maybe I loved you like a diary
and maybe this city is only a grid
we walk up and down each of those
streets looking for tent cities and immortality
I lead the way because I can do that now and
you follow only because I’m taller
each house looks the same in a different way
I wonder why these aches feel exactly like
things I haven’t experienced yet

I write very honest poetry and
that is something you just can’t comprehend
what is even the point in living if one day I will die?
he only writes about women, and he writes
like he has nothing but resentment for us
he *****, reeking of cigs, he ****, he drinks and he writes
every last one of us as the main character

I shiver because I’m tired
I trip because I’m sober
I used to say I write confessional poetry
but maybe I was just lazy
maybe I just wanted a diary

I’m so glad you’re too stupid to read my poetry and see all the ways I wish I could rid myself of you, or just this plague of love and what it feels like to love you even when you treat me like a piece of ******* ****. You’re a poison, you know, or maybe it’s just unrequited love. I feel you like you’re stuck between my teeth. A rock in my shoe. The dull of a tattoo needle. I’ve loved you, I’ve tried, but you look at me and see someone I’m not. I’m not all these bad things and I won’t stay as small as you want me to. I want more wine and I want to be in any other bed.

I have no words these days. I’m stuck in a maze inside my head and have yet to find a way out.

this is all a diary—-

I don’t know if I’ll ever stop writing to you.

Sometimes I hate everything about you.

I want to ask you questions that you’re not going to want to answer. I miss the parts of you that you’re hiding away. There’s a guy that is rocking back and forth to our left and you show me him with your eyes; I want to trust you more than anything in this world.
Do you think of her? Do you miss her? Have you spoke? I’m scared I don’t believe you.
I drink wine now, I loathe this day. My skin is itchy and I miss the way your cheek feels against mine, you’ve never felt this far and one time I slept away from you for a full month-
Is this right? Is this real?
I miss your skin. I miss feeling connected with you, I miss being able to feel secure. I miss when I saw your hands move and didn’t wonder about her, I miss the purity, the simple,
I never was supposed to like the taste of wine. The guy is rocking. The guy is rocking.

you’re holding a phone to the mirror about a foot away, the camera focused with you directly centered. your best friend talks about something or something or somewhere or someone she’s doing and you can’t help but feel like you’re behind. you ARE behind. ****** catch up.

you snap a phew photos and zoom in a bit so the photo looks more grainy. you go to work and cuff your jeans and walk without picking up your boots. you tell the girl who wants to be your friend that you can’t get a beer after work because you’re feeling like you want to get out of this space and that’s .... okay. you put your phone in your back pocket and you open up the door. you go outside.

you remember walking down a steep set of stairs in another state you haven’t visited since 2014. you remember the god awful shirt he was wearing, you remember his room smelling like **** and your body feeling so out of place. you kept your cool for twenty or so minutes. when you retell the story you like to make it seem like you ran out in a hurry but in actuality you waited a bit wondering why he didn’t kiss you. you really, really didn’t want him to, but he didn’t try.

your phone ends up back in your hand and you’re scrolling thru life sized images at an alarmingly fast rate. it beeps it buzzes. you plug it in because it’s dying. so are you. so am I

better elsewhere
better off elsewhere
better
better today
better tomorrow
better three Thursday’s from now
pull me closer, please
pull me as close as you can manage
pull me as close as you can and then
I never want to see you again
don’t touch me, don’t look at me
I want nothing to do with you
I think you’re pathetic, to be honest
I think I’m light years above you
get the **** out of my face
get the **** out of my way
I’m better than this
better today
better tomorrow
better three Thursdays from now
I hope one day, too

It’s been sunny for what feels like years and my skin is begging for moisture. I only want to talk in hyperbole but I’m afraid of not making sense, I miss the times I spent alone. I miss myself, I miss knowing who I am. I’m afraid of time with my mind, I’m afraid of what I would have to face. It once rained for weeks and I felt the most confident then.

