I have never seen a specter so graceful
yet so distortedly horrible
it’s like looking into silver
and seeing
shadow
where you should smile at
ruby lips and crystalline eyes

instead you watch skin melt
like a box of crayons in hell
are we not in hell
I see a ghost everyday

I see her glide down
and shimmer in the rain
she looks like madness
like straight sin stuck in spirit
encased in gilded goblets
just don’t scratch the surface
or you’ll be disappointed

they want to hold her until
it comes to walking home
she knows she will drift
down wet sidewalks alone
no one can see her anyway
apparitions are hallucinations

I would like to paint my vision
but alas, I only have graphite
so I’ll describe her in light:
there is something so beautifully sinister about chandeliers

everyone wants to swing on glass crystals
until
they
shatter
and all of a sudden you cry
phantom

she is put together
twenty-four seven
breath of peppermint
perfume of floral heaven
she is perfectly mannered
exceptionally kind
you'd never notice
everything else on her mind
she is incredibly smart
her words are so witty
tied off with a ribbon
just to make them look pretty
she is never not smiling
all happy-go-lucky
the best mask to put out
when her days are just sucky
she is friendly to all
personality of bubbles
the kind of person who wants
you to forget all your troubles

but she is more than just
a tin of altoids always on hand
a spritz of marc jacobs to make her smell grand
a perfectly proper dollop of grace
an unworried smile on an unconcerned face
a paper fine-tuned and turned in on time
a colorful poem with many-hued rhymes

she is constantly tired
a string ball of stress
sometimes she can't be bothered
so today her hair is a mess
she is sometimes unhappy
sometimes stuck in the pain
so being silent and distant
might help keep her sane
she is incredibly stubborn
needs to have the last line
born with a hard nose
she refuses to resign
she is not so perfect
she will constantly fail
but if there's one thing she is
it's someone who will prevail

yes, she is a can of la croix
and all things filled with joy
but silver packages all wrapped
can keep treasures trapped
so take her as she is
all the sour and sweet
because without all these things
she wouldn't be complete.

your blood is boiling
your heart is pounding
but
screaming at the cars
won't make that red light turn green

You have scooped out the sky’s stars
Scattering them into sparkle soup
Compressing them into a can
That crackles when I crack it
I often think of how
You sit so sweetly on my shelf
Cold and crisp, you patiently perspire
How you cover my tongue in twinkles
And coat my throat in glitter
My lips fascinated by your fizz
Bubbles on my breath
And spangles as I swallow
Oh, La Croix
There are few things
That bring me as much joy
As sipping on your summertime
And seeking you in supermarkets
How I long to reunite with your refreshness
For you cure my carbonated cravings
Through your effervescent ecstasy  
With a hint of lime.

past rows of cookie-cutter houses
the left bike path gives way
to the red metal playground
where my brothers and i lived
our dad chasing us
hiding in the tube of the slide
spending hours on our spaceship
jedis outsmarting darth vader and the dark side

the stretches of field
lace their ways around the street
like the green apple sour belts
we ate until our tongues hurt
watching pick-up games
my brother and his basketball wins
dribbling with his friends
while lemon popsicles dribbled down our chins

the giant lake
filled with brightly colored kois
storks serenely standing out on rocks
i sang to them as if they listened
water rushing into our ears
balancing on a worn-out waterfall
everything man-made
and everything beautiful

the burnished blacktop
not a blemish in sight
no cars barreling down the road
our wheels would glide so silently
racing up and down smooth street
so shiny it hurt your eyes
pedaling and peeling away
if you go fast enough you could fly

the lamppost on the corner
carved into by kids
generations of neighborhood
gone as we grow up
and yet the light was never lost
the pink sky fades to dark
but to revisit and recollect
is just a walk in the park

lub dub lub dub
fist clenched in my chest
nerves and nodes grasping the strings
my pacemaker running rampant

lub dub lub dub
each chamber beats and pounds
pressure rising ever higher
millimeters of mercury mounting

