I can promise you
second hand nicotine and
so many muddy metaphors and
every ounce of poetic nonsense
you've always wished for
I can promise you
tangerines, sticky kisses
and little glances
that will swell your heart
with something that could only be
special
I can promise you
that it won't be
I can promise you
that I'll run
I can promise you
that you should take these promises
and
run faster

I think that
perhaps
I've finally grown tired
of finding new ways
to say that
simply

I am sad.

kiss my spine
so intimate
your flaming breath
seeps through me
as if the years have made me porous

trace the silhouette
of my calloused fingers
and linger
on the ridges of my wrist
you shiver
I resist
the temptation of escape

rest your head against my own
so heavy with memories
the sinking weight
of stories never told

I taste your breath
I taste your empathy
I taste the words
you never said

I have always yearned
to make music
maybe
I just don't have any music to make
Simply so much to say
but no courage to converse it
in need of beats and melodies
to camouflage
the vulnerability
that I present with my words

you are heavy
wearing the dust that has settled
on your sadness like a crown
you've grown so accustomed
to your fog
your water logged eyes
they demand an escape
yet you won't
let you
let me
lift you out

To find a calm state of mind
A meditation to stop
The steady resistance of my brain.

Silence.

Leaving you to the mercy
Of your darkest ambitions
There's no point in running
Continuity is a curse.

I thrive off of change
Your sickly sweet contradictions
Always keep me entertained
Yet another reason to stay insane

every time I write
it's like my fingers have to
dance around your memory
sweeping your substance
under my keys
not even an ounce
unearthing you
could so easily swallow me

don't cry
don't cry
don't ******* cry

but be honest
stay honest
stay logical
but don't stuff your emotions
be honest
be logical
don't cry
be strong
but don't push back



just don't ******* cry

we kissed like
that last bit
of drunken innocence
could cauterize
our wounds

but instead
we bled into each other
your sighs filled my
hunger
and you didn't know
that those scars were new
and I wanted
you to pretend
I wanted to
pretend for you

but really
I wanted to be full
and your lips were warm
and wanting you
was nothing new
and two hours of sleep
was plenty
for another day
of our pretending

the irony:
killing time
ends up killing me

but hey,
it's nothing personal
it's strictly business

far too sober
and far too lucid
to formulate
anything worthwhile

but I'm nothing
if not stubborn

alas
it's an underrated
virtue

Too many deep breaths
feels like desperation
You bleed through other people
you're an expert on salvation
The horizon of your hips
is by far my favorite mystery
Temptation told me tales of
our impossible history
it just hit me
you don't mind sunrise
because morning aren't
saturated, stained with goodbyes
I want to know your
when, how and why's
Where your worries go
at the end of the night
Then I could take your misunderstanding
as love
Because it can't be understood
so much as coveted
and
There's something in my past
that makes my head not grasp
why I ended up surrounded
by a world of destructed evolution
You can be my problem
I've had enough solutions
Too many left and forgotten
Too many ways to get lost
I may not be whole again
tangled in your fantasy
So captured in my abandon.

I won't take one more day
of being dulled down
to your level
Suppressing the rest of
what keeps me from hell
because your fragile grasp of power
is just that tangible

You say I stress on your spine
I know it's just that
my existence
escapes the boundaries
of your mind
when this exasperation
can't escape
when you so refuse all reason
I ache to break
the balmy surface of my skin
(in the end
I cannot win)

I know I owe you
for a life I never got to choose
for all these years
marked by faded bruises
though I love you
you've barely got
respect to lose

I have such torturous confliction
on whether or not I'm long gone
and I don't know what it's like
(to be here at all)
what if I never get better?
what if I'm worse than I thought?
what if it's never been real?
what if it's all that I've got?

brushing sand back and forth
I wonder where your eyes rest
drinking in the possibilities
that yearn to exist
anticipation
of a rising tide
hopeless hurry
because in the end
I can't be satisfied

why do you do it, if it won't last?
it will just get destroyed in the end

well,
don't we all?

*yet we persist

four hundred ninety four days.
forever became
an impossible promise.

the broken rush
resonates through my skull
reminiscent of heavy footsteps
My nightmares
all returning
climbing onto my chest
weighing me down
I wouldn't dare open my eyes
terrified
Daddy said I would forget
well he was wrong
and so was I
to twist my subconscious into lies
creating a getaway
So my monsters followed me to the grave
so it seems
and nobody is left to save me
do the terrors win?
is this really the end?
the weight on my chest
sinks deep
into my heart it bends
If its over
might as well
see the creatures
dragging me to hell
with my last breath
my final moment
it will be said
that my eyes were open

half hearted apologies
200mg of sertraline
grapefruit (too bitter like acidic nostalgia)
concealed lust
that endings are so final
that they can still lack closure

