Your soul calls out to me, did Lethe make us forget? Who we were to each other?
Who are you?

It matters not, I reached you too late and our souls entwine, fingertips brush.. but I can never cross the ocean between us.

Despite all my words, all my 'wisdom' - my temper gets me into trouble.

I told you I wasn't good.
I told you that people would fail you, we both knew.
Yet you opened up because we asked and it was a crack, a slither of who you are.

But it was enough, it was enough.
I'm sorry I failed you. You should never trust anyone - but I wanted to be one of your exceptions.

eating the ****** weapon and
wearing the fur.
i have nothing to say so i ramble,
and think about what i should buy you for christmas
and how ill give it to you without
tripping the wires
you keep around me

I never once kept the door closed,
Despite everything that would make you think otherwise.
My arms tremble at the thought
Of pulling all this weight again.
But I was ready.
The things you do for love
Or what you thought love was.

Nothing says emotional stability like dollar store sleeping pills.
Inertia for a brain
I let it all pile up
Until I'm buried in snow like a cokehead fever dream.

I fell asleep on the high road
Waiting for you to run me over.

he leans in to kiss you. his lips graze yours, a careful brush, so close but not close enough, as the two of you breathe the same air. his breath is warm, his body is warm, everything about him is so warm when you feel so cold. next to him you feel like ice. and his touch melts your cool skin, and you’re melting, melting, gone. you’re kissing him, your chapped lips on fire. your baby is the sun and yes, you know this is going burn eventually. it burns already anyway. but you’d burn into ashes for him. you’d fade for him until there was none of you left.

his gaze leaves nothing of you. you burn until you smolder every time he looks your way. he’s older than you, and it’s almost like he’s lived so many centuries before this one. and he calls you “my love” and “baby boy” and he makes you feel soft even when you’re sweat drenched, even when your skin tastes like the ocean.

you’re on fire, but it’s alright. / there’s pain in this desire, but nothing’s felt more right.

icarus, your baby is a fire.
no.
your baby is a thousand fires.
your baby is a thousand fires,
and each one is so beautiful,
that you don’t mind
how heated
things are getting.

this love is tragic, dear icarus.  and although you know it’s going to **** you, or maybe even because you know it’s going to **** you, you can’t stop loving him, and the heat radiating from his skin.

Please don’t say not all men, when me too
becomes me three, me four, then twenty,
two thousand, too many for boy to be boys
or locker room talk.

We can’t talk away when men power grab
for things they have no right to touch,
with 140 characters insincere apologizes.

It’s time to man up and speak out and say
that being a gentleman is more than chairs and doors.
It’s less bro fists, shrugs and awkward laughs.
Instead, it is not cool bro, and really man you know better.

Because we know better, we know what goes on behind
closed doors, and only dealing with it when the doors are open
is not a solution but a symptom of the problem.

Being a nice guy does not give you access to her thighs.
Compliments don’t allow you to pass judgements
and what she wears, where she goes and what she does
does not mean a free pass.

If this culture thinks silence is permission
than I will be loud until no one has to say me too.

one
Be gentle, because they don’t know any better. I know that you’re the child, and I know that you’re scared, and I know that it isn’t your job to be gentile or kind but I also know that being gentile is easier than being angry.

two
Make sure to give up your heart and soul first. Take your feeling and put them into a box, and shove that box far away because God knows that they’ll only heart them anyways.

three
Read well and often. Send your mind into a new, completely different world for a little while. You need it. We all need it.

four
Learn how to be distant. Learn how to love from afar. Being close will only hurt more in the long run.

five
The most important part of loving an alcoholic is loving you first. You are not your parent’s mistakes. You are not what caused them to break so harshly that they turned to a bottle rather than a book, a drink rather than their daughter.

I learned how to love an alcoholic before I learned to love myself. And to this day, I’m still learning.

i’ve been thinking a lot
about your hand in mine
the way that our fingers
and palms intertwine

but i think about death
about loss, about worth
i admit that i fear
to return to the earth

where our bodies dissolve
into roots of a tree
and will grow into trunk
then limb, then leaf

but i've heard from a bird
that death will reverse
and your heart will beat hard
like it did at your birth

so hold on for dear life
with your hand in mine
if death makes us let go
it is only for time



© Mike Mortensen

to the monsters under my bed//

i see all of you. in this distorted pink glow, i see you. you whisper at night when i’m wrapped in blankets and my toes are cold. you say things. you creep into my mind and whisper tainted words that are not sweet nothings, but bitter everythings. i do not dream. i become my fears, shattering mirrors so i do not have to see them. i don’t have to see myself.

you are these battle scars, and the reason i am ashamed of them. you are the soft melody with harsh words and you’re on repeat. you’re ******* relentless.

when i was younger, you stayed in my bedroom and came out at night to taunt me. you’re everywhere now. your insults are the godforsaken soundtrack i’m living with.

living. what’s that mean? i sometimes wish i could carve strength from my bones, and wear it around my neck. i slide in and out of the present. no one notices, and the only relic that i bring from this time travel is an ugly one.

i remember being touched on my upper thigh/hands on my face/fear/living in the eyes of the sun/nothing. i remember nothing.

i hate you.

i hate the taste of damp salt. i miss the key to my heart being copied and handed to those who wanted to explore it. i don’t miss the house parties held there by the undeserving. the mess left. the cleaning process. attempting to heal.

some days i awoke and all of your eyes were staring into mine. it did not feel like looking at the stars. it felt like a glimpse of hell. a swear word. a sea of red.

i see all of you. but that doesn't mean that i accept you. in this distorted pink glow, i see you. and you’re not just under my bed.