When I was a child
I never slept under the covers
Because I hated feeling confined
By a space I knew wouldn't save me,
Quite like I wanted to believe it could.

But no amount of pillow forts
Or draped polyester sheets
Could keep the boogeyman
From getting into
My head
Or provide me
With a way out when he did

What is the darkness?
What is in the darkness
With one less sense
My eyes can adjust

But my fear
Finds an incline in every lonesome sight
Found in the corner of my open eye.
Or every heartless creak
That doesn't have a home,
Until the daylight
Creeps in to greet my
Wakeful mind.

The rays of light
Aren't any more reassuring
To the monsters under my bed
Than the slivers of darkness
Are to the little girl
Who is afraid
Of an absence of color.

Perhaps that is where my
Love of lightning
Drew a spark.
Amidst the rain
I would stay up for hours to sing to:
A song in the thunder
Written just for me

I find a comfort
In having proof that
Something bigger than myself
is at work
On a lonely night

The dark presence in
darkness
Never sufficed
To make me feel as alone
As I wanted to be

But a storm
Was always a friend
I welcomed into
My drifting sleep

They tell lots of stories,
Those scars on your knuckles.
Above mounts of glory
You know when you're home.

You act like you know
The answer to everything,
But you speak around questions
Because you know that you don't

I know what you're thinking,
Don't say it out loud
Because it will just ruin the moment.
I thought better things about you
Until now.
But now I don't know
Who I'm alone with

I wanted to tell you
But the words met traffic in my throat

My eyes peak through
The gaps between your fingertips

Have I caught it?
Or will my grasp lose grip?

The weakness in your voice
Spoke to me a language I had hoped you'd never know

You're fluent
And you've out grossed a mid-summer's day

As you speak
A crow's feet make their way

I know how
This is going to end

I can see
Somewhere known in my rearview

My brain is fighting
The migration in my stomach
But I know better
Than to follow every heart
That passes by.
My hopes are higher
Than my expectations.

I've been here before,
My naivety has yet to depart
But the more I over think your words
The more cautiously I have to find my own

Yet you always leave me with a loss.

I'm a deer in the headlights.
More mayhem than
The Allstate commercials
Circulates my brain
With the idea
That I am actually worth
A love I've always dreamed of.

I don't know the shape of your handwriting yet,
An authenticity built
Constructing more than just words
Or indentions in the paper.
I dream of tracing my fingers
Across your ink ridden paths
To find a memento just for me.

But I don't even know if you'll remember
A promise I'd never break.
I'll be Mrs. Goldfarb
Waiting for the mail
Waiting on you
to stop and
Wait

I couldn't read by the ocean
The sea breeze prematurely
Flipped each page for me.
My eyes caught
The very words I had been
Anticipating for hours

I found the end
Before I configured a beginning.
Much like the way my daydreams
Never quite know how to step
Out of the clouds.
Probably because
They have a hard time finding
A ground they've never known

Tales taller than myself
Filled up my silly little brain
With the idea that
I'd rather jump ships
Than skip from stone to stone

The water here is polluted
More than the people.
They insist on throwing their
Things
Into the ocean.
The problems they've been
Tossing away all these years
Always find their way back to
Shore

But I find that there's a sunrise
In the middle of the day
Coasting over every lonely coast
In search of a girl
With her head under the waves

Life is a little more peaceful there

My mind is racing again
At 4:37 am
I wish my grades were as heightened
As my inability to sleep

I’ve been having nightmares
But they don’t scare me anymore
Sometimes
I find a comfort in knowing
That the monsters I’ve dreamt
Are a lot more pleasant than the monsters
I have left to dream

I don’t mind it
But I mind you
Only because you’re always on my
Mind

I pretend that I’m a solipsist ,
But I could have just made it up
Your love wasn't as real in my heart
(As it was in my head)

I am a shy little flower
Somewhere behind the trees
“There’s really no way to reach me”
But there is.
No one has taken the time to
Explore

I once met a girl
A traveler in that moment
She told me a story about her grandmother
Who was shipped to a boarding school in Germany right after WWII.
At the age of three
The first sentence she ever understood was:

"Everything is broken"

And she lived a whole life
With that silly little thought
Echoing.

Someday
I will find an ocean breeze
Worth calling my home
With sand as soft
As my tinder
Beating heart

Good night
Is a formulation of words
Whose meaning I am still
Unfamiliar with

As I walked along
Your art stricken walls
I wonder if I’ve ever really been capable
Of creating

But hardly ever do I strike an inspiration
I can call entirely my own