lub dub lub dub
my vena cava caving in
my pulmonaries passing out
tight and taut now limp and languid

lub dub lub dub
my atriums crumpling
my ventricles moldering
its contents come spilling

liquid straw spouting
a serum suspending
red discs running
gasping for something
then slowing and clotting

my leukocytes leaking
my platelets melting
blue blood is boiling
crying for something
then breaking and rotting

my strings are snipped
cutting off the circulation
a cardiac collapse
i wanted love to make my heart beat
not bring my arteries pain
i wanted you to make my system complete
but alas it was all in vein

You say you are flickering
a candle in the night
You say you are quivering
coming too close to the light
You say you are shooting
like firework glitter
You say you are sharp
like coffee too bitter
You say you are boring
like 8am math class
You say you are itchy
like sitting on dead grass
You say you are gnawing
like dogs on a bone
You say you are rasping
like a guttural groan
You say you are cutting
like scissors and shears
You say you are frightful
but what are your fears?
Let me see
I think that’s cabinet twenty-three
Or maybe twenty-four?
Nevermind, that one is sore
I swear I organized this place
My papers each have their own space!
You say you’re piercing and pounding
at the same time?
I’m not sure my files have reason for that rhyme
If you’re cold, here’s a blanket
If you’re hot then I’ll take it
I know you’re trying to tell me,
I know you wouldn’t fake it.
Just fill out this checklist
I’ll be back in a few
Just give me the gist
So I can diagnose you.

A second is
A second is
A second
Is a minute
Is an hour
Is a million years
Is a piece of camembert
Einstein watched melting
We say we
cannot bend physics
While we will
the clocks to slow
And **** on honey-sweet
seconds
Like ants lapping
up sugar
How we twist time
like saltwater taffy
And break our
hourglasses
to scatter seconds
like sand
I do not tick tock
I would rather talk
about how time
will not fit into my
crystal frame
So what good is a clock
I say we let them liquify!
If memory assists me,
if memory persists
it’s all relative
So if my mind is on Mars
you cannot say I am late
I’m actually quite early!

Standing in the supermarket line
Pacing up and down the aisle
Colored boxes collecting in your cart
As you struggle to select
And then you choose me.
Who can blame you?
I tempt you with my tanginess
I ****** you with my sparkles
I beguile you with glitter
I fascinate you with fizz
For I know how to appeal
To those who are captivated by stars.
But be weary;
Effervescence is ephemeral
And stars disappear in daytime
My bubbly bliss ending
In a bittersweet goodbye
Nothing good lasts for long
The magic always momentary
And as quickly as I am everything
I become nothing to you
But a shiny shell of aluminum
Better suited in a blue bin
Thanks for the memories
I hope you taste lime when
You see me.

to the core.
if this is evisceration
then i can empathize
with all those creatures
cropped and chopped
sliced and diced
salt from my eyes
sprinkled as seasoning
chewed on for your convenience
until i lost flavor
and you wadded me up
whittled me into waste
this is all i am now
a carcass of bones
pulverized into powder
drifting as dust
ah, to be solid and savored
full of taste and trust
but sadly now
just reduced to
just

How nice would it be if
Empathy
Was as easy as cross check done move on?
As simple as sewing several stitches
Slapping on a “come back in a few weeks”
Put some ice on it and pop a few pills?

Empathy means realizing no trauma has discrete edges.
Trauma bleeds.
Out of wounds and across boundaries.
Sadness becomes a seizure.

When someone carves their soul open
Letting its contents spill out
The blood and guts in all their glory
How can the bandaid of that must really be hard
Stop the stream of sorrow?
How do we expect to be a tourist in the suffering of others
While reducing them to a bundle of symptoms?

Empathy is not a meteor shower of synapses
Firing across the brain
It is a choice we make to extend ourselves.