I’m not sure I have anything to say but it’s been weeks since I’ve written and I really need to ground myself into something other than this. I’d rather scream out into the void, talk in third persons or pretend there’s someone else listening than be so afraid. You think I’m weak but I’m not. I hate that you think you know me when you couldn't be further away -/

It’s getting colder out and I’m really excited to have less of my own time soon, I say that but it’ll probably get really old not being able to go out and do whatever I want whenever I want, although I am pretty sick of the smell of cascade hops on your breath as you tell me something about some thing about something-
I wonder if I’ll ever be in a relationship where I don’t have to sneak into the bathroom to *******.
Tomorrow marks a year of my life I’ve spent with you.
The air is getting colder and I wonder exactly how much ******* in my life I’ve romanticized. I thought about you cheating on me right when I was about to finish and it didn’t even completely ruin it for me, maybe I could turn it into a good thing. A year ago exactly you slapped me and then came, now you’ve got me flat out on the ground and you’re walking and stomping all over me instead.
I do in fact get to write an angry poem. I get to sit in my little corner and write some words nobody will ever read.
I wonder if I’ll always be laying on the bathroom floor making myself come.
I imagine each of the bathrooms-
The one on 5th street, my apartment but I guess she called it hers too, always with the light off and in the shower because I was ashamed.
A handful of times in the one on the north side, usually light on because I was home alone. The shower was running just in case. Door locked.
This one- with stains of my love leaking out each corner I turn,
my towel on the rack and my thong on the floor and our single tooth brush in the cup.
my soap in the shower and my makeup stains on the mirror and the time I got up and locked your bathroom window because your friend got robbed that way and you were scared and I wanted to make you feel safe in your home.
I’d love to leave this city. I’d love to go somewhere where the weather isn’t so bad, it really affects my moods in so many ways. I’d like to be a little bit shorter, too, smaller in general. I want to take up less space. I want to blend in but whenever I open my mouth it's always me asking to stand out.
I love you today as I did then.

I pull into my driveway and
my neighbor is standing in
front of his door wearing a
wife beater and basketball shorts
that go to his mid calf with
his bare feet shoved into
slides that are too small
and he's owned since 2005.
nearly every part of him is
large, except he's 5'7:
his beer belly protrudes
from his ribbed cotton shirt
his his ego escapes from
his perpetually messy house
(his door is wide open, all the
cold air is escaping, it smells like
cigarettes and being ******* over it).
he watches me park
his woman (I have to set this picture, there is no better term)
stands up straight at right
underneath his eyebrow
and glares at me in unison
I let my hand trace the chair sitting
on my front porch for a few seconds
and wonder why I’ve never sat here before,
residue rain falls from the outside banister
and I feel as at home as I’ve ever felt in this
stupid god forsaken ******* apartment
my neighbors are still watching me and
I realize it’s because they don’t recognize me
because I'm really never here
with the hair on my arms all
standing up in unison
I unlock my door and step inside
drop my money and count my keys
my knees are rusty, I feel small
there’s only so many times you can do this
and only so many times I can too

there’s nothing else to say
I don’t trust you
I want to be a little higher
a little taller
a little stronger
I want to love you
less
I’ll still try and have ***
with you tonight.
I know myself more today
than I did yesterday

I look up to your ceiling and look at the banisters
if you count the ones on the edge there’s 7
I look to my left and my right
and imagine being anywhere else
feeling any other thing
my back is hurting so I sit up straight
there’s smoke in the air from the ****
you’re smoking out of the **** I got you
my best friend told me I should
take that back from you out of spite
I’m excited to see her this weekend
but I am sure you’ll be in the back of my mind
I accidentally gave my dealer a 50 instead
of a 20 and I gave you the majority of the drugs
the flowers I got you months ago are swaying
from the ceiling and I speak a lot of words
for someone who doesn’t really say much
I got through a bad day and
I just want to tell you all about it
I miss you, I miss you
come kiss me on the lips
I want to exist as somebody
who only feels what’s necessary
what do you think happens after we die?
do you think it just goes black?
I want to kiss you on the lips and fall asleep in your arms

1
I read in a poem that there is no sound more ****** than the clink of a belt being undone but you only wear worn out t-shirts and a frown on your face. I think of the sound of tires driving slowly over the asphalt and how I could get turned on easier by a look than a touch.  Your bed and you both taste like sweat but I am not going to complain because I'd rather be overheating than alone. I consider switching on your swamp cooler but it's loud and I want to be able to hear your moans in order to remind myself that you want me too. Do you?