cherry stem knots
lonely hearts
imperfect truths
melting ice (to cool my nerves)
misunderstood temptations and thoughts

narcissistic thought
introspective questions
philosophy
and solid facts

please get out of my head
I'd honestly rather be dead
or at least sleeping
than searching my soul
or creating some ******* identity

this isn't a poem
you've been fooled
this is a comatose rant

this is cigarette ashes
blowing in the air
it smells like **** and gasoline

this is the scratch of a strangers beard
and his alcoholic breath
and his secrets that he's drinking away

this is failure at the end of a movie
this is disappointment
without a hiccough of glorious relief

only empty
yet overflowing
words
strung together with teenage angst
and a yearning for someone
to tell me that I'm not the only one
who sees this world
this frail sense of humanity

this is uncomfortable, sweaty bedsheets
this is tossing and turning
this is sleep with no rest

this is a stubbed toe after a breakup
this is my grey matter
attempting to produce something worth typing
and failing

but I'm too stubborn to give up.
I'm sorry.

I want to cut off the parts
of me
that remind me of you
I want a breath of
something
besides the cold hard truth
a drink of anything
to forget these bruises

your not so distant
memory
is so much more
than I bargained for

tell me how our story goes
(or went)
I'll keep pretending
that I could ever
forget

I stay clear of words that
sound too soon
questions that
will hurt too much to ask
I can **** down
a lifetime of
lies or *****
but I can't move on
while leaning on the past

terrified, that you're gone already
when you're not here, my heart feels heavy
my mouth tastes acidic
without your stubborn kisses
curl my shoulders and clench my fist
oh how I hate this distance
it gets colder as you stay quiet
you didn't promise that you'd never lie
this feels uneasy and I don't know why

you hesitate...... making me question
everything that I want to believe in
I'm learning to trust, you're my test
to see if I'm better, to see my best
my fingers search for your hair to caress
I guess I just miss you
nothing more nothing less

Then again, I know this is much more
I'm scared I'll be alone again, fighting my war
I'm worried that if you left, I'd have nothing to fight for

I don't want to need you
I detest dependance
But without you beside me, nothing seems to make sense

I'm letting down my walls, but keeping my shell
before these few months, I was living in hell
I'm changing my ways for you, can't you tell?
I refuse to slip back into the place where I fell

I guess I just want to be worth your time
to be beautiful for you, so you stay mine

I'm a constant battle over this
I want to starve, live off of cigarettes and your kiss
on the other hand, I know where that will lead,
I need to keep fighting
I won't let you see me bleed.

I kept pretending
That I couldn't remember your name
So determined that you weren't
Worth the time of day
I guess it's a reflection
Of my own sorry self
Such pretentious invention
Of isolation's hell

late night cravings
and spurs of inspiration
that kind of cold stillness
that makes you want to write

white noise, loud thoughts

get away get away get away

time is running fast
no one noticed that you stopped
overwhelming numbness
chills your nerves

losing momentum

slipping away
again
so soon

This is a letter
To you

My thoughts are hectic
They bleed through my sinuses
Asking me to give up
Never! My heart screams
But my gut agrees
It aches to slip back into emptiness
I yearn to shrink away
Like I have in my dreams

I feel eyes on my spine
Making me doubt my sadness
An angel drops with the beat of my drum

Children are screaming
They don't know what to do with their hands

There's an esoteric understanding of the stars
And their shimmer

Did you witness the jump?
Do you consume your lust?
I live, in a cryptic sense.
Tear out the pages that remind you of home
We're dusty and unused
Blurring at the edges
Like monochrome photographs

Clasp your hands and cover your eyes
Covering you from the pouring lies

Overdose on oxygen
Keeping you alive until it decides you should die
It's reminiscent of your pessimistic outlook

I have nothing else to say.

Bittersweet
almost metallic
your fingers pull me closer
I can't wait anymore
let's digress
into the silence
of understanding
fill in the cracks
while you calm my tremors
Find a new sense of serenity
that I never thought was meant for me
when I found you
I realized you were missing
don't leave me
but don't make promises
that you can't keep
I know that you're under
these starry nights,
with or without me.