If you want to show empathy
Get your bags packed and your passport ready
You enter another person’s pain
As you’d enter another country.
You crawl into that box
Even if it’s a tight fit
And you sit.
And you listen.
And you let yourself be pierced by pain and bittersweetness
And you look for the horizon beyond the visible.
You don’t steal an experience, but you share the slice of story.
You learn that even if you mark checklist item thirty-one
It will never be over, never really cross check done.

you CAN have your cake
and eat it, too
yes, yes
i know the proverb
says you cannot
but i can override words
and you CAN eat it
and savor it with a smile
in front of everyone
frothy frosting and all
sprinkled sugar mixed
into your confetti cake
delicious
no thank you
one slice was quite enough
i'll be right back
door shuts
and you are back
in an all-too familiar place
cold tile
party smile melted off
your pastry sitting in a pile
as if it knew
it wouldn't be there long
everything so white and clean
but not for long
kneeling, crying
it doesn't take long
for your treat to reappear
a rainbow mess
but hey,
now you still have your cake!
might not taste as sweet
might burn your throat
and break your heart
but i told you
you CAN have your cake
and eat it, too
so get up
wash your hands
stare into the mirror
at someone you don't recognize
her red face
red, tear-stained face
stares in disbelief
but we all know
you'll be back
so wipe it off
grab a mint
plaster that smile back on
you look pretty!
i'll see you at the next party

I see it clear as day
Although vision blurred
I feel it, red-hot and stinging.
I see the sky crying, too
The perfect gray
I hear it, bells sweetly ringing.
It all seems so business
So pleasantly polite
So black-hides-the-blue
So completely unlike you.
But there is nothing pleasant
About the gaping hole that widens
And threatens to tear me in two.
How am I supposed to walk these halls
And not think of you?
I will see you everywhere.
I hope you know that.
I will see you in the rain  
I will see you in the red and white
I will see you in the green and gold
Doesn’t matter if time dulls the pain
Doesn’t matter if day arrives from night
Doesn’t matter if I’m suddenly old
I feel as though I’ve lived a lifetime
Or twenty.
Life is full of hard rocks
But this
This pelts me with enough
To break down a building.
And I’m broken
Melted into the fresh dirt dug up
I smell it, to the earth I’m clinging.
You are gone
I see that clear as day
But you cannot leave
I cannot bury the memories
I hope you know
I’m not even going to try.
Because they can take you away
But to me, you’ll never die.

You are stranded in a sea of people

Battered bodies that generally

Bob up and down until you cannot see

Who was just to your right and what

Shoes they were wearing as they

Are swept away by the swell when you look

Through thick throngs that search for

Someone slow to swallow whole and

Chew and churn until you hear

The suppressed screams of stragglers, but what

Did they expect to find when they

Wandered into the waves? Did they not listen

To the warnings? Is this not what they asked for?

When I first heard that cats were stuffed in poison boxes
“For the sake of physics!”
And that I was being pulled by particle puppeteers
Bending at the will of the quark queens
I wanted to snip the invisible strings
That entangled me into time-
      My brain is plastic, but not that plastic.
But we all know that no thread means dead,
And with the closing of shears comes the closing of years,
So somehow I have to accept the entwinement of time,
Calling it an envelope versus suffocation,
Embracing my identity as another fish in the net.
My life is a tumultuous tumbling into truth
So I’ll bite-
     I’ll let it wrap its layers around me.
After all, I’m no stranger to strange connection;
If I ever have time to spare,
I turn apples to eyes and hearts to metal
in the matter of a nanosecond.
But how can I meet a stranger
And call it love
In a picosecond?
How can I stretch into the sundae of sky
With stars scattered like sprinkles
And reach the caramel core of connection?
This isn’t one scoop of constellation confetti, please-
It’s not as simple as a cup or cone.
This is the sticky saltwater taffy
Before it is wrapped into ribbons.
So I grab my hammer and go to town.
It’s not easy, and sometimes
My neurons want to melt
dri
     p  p
    i
        ng
Down the page
But I grit my teeth and demand
The particles to stop propagating
For one second
And talk to me as a galaxy pedestrian.
They tell me that
The only way to see my string
Is to sit with you.
And with what time?
With no notepad?
With nothing but two forces
Tied together with
Nothing but coffee in between?
These particles can’t process
Time constraints, deadlines, schedules.
I sigh, and I try anyway.
When suddenly I am not on your sofa
But your rollercoaster
The thread of our souls made visible
With each dip and dive, each loop and lurch
You give me a piece of your world.
And suddenly we are not strangers
And tugging at heartstrings
Means something new
The layers of universe
Lead me to you.