2
I was doing my poetry homework when I had to stop in order to write poetry.

3
I dont know if I can handle the fact that you have made playlists for other people and that is so 2018 of me. Did you make that playlist for her?

4
[redacted]

5
If panic attacks actually helped anything I wouldn't mind the hyperventilating but instead I still feel like a sink has sunk inside my chest even after I've calmed down. Wouldn't it be nice if you could cry it, release it, scream to the skies and then be okay afterwards? I'm not sure who made me believe the symptoms of my mental illness should be like a shower; I don't feel cleansed. I don't feel new. I only feel raw, exhausted. It feels more like that same dull knife is tearing me open each skin layer at a time until I figure out how to grab the hand that holds it or I'm left open on the table, whichever comes first.

6
I'm writing in order to breathe. If I can't get oxygen to my brain my fingers won't be able to move.

7
I'm so scared I'm going to lose you. I don't want you in any other way. I want to love you, hold you.

8
I hear a baby crying outside of your window and I realize I need to get up to go home and get my work clothes. I find these simple things excruciating. Writing to you is a diary but I never should have learned to open my mouth and speak.

9
I started this poem four months ago and titled it a seven day long poem but I guess now it’s more than that. You always made me feel the things I’m currently feeling, I've never given up control this much in my life. I like to be in control, the one ignoring, the one who needs the time. I wish I didn’t love you like I do (it's just, there you know. It won't go away. It's not too much or too little, it's just stubborn, just like you). I'm so scared I'm going to lose you. I don't want you in any other way. I want to love you, hold you. Did you make that playlist for her too?

I feel your absence like the sound machine in my therapists office. It sounds like static, white noise, I know it’s only there to distract me from what the person inside her room is discussing.
An elderly woman walks out and folds the blanket she has wrapped around her body and places it gently on the ground. She is laughing to herself lightly. I wonder why she sees my therapist.
I clutch the tissues in my hand and look at the floor. I don’t want her to look at me. I smell like patchouli because of this stress relief spray I found sitting in the waiting room that I decided to spray all over my skin. I want to open up the bottle and drink it. At this point, I want relief almost more than I want you.
I hear her typing on her computer and wonder how long it’ll take for her to open the door and tell me to lay on her couch. I haven’t seen her in a few months and I wonder if it’ll be awkward, but my senses are on overdrive so I’m sure I’ll just end up crying.
There’s a circular table with six different teas, coffees, Emergen-C’s and a jar of honey sitting directly in front of me and a box of affirmations to my left. I shake my foot because I can’t sit still. I shake my foot because the sound machine is giving me anxiety. I shake my foot because I’m in a bad spot, again. I don’t know who I am, why I’m here, or who I’ll become. I miss you.
You made me feel grounded and I know you felt the same from me. I loved that feeling, you hated it. I need that feeling, you try your best to push it away.
I don’t feel like I’m panicking, or anxious, I only feel sad. I want your skinny little lips on my neck and I want to feel safe in your bedroom. I imagine what you and her are talking about in those green text messages and my stomach goes into a knot. It’s gotta be something surface level.  Disgustingly surface level, the kind of small talk that makes me puke. Small talk is comfortable to you.
The analog clock ticks loudly and I wonder if she’s doing it on purpose. I want her to open the door fifteen minutes early and allow me to start crying sooner, I feel these tears deep inside my chest and I don’t want to stuff them down. But I’m going to, outside in the real world.
I wonder when we are going to talk again and I have to acknowledge that it isn’t up to me. Most things aren’t. I wish I had more respect for myself so I could hate you for what you’ve done to me but I’ll just call myself overly empathetic and understand your actions instead. That hurts, you know, always trying to find the good in people. It hurts because sometimes there isn’t any good, but I am still here searching. I hope there’s more good because I want to go to the pumpkin patch and make out in the corn field again but you want to do whatever you want, whenever you want it and I’m only an after thought. I wish I was whatever you wanted.
I still have twelve minutes until she opens the door. I want to have a therapy appointment three times a week, I want to have a therapist who tells me what to do. I want the love of my life to not hurt me so bad, I want to be loved gently. Kindly. Carefully.
There’s a difference between want and need and gentleness was never something I put on my to do list. Instead I wrote independent, tough, hard to love, detached. I wrote difficult, stubborn, distant. I wrote down every single bad quality you have and decided to love it more, decided it made you YOU, decided I could walk through the mud as long as I got to lay on the beach the next day.
It’s been a full week since I last slept at your house. We’ve talked everyday but it has felt like the static the noise machine is making. I still have nine minutes until she’ll open the door. I still have days on weeks on months until you’ll consider opening yours up one more time.
You did this, but I’m here hurting. This isn’t what I asked for, I did everything right. I don’t have as many tears left as I thought I did. I’m going to go to the gym and lay in a park and try to push off feeling sorry for myself until I have no other choice. I want to push away all these feelings, maybe it’ll lessen them. Maybe the wound is still open and blistering and I just keep pouring patchouli stress relief spray right inside it. Patchouli is your favorite scent. One time you told me you were only tobacco and patchouli and you bought me a candle with that scent for Christmas. You’re the opposite of stress relief.
I miss you, but I know not speaking to you for a little while is going to help me. I don’t like talking to you when I can’t call you mine. I don’t like the way it feels to kiss your small lips and feel your jaw tighten. You hugged me so tight and I took one more step and leaned in. You said goodbye, and I said that was a mistake, I shouldn’t have done that, and walked hurriedly to my car.

