,
Poiting their knife-like ends at her
And she tried her best to duck around them
One caught her knee
And she silently said a prayer of thanks
Because it missed the open wound on the joint
By a mere three inches
Still, the fresh cut bled just like the rest

This was good luck

She reached the end of the trees
And something strange happened
The corners of her parched lips turned up
Against her will,
As if they didn't understand the weight of gravity,
As if they had forgotten the things that had preceded this forest
The things she wouldn't be able to forget

But oh, it felt so wonderful to *smile

She had collarbones like knives.
Her teeth were white as a snake's fangs,
And her eyes bright,
But dangerous,
As if they held the snake's venom.
The irises were black as coal,
Black as night, an enlargement of her pupils.
She didn't walk like she owned the place,
She walked like she created the planet
And everything on it.

She kept her jaw set.
She kept her head high.
She kept her confidence untouchable.

She counted every boy she'd truely loved on one hand,
Starting and ending with her *******.
She left the world feeling afraid of her,
But no one ever broke her heart again.

I want to feel endless

wrap your body around mine
until I lose myself

if only for just a moment

take my hand in yours, so that,
when you pull away, you
take my sorrows with you

so even when you're gone I'm happy

run your fingers ever so gently
across my skin
I want every neuron, every nerve ending
to feel on fire, just once

because I need to feel alive

take me home,
kiss away the bad memories,
and let me sleep in your arms

I want to feel infinite.

I'm a mess
And I'm 99.99% sure there's
A rope tied around my heart because

Why else would my chest feel so heavy?

And the knot must be right below my lungs,
An inch or two under the hollow in my chest there.

And even though that's where I think it is,
I can't find it without cutting myself open
And spilling my viscera all over the floor.

So please, shake me until the knot loosens
So I can finally breathe again

And shake all of the feelings out with it.

Eleanor lives in house number three
And walks through her garden there
It's the place where she always wants to be.

There's a swing outside hanging from the tree
That she and her neighbors share,
Eleanor who lives in house number three

Eleanor and her friends squeal with glee
As they take turns flying through the air
It's a place where they always want to be.

As she swings she imagines what it's like to be free
And to live a life without any cares
In a world away from house number three

She tried to beg and she tried to plea
Now children only play there on a dare
It's a place where no one wants to be.

Eleanor tried her best to flee
But he caught her by the hair
Eleanor lived in house number three
And that's where her soul will always be.

poetry is expression

it is a window,
a way to open your mind
to new ideas

it is a light,
a way to see things that
had been hidden before

it is a lens,
a way to see the world
from a slightly different view

but most of all,
poetry is a mirror
it is a reflection of the writer
and in the best case,
the readers will see themselves too

poetry is expression

Let me tell you about a girl I know

She lives in a brick house,
But her mind's encased in one-way glass
She can see through others,
But she rarely says what she's thinking

She drinks to feel free
But finishing the bottle doesn't make the boys love her
It just breaks the rules,
Something that is all too ordinary,
all too easy for her

You want to believe that she's dependable, she's responsible,
But her only certainty is her constant lies

As smart as she is,
She finds herself in the middle--
Caught in someone else's game-- all too often

She's never without a joke or prank,
Wears them like sunglasses
So that no one can see the emotions behind her eyes

She's begging for security
She's a liar, a manipulator,
A girl starved for something real

And she won't let herself have it

I want to live in the
Hollow just above your collar bone
I'd like to leave all of my kisses
On your neck,
In the space just below your ear
I'd wake up just to watch
Your eyelids dance in your sleep
if only you'd give me the chance

the way you smile
and the way you look
when you finally laugh

****

that's the stuff worth living for

Tension runs through me
because I'm holding back.
I feel it all around me,
Can you feel it too?

There are so many emotions unspoken
So many poems hidden and unread
So many things I could have told you
So many things I should have said

Tension runs through me
as I try to hold back.
I feel it all around me,
Is it running through you too?

he had stars in his eyes
when he was excited about something,
an energy she could feed on,
and a way of speaking that
left her feeling like the world
was, in fact, a good place

they say she was broken too early
she picked up the pieces and
put them together crudely with tape
then she built the wall,
to hide her poor creation from the world

what they don't know is that her heart aches
just thinking of the city
her heart aches when she remembers the past
her heart aches when she sees his face
her heart aches because it will never be the same

Oh, you have so much power
But you can't even see it
You could make her do anything
With a smile on her face
You could ask her anything
And she'd answer with her best quip
You could steal her heart
But she already gave it to you
--Giftwrapped-- With no hesitation
And you've held it hostage
Like the greedy boy you are

I should tell you...
there's always music
right here,
between my ears

it never stops
-- but sometimes it changes,
like when I see you

it picks up the pace
my heart is it's rhythm,
and it's a fantastic new song
--loud and strong,
beautiful and happy--
that makes me stand up
and dance around
twirling
circles and circles
until I fall down again

I told myself you were the sun.
I bathed in the light you radiated.
You warmed me up.
You made me happy again.

But I could never fall asleep
just thinking about you.
It was never that simple,
and it wasn't quite right.

Now I'm looking at old photographs
that I took down from the wall;
there I am, smiling with your arm
wrapped around me -- you were looking away.

she watched as the world fell apart around her,
everything worse than before, a new kind of interruption

she felt her chest tighten, her heart ached more than ever
her throat had a new lump that made it hard to swallow

and she got that feeling again,
the one that told her she must do absolutely anything to fix it

give me a thousand options every day

every day I'll pick the boy
who can recite my favorite poem from memory
and never ceases to make me smile

my body has never felt so heavy
my skin has never been so hot
it takes effort to climb just a few stairs
and when I lie down,
it's like I'm sinking into the bed below me
too heavy to move
too hot to move
I am burning away like coal
but I'm not getting any lighter

I feel like I am living
solely off of memories.

Perhaps Emily said it best
when she said that hope is like a bird
but I believe for some,
hope is much more like a set of keys.
When it's lost,
life gets a lot more worrisome,
and it's hard to function.
But when it's found,
suddenly the world opens up again.