You say I’ve never considered suicide
Not seriously at least
Not enough to lose sleep
You always hear about the cases
But the bridges seem so far away
But when everyone is disappointed
Each smile is an extra effort
It seems so sweet
I can almost taste relief
An end
An escape
How many muscles does it take?
To pull a trigger?
No one will give me an answer to the real question
So what’s the point?
Searching for a purpose
A reason
The music of water filling lungs
Lulls me to sleep
Playing over and over in my dreams
In hopes for a break from reality
I’m trying to think of things I love
But they seem to have faded
I feel lethargic
I’m inhaling an iron aroma
A smell of veins and mind games
Burning flesh and hair in flames
Eyes closing
The pain is gone

I wake up,
look at you,
I see everything.
while I linger
on the corners of your mouth
I see the pillars of morning light
and the way your breath
is hypnotic

I see the moment between
dreaming and day
for all it's worth
and I know in my bones
that it's worth holding onto
I see your eyebrows furrow
and remember why
I should burn the letters
that I write when I'm angry

I remember when I saw you
and I couldn't remember
where we'd gotten lost
but my soul sighed with relief
when I found you

I see you
and I see everything

There is so much i can do
to push back on the weight
of my shortcomings
To counteract
those words that don't fit right
those doubts that scrape at my
peace of mind
collapsed and buried alive
by ten tons of
'what if's and 'I'll do better's
you told me to dig deep
but I'm already
too far under

I loved the silliness
the secrets
and the penny paid thoughts

but all I dream about when sleep comes
is the thirsty selfishness
and I'm caught
between nightmares
and daydreams
in between
brutal introversion
and broken seams

tired of your consistent inconsistencies
and your forgetful debt
to false threats
of answered prayers

Tracing your face in charcoal
(I can never get the eyes right)

Counting out the melodies
In the whistle of the wind
Rereading wrinkled obituaries
mouth to mouth
lets pass the smoke
And bathe in our amateur poetry.

Feel my spine against your chest
Watch the shadows drift
We don't need a thing.
Try to forget the minutes
I'll listen to you sing

I never learned not to bite my nails
But hell you still smoke cigarettes
And in our bad habits
We found the closest thing to happiness
That I've ever seen.

We always meant to paint your room
But in the end your empty walls
Were somewhat calming

Your know that I've grown fond
Of finding stories in the ceiling
And we'll lay here
until the paint starts peeling

I'm a ghost of a persona.

until the bath water goes cold
watch the day go dark

Letting unanswered questions fall
Onto the stagnant water
Look into my own glazed eyes
In the waving reflection below your neck

I'm cursed to never understand
How you call just one place home

For now lets pretend like I'll never leave
Breathe in the rising steam
Lets never forget this moment

sometimes I write goodbyes
to prepare for hellos
and maybe that's why
they like me
(when I'm distant)

Call it what you will
But the voices
Just
      Get
             Louder
Take their words
Take a pill
Make
        Them
                 Prouder
There's only two ways
Up or off the edge
Lets
       Just
               Fly
Our feet can float
Above the ledge
Let
      Me
            Die.

when my fingerprints
are full of ink
or
tip tapping on the keys
I am subject to denial
for
I have not lived with enough
of myself
to write anything
worth your time.

These words slip through my lips like a sharks fin
Condemning me to troubled waters
The disease acts like a doctor
A treatment to weeping
An emotion dripping in
Chasing me to the deep end
Time passes as nights bloom
Into an ocean for the stars
Diving, dipping in.

Her parted lips
awake in a sleeping city
And time again drifted away
the hurt of memory along for the ride
Her spine curved over
Tracing the letters of a prayer
Whispered
Collected in my eyes
Injected in my mind
a changing sincerity
her inspiration
Sprinkled across the dark
Of the city’s reflection
We won’t miss a thing.

my bones feel hollow in the winter's silence
crisp wind cuts through the seasons
bringing an atmosphere
of endings

my reflection in the lit up city window
seems morbid
in comparison to the ribbons and stars
families rushing to warmth
expectations of kin
stiff grins and distant conversations

the absence of magic
that once sparkled in my sight

not desolate, though
another run around the sun
brings hopeful glimmers
of beginnings

surprise me
with outstanding empathy
with passionate
thirsty curiosity
outstretched hands
and eye contact
that doesn't seem so
v a c a n t

apparently
you're gone.
In a way that you've left no remains.
I was holding on to
a concept
an ill timed joke
like sand
it slips
right through
my fist

My knuckles turn white
with sincerity
and I ponder the rain
that hits me
like a million kisses
did you stand under this rain
did you dance
did you think of our embrace

I'm letting you free

but first
I have to destroy
everything
myself
your memory
and any left over belief

we were
but we are not

a beautiful concept
that can't live on

and it is foolish
to clutch on to
dreams that are gone

You held my face so I couldn’t look away
Your words so achingly innocent
I couldn’t help but believe you
Nothing was more real than your dreams
Following the streets
We look for change
But never kept our inspiration
The lights had dimmed over time
It’s a ****** lullaby
Losing yourself to the wings of desire
You’ve lost your concentration
You’re losing your subtle charms
Looking through your imagination like a kaleidoscope
Mixing and matching the world
So real it kills your senses
Ends the devotion flashing in your eye
The skin of the drum
Pounding to keep you alive
You’re waiting to forget
The devastation of your last cigarette
The flooding of an argument
Against my reason
These are the nightmares
That you wouldn’t believe