This is a moment I want to write about for no reason other than me, my almost empty beer and the song playing. I am no one except my own. I'll never love you as much as me.

You don't deserve my unconditional love but nobody ever does, any time it happens. Here we are again. I'm too high to write about this right now.

What do I have to do to get you to love me like you did?

I need my chest to stop hurting
I need my tongue to stop burning
I need my teeth to stop gnawing
I need the feelings in my limbs to find their way back to my bones
I need to stop sleeping
I need my swollen eyes to regain some sort of dignity
I need my nails to stop growing so I can stop biting
I need you to come back to me so I can pretend I am okay
I need you to come home so I can distract myself
and pretend I am okay

I've never been less afraid of death than I am in this moment.

Does it always wear off?

I was only fifteen inches and barely seven lbs, I was born with really curly dark hair and five different illnesses. The first year of my life I spent strapped to a bed to make sure I didn't move around and choke.
It's always been a ******* trap.
Nowadays my legs hang off my bed because my body is too long.

The place becomes familiar, the weeds start to appear, my dark roots start to show on my patchily bleached chemically stained hair, the hard drive starts to slow down, I have to take my car to the mechanic, and you feel like us changing from what we once were is just a part of life.
The bones break, the skin wrinkles, the metal rusts,
my shoes have holes, my hands have cuts, my body starts to grow tired, the job gets boring, stuck in the same place with the same people doing the same thing, life becomes just routine alongside the winter that turned to summer and the people that you can no longer consider strangers. The money runs out, the clothes start to wear, and all of it, absolutely all of it, loses its charm.
You say nothing can stay the same as the beginning, but do you realize what that equates?

I've had three, four, five first loves because each time it's a little different. I'll never know what it's supposed to feel like and it stops me from continuing. This song was playing during a *** scene, the red lights reflecting off of her face while she leaned in, showing the emotion that had been stuck between her gritted teeth.

I want to wake up, I want my body to grow old and I want to stop being so tired. I feel the most at home when I am alone so it's okay that I haven't seen you in days. I'm worried about myself. I'm worried about myself.