I can handle blood, okay?
Knuckles when my wraps are loose
Sucker punches to the nose
Scalpels, scissors, screws
When the first incision flows
What I can't handle
Is knowing that I could slip from your mind
Into a pile of spontaneous moments
A slew of songs and stars
A collection of couches and cars
I check my phone too often now
So do not disturb stays on
Because when I do it,
Your message lives in a paradox of quantum superposition
Both sent and unsent, simultaneously
I don't have to wait in pain for pings
To remind me that you care
You crush me with care
But I will have to leave
My land of delusion
State of confusion
Cut off the perfusion
And come to a conclusion
My conclusion is:
I hate that my heart hurts
I hate reality sinking in
I hate leaving behind sparkles
Why couldn't they just stay locked up
In my all-too-familiar bottle of prosecco?
Why did you have to shake it up
And leave shimmer all over me?
Why do you make me want to
Sacrifice precious sleep
For another chance to impress you
And make you want me again?
I'm now not-so-subtle
Which nauseates me more
Than waiting for the first cut
Because you made me care
What a concept!
I don't know if it's a nerve block or what
But I once was feeling stuck
And now I can breathe again
I don't even know what I leave you with
So I will start with words
And Christmas lights
I hope you hang up Christmas lights
I'll stay in my world of romanticism
While methodically trying to not seem crazy
I'm never like this
But there's just something about you
That has made me want to write poetry again.

you see me as carnation pink
like the flowers you left on my porch
i'm feeling more of a seething red
like the innermost flame of a torch
i don't want to crack in front of you
but how many angsty songs can i play
you call me a saint, that's a tall task
it's hard because what am i to say?
i've been programmed to believe
that any ounce
any drop
of emotion
is too much
and i am crazy and in the wrong
but i consider myself
to be seasoned in reason
deluged in logic
i will let out a sigh
and turn the music up louder
at least you're not here to see me suffer
but then again
that's part of the problem
isn't it?

The house stands still as the sunshine trickles in
The only movement from the sparkles dancing through the window
Glinting of the glass of a hundred chandeliers
And although glittering,
The blinding bling is lonely until nightfall
When the candles are lit as tiny sparks through the glass
The shadows now shimmering as the day comes to pass
And night is almost brighter than the light
As countless couples gather for the colossal affair
Sauntering up and down marble steps
Tripping over silk gowns
Stumbling into raw ivy walls
Filling glass goblets with golden champagne
Bubbles to spark any conversation at all
Filling the soul with warmth and excitement
Until everyone’s minds are clouded and coruscating
Flashing diamonds and expensive watches
Pouring flute after flute
Until the notorious night comes to a close
And the stars from the champagne sparkles fade
Into early morning sun
Pale through the window
Waking up the chandeliers
While the rest of the house remains empty,
Yearning for another glimpse of life
Day after day.

his cologne left on my shoulder
as he said goodbye to me that day
his laughter stuck inside my head
as i scrambled for something to say
his green eyes filled with fireflies
as i tried to find something to do
his sweet words keep me up at night
and if only, if only he knew.

Throw me up against the wall!
Tie me up and let me fall
I hate soft scenes and caressing cheeks
Love isn’t patient nor for the meek
I drown and rise until I fly
Only to sink and sparkle across the sky
You’ll be pleased to know you’re the reason why.