The alcohol that you measure in your graduated cylinder  
is not the alcohol you binge drink on the weekends,
is not the alcohol your parents drink out of elegant crystal,
but they all burn.

Burn like the knowledge that knowledge gets you swallowed into the abyss of faceless statistics only to fill up the remaining desks left by those who care too much not to.

Life is too short to worry about why 1, 2, 3 has turned into your abc's while life screams just shut your textbook, please. There's love, and ***, and drugs just waiting for you to realize that school rots the brain, not Mary Jane.

But Mary Jane still sits with her nose in a book, knowing life doesn't end when the graduation caps fly up,
                                                           up,                    
                                         ­                        up to the top of her class, because money may not buy happiness but without a solid education financial stability is a joke, and it's a matter of time before you crash and burn,
                                                                ­          burn like the alcohol in your red solo cup, chugging away the inevitable:
                        life is wasted by the try-hards and the try-nots.

The geeks and the nerds whose potential is squandered by the system, teaching them how to read rubrics and recite rhymes and reiterate the same ******* spoon-fed to them by those who failed to exceed to the limitations of the textbook.

The hippies, the druggies, the ones who can be found in the dark hallways and back rooms and hugging the outside walls all see the futility in it all. so why not jump out of an airplane without a parachute because each joint only lasts a few puffs, and the high only a few short blinks until you are thrown back down to earth.

High school reveals how you will survive life: in one impetuous bright burst or one prolonged apathetic smolder. But all the blazers and all the late-night homework-doers will have to put out the flame or turn off the light sooner or later.

My hunger pains lull me to sleep;

they scream victory.

I think too much,


                                              and sometimes
                                                       ­                         

                                      ­                                               I forget to breathe.

the world is too bright.
i am blinded by false smiles and laughs strained to reach that falsetto note.
that preconceived notion that paradise of the land brings paradise of the mind.
sand is still sand, and water is still water,
less we quantify their quality by purity and color.
sand is still sand and water is still water,
and i am still me.

the world is too bright,
so i filter it into sepia tones gentler to the mind's eye and swim to where the water meets the clouds.
i am drowning,
but not from the ocean's relentless caresses,
but from the world's relentless stresses:
beauty that is measured and calculated,
saturated with standards that burn like the sun and are as intangible as its rays,
a paradise built on sand as quick as it is to judge.    

so i swim to where the water meets the clouds.
where the water is still water,
and i am still me.

devour me.
eat me until there's nothing left
but a hollow shell and heavy
breathing.
cast me to the side,
tears stained black,
thoughts fuzzy and a bad taste to
the tongue.
skin tearing, lungs collapsing,
just breathe.

the world spins,
falling, falling,
crashing.
heads on fire,
eyes diverted.
quick, silent footsteps across rotting ground,
dark rooms and dank air.
words that tumble and jumble,
roll out of the mouth before they can
be put back into their iron cages.

**** on my insides until theres
nothing left,
but a wondering as to what comes
next.

just breathe.

the sun comes up.
my demons are put to rest.

a red velvet cupcake wrapper casts shadows on the desk while
abandoned crumbs still cling to a dainty mouth.

a rose dress worn by rosy cheeks and some pink thighs,
pink thighs that stay petite to match that flawless, porcelain stomach.
a stomach he wants to grab, and pull, and hold.
fleshy lips and rough tongues.
pleasure on the lips, on the hips, on the tips
of the fingers
that intermingle, and intertwine
that trace the perfect buds of a budding girl.

stark white snow ******* the life out of the frozen ground.
stark white sheets ******* the life out of men.
gloves that come in neat little packages signifying
love?
lust.
trust?
a gift given that can never be returned.
she can never return.
yet the bumping and thrusting and heaving continue.
sweet smelling sweat and sultry sighs.
roses are not innocent.
they conceal thorns, they draw blood.

blood the color of the last remains of a cupcake,
frosted with secrets and assumptions.
a pleasure on the lips, but
never on the hips.

when all i want is to be free
im trapped
behind a suffocating layer of myself
when all i want is to taste
i dont
i will myself to turn away from temptation
when all i want is to succeed
i fail
too little or none, i shed nothing
i am still all that i was before