Standing up is boring. I write about this feeling every time but yet I've yet to find a word to describe it. There is something about the placidity at 4 am that has me drinking orange juice on my porch watching the sun come up each one of these nights, in a row, like a pattern. My body needs to stretch, needs to grow, I can't be restricted to locking my knees and standing in place. I can't be restricted.

We will dance on our way to heaven, and I will never be afraid again.

12/20/2017 12:00 am
It's December and I am learning that you can be strong and fragile at the same time. I'm also learning that there is a time and place for me to be literal, and a time and place for me to paint a picture of another day, another time, with words that I probably should just leave unsaid.
If, when you walk inside your front door and set your stuff on the ground you immediately feel the sweet release of a long day ending, does that mean you need to change something? or is that more to do with the way the world turns and the way we are used to operating? should we feel glad that it's all done?
If I spend my time feeling like I'm wasting it, does that cancel out the wasting, am I somehow making up for it? or does it mean I'm wasting it even more?
I wrote in a poem a couple years ago that I spent a lot of time asking the grass to grow for me, but it never did. I couldn't comprehend the fact that it didn't listen, ignored all my pleadings, but now it's December
and I'm learning that sometimes a metaphor can be very, very literal.
I'm also learning that words don't always do it.
I spent a long, long time begging that grass to grow, but it never did because it needed to be ******* watered.
Did I think it could hear me? Did I really think the words would make the grass sprout?
Sometimes you need to be held, kissed, taken care of with lips sealed shut. Sometimes words just don't do it. I promise you, I am learning as quick as I can.
I learned a few weeks ago that the Hawaiian alphabet only has twelve letters. Do you really think that is enough? How can they say anything they want to say?
Every language should have a word for love,
apples dipped in chamoy, the feeling in my stomach when
you're acting different with me, the perfect high, the moon when it's only a sliver, and the sun setting while we are buying cigarettes at a gas station and it look peaceful but I'm angry because nothing is ever good enough for me. Actually, there should just be a word for everything so that we never could feel alone.
Maybe instead of trying to get you to recite your ABC's to me I should learn to stop putting stuff into the universe that has no universe being in the universe.
I promise you, I'm learning as quick as I can.

I want to feel whole but I only
feel like my skin isn't on properly
is there a way to tighten it?
take it off and alter the way it hugs my bones?
it's all a mask and I'm only
trying to figure out how to rip it off.

I don't feel lust or admiration
I feel the weight of the past on my heels like I'm Achilles
who am I to decide when the sun should shine and when I should go?
It's taken me years to grow this measly inch, I wonder if I'll ever be able to stand up straight without my ego hitting the ceiling
I'm laying in a bed that's a bit more familiar now trying
to remind myself to stop making it about everybody else
this is me, here now, breathing polluted air and attempting
to turn my saliva into something a little more meaningful
I don't deserve credit, it's what all humans do
I find myself in junkyards often
I walk among the trash and kick cans and find rusted
cars that stopped running years ago unlike you and I
and our pasts filled with scenes of both of us sprinting full speed
we can only talk through our body language which is
why we find ourselves hating each other as often as we do
life would be easier if I picked up two of those cans
and put a month long string through it in order to
have a one on one conversation
I don't know myself
I need to leave this city and start over
because every few months I say the same things
my only ******* emotion is jealousy--
I'm jealous of you for living a life that
didn't once involve me. I want to do that too.

SHAPESHIFTING
7/25/2014
in under two minutes
I could shed my skin
my limbs aren't my own-
to be in your presence
to feel the warmth
hearing breaths, chest moving
If your arms are around mine
the shift becomes inside
like the plates of the earths core
positioning right into each other
filling each other, filling me up
shapeshifting
I'm not me when I'm with you
I'm indebted to this feeling
take my skin;
my veins -
rip out my entire being
shapeshifting
for you

BASED ON A TRUE STORY
[the true part]

you got there and I was already breathless. I'd been waiting all day for some sort of release, let's say, and when you arrived it felt like that was good enough already, as if there was some sort of ****** in your eyes. you came through the gate, went into my room, and at first we struggled through trying to figure out how to speak to each other after being inside of one another so soon, you spoke slow.

we smoked in my bedroom and the fumes [re: our fumes] went inside my ceiling and out of the fan, maybe just into the walls as if they were lead rooting, sticking, planting itself inside of the dry paint, coming out to make me sick one of these nights that you're somewhere else. the light turned off, the clothes came off, but I still saw an orange hue. I stopped and turned, we were both high and you were kissing on my neck, we didn't understand how to allow our bodies to just do what they wanted to and you didn't quite understand my hesitation. Infatuation tastes like gasoline and I looked at you in my dark room but swore I saw a light, a spark of some sort, I imagined the room on fire, ignored it, searched for your lips through the darkness but quickly opened my eyes to red and orange in my peripheral vision. I failed chemistry but here we are, I'm searching for cigarette ash in my bed hours after you've left because I swear to god, I swear to god we turned orange.

I sat there thinking about how I was going to write about my come to Jesus moment. could emotional, mental and completely internalized connection manifest into a physical light? Is there such a power in skin on skin, mouth on mouth, your tongue on my teeth all the way to my ******* knees?

An hour or so later we were sharing water [a spiritual post-*** experience] and you were chain smoking outside while I rested peacefully in my bed, naked, staring at the way you inhale. We were talking about something [my music taste vs yours? the story of my sisters ex-boyfriends suicide or maybe my dads drug addiction? your pattern with girls that wanna make you their boyfriend and each time you got suspended from grade school up until they outed you to your mom?] and I turned- the light was back, it was coming from inside of your mouth, it was coming from the way you breathe.

Maybe we were talking about ******* in your studio because you now have a key or the possibility of going as Rose McGowan and Marilyn Manson for Halloween. It wouldn't really matter because the orange shows up when you're there.

I am as strong as I want to be, because right now I care more about leaning out and taking in as few calories as possible. Losing the pounds in order to gain 'em back, you know? There's very few questions that truly have a right or a wrong answer, and I believe that with 98% of me. Sometimes a right answer simply means it is socially acceptable and a wrong answer is the truth, so in that situation you'd want to throw away your moral compass, clench your jaw, and hope that the lies that come out just result in pearly, shiny teeth.

you take a sip of something and it tastes like, ummm.. bad. it tastes like deceit, but that isn't totally possible (OBVIOUSLY), so in a literal sense it just tastes like the Coca Cola syrup that didn't have any carbonated water mixed with it. It's sweet, flavorful, but kind of tastes like it could erode my car engine in a matter of seconds, you know?

I feel the sip deep inside of my body, I can feel it trailing down my esophagus (is that what it is?) or maybe just my throat, a tube to my stomach and then to parts of me I better just not try to name out of fear of sounding stupid. fear of sounding stupid drives the majority of things I do, but that's okay, because at least I don't sound stupid.

the sip gets caught in the pit of my gut and I start to feel uneasy. I probably should have looked at the bottle before sipping it, huh? I probably should have asked for a detailed list of ingredients like the responsible wanna-be-vegan I should be? I call myself a wannabe most things. its just the person I am.

I take a seat because I don't feel good. this is going to hurt, this is going to land me in the hospital probably and might take a whole while to get over. this is turning too literal and I'm trying to beat around the bush, so ill just tell you about the time I took a sip of a coke can and a bee was inside and it flew around in my mouth for a solid 5 seconds before I managed to open, spit, and scream. that could be poetic if you really hunt, like I waited 5 whole seconds to get the monstrous bee out of my ******* mouth, I just sat with a confused look on my face for 5 whole seconds!!! thats a whole giant metaphor! I still swallowed the Coca Cola and it tastes like ***.

IMAGINE THAT people- poison only takes like poison once you've swallowed it.

in order for me to pick the roses and give them to you, I first have to grow them. it starts with planting seeds. I forget that a lot which only leads to feeling guilty that your hands are empty, that I don’t have something to give, but I know that one day I will. sometimes I find it difficult to find the time, energy or even simply the motivation to water the soil that’s clogging up my already cramped bedroom, but again, without these steps, they can’t ever grow and neither can I.

I want you to know that I sleep on my back now. in fact, I can only sleep on my back, but not in a I-never-really-sleep-very-comfortable type of way, more that I doze off peacefully, with my fan on full blast and my face pointed towards the sky. I am moving as freely as a flightless bird these days because I have two working legs but nowhere to go but I want to let you know that my mind is still moving a million miles an hour. the world looks a little different when my eyes are dry, in the same way that some of you look much less appealing when my conscience is clear. I pack a bag and drive to another city sometimes when I’m having a bad day, and it reminds me of how stationary I am- but only for now. it’s a good thing because this world is really ******* big.

I’m so happy I don’t have to take care of you anymore.
1

I'm polluted with thoughts I don't feel comfortable thinking. I'm searching for an on and off switch, constantly, but I still haven't figured out why the world looks so different when I don't take my medicine so it's hard to imagine cutting my own circulation.
I am a figure of irrationality.
I counteract myself more times than I can count on a daily basis yet math has always been my strong suit. I like right or wrong answers, it's easier when there is no room to debate, but I like to argue more than I like to talk, ask any of my ex-girlfriends.
A guy I knew from high school shot himself in the head on top of a hill behind his parents house on my 20th birthday, for days I only thought about the look on his brothers face when he found the body. everybody described him in different ways, but my only real memory of him was the time I got drunk with him for the first time and I ended up running off a 6 foot wall, I don't have feeling in part of my leg because but for some reason I still wish I could hear his final thoughts plugged into my aux chord in my car so I could listen to them on my way to work and attempt to decipher,
I only want to understand.
Understanding always makes it hurt less but I think that's just because I make excuses for people in order to make myself feel okay.
I learned really early to play dead. It quickly progressed to avoiding mostly everything and using my newfound skill to become invisible. It's all just so morbid now. I talk a lot and smile a lot and enjoy life way too much for somebody who has these thoughts but one of them is surface level; I'm not sure which, I'm sure one day I will though. It's not my place to think or feel any of this, I have no right to reach out to people, but I still firmly believe that I am the owner of all my experiences. I miss feeling nostalgic. I don't care about the past anymore and it's only making me homesick for the times I spent swallowing the noise. It's just so ******* quiet now.

Why did he do that? How did it get so bad?

there's a part you will never be able to touch
whether you shrink yourself down to the size
of a quarter and jump into her back pocket
whether you beg and plead and stomp
and cry and demand to understand what I
have that you don't, you never will

it isn't love or effort or commitment
it's responsibility and dependence and
the cruelty of saying you'll never leave.
and then there was me
trying to make the blood stop gushing
slapping her face with a force I'm not proud of
trying to get her to stay awake long
enough to regain consciousness
memories of somersaulting down stairways
and the look in her eye before I saw fists

it's the middle of the night
and I won't rest until I get
the chance to change everything
and jump into another body
I've got chlorine in my hair
I've got scars on my skin
I'm only trying to keep my
head above all this water
the end means I stop looking back
you know how skies look different
when you're at a ****** gas station?
I think that's kind of the same as how
your love always seemed sweeter
when it was nearly killing me

I don't know when enough is enough
giving up is something I never learned to do
and my expiration date was marked
for the minute she took her call
I knew that then and I still do now
I see clearer now than I ever have before
but I look around and I wonder
what it's like to be found
or at least ******* seen, pathetic

I almost got to touch her, once or twice
but I just laid in her sheets and wondered
if I did it now, if it'd hurt worse later
if I do this now, if I put it into words
will it still hurt me in the morning?
I'll never find an easier way to let you
in on what the inside of my body looks
like than by telling you that I still
cry for a girl I never even touched
I'm not sure you know what I mean by that

do you know what it's like
to always want more?
a blessing and a curse
my body is moving
but my soul is stuck
hidden behind my actions
that speak unfortunately
louder than these words
there's always something
blocking my view-
the sun waking me up
the drive taking too long
my love being too strong
do you know what it's like
to never have enough?
I'm scared I'll get to the top
and keep pushing for more
I'll be on top of the world
with no way to breathe
no people to see
nothing left to beat
I'll be on top of the world
screaming at the milky way
"come, take a ******* piece of me!"
the sun will burn my skin
I'll have five thousand freckles
and heat stroke year round
do you know what it's like to
want so much but have
no idea where to start?
at this point my words
have to start doing more
this thought can't just count
I'm trying to prove to myself
the only way up
is to bring myself down
do you know what it's like
to knock yourself off?
I want to be humbled
and then empowered
these days
can not
will not
last forever

I sit on top of my rooftop
eating honey and smelling flowers
wishing on the stars and the
cracks in the pavement
for a chance to become a bee
if you want to give up, go ahead
I'll try to pick up the
pieces as best I can
but just know I'll
always put myself first
besides of course
when I put you before everything else
which will happen fairly often
if not always
but other than that
it's about me
I know you are sick of my
indecisiveness and irritability
and I know nobody thinks that I
notice when I start to spin out
but I really can feel the difference
in the same way
I can tell what color a rose
is by the way it smells
and the gender of the
bee by the way it stings
on my pessimistic days
I can tell if a rose is dead
by how bad the thorns
make my fingers bleed
there are talents behind
this shaking knee
and inability to sleep
ones you will never see
If you are having a bad day
I can try to help it turn around
but just know once I start
I'll never stop
x

I am a poet
when I speak, I speak
when I listen, I listen
and when I write a hole is created
inside of my chest which nothing can fill
do you like what you are seeing?
sometimes in the middle of the night
I crawl back into the cave I came from
and imagine if all of it wasn't real
the grass is green but I didn't water it
so I can't make any metaphor about what
is on the other side or how the work you
put into it always comes back threefold
if I was to explain something to somebody
I would automatically arrange it into a list
you always had a particular look about this
found my unwillingness to write paragraphs
endearing and romantic, but obnoxious
said my brain works in one to tens-
but wait my heart must beat that way too
I count the times you water it, the times I do
I count everything in shades of grey
sometimes I wonder if the grey I'm surrounded
by was white that I accidentally threw my black into
maybe it was pure and I let it all dribble too many times
or maybe it was just something I was born into
speaking of being born, on his death bed my
dad told me about the feeling in your chest you
get when you know something isn't right
the way your eyes shake, the inner conscience
that comes out to play through your pupils
pupils tell a lot about a person
what makes something turn green?
I always say stuff about my dad on his
deathbed but in actuality he was nine
hundred miles away in a hospital bed
with nobody except a prison guard
and the handcuffs on his wrist
he died a painful death, alone
sometimes when you mock me
I want to show you the venom
I have inside of my veins
I'm nobody's, not even my own
I'm something completely
uncharted and untouched.
sometimes when I think of my dad
tied to a bed taking his last deep breathes
I wonder if death is something that's
pre-programmed into us when we're
born or if our fate is somehow up to us.
without honesty, without trials
without any of these abundant emotions
we're just on boring and borrowed time
no matter what words you make a bow out of
the truth of the matter will always be shown in
how green our grass is and how alive our eyes look

I'M GLAD YOU
think there's more to me than this
I'm glad that when the sun shines
it shines right onto your back
I'm glad it darkens your skin
and brightens your mood
I'm glad we are complete opposites
you smile at me and I smile back
you'll never be as neat as me
I'M GLAD YOU
say you love me
I'm glad that you love me
I'm glad you think you do
I'm glad that I'm not sure if I love you
it's easier this way
we stay, ok, we don't, cool
nothing really matters to me
I'd rather be halfway than
completely hindered
I'd rather be halfway than
completely hindered
I'd rather be halfway than
completely hindered

I stopped writing. Maybe that's how I know.

maybe this is the only way I can deal with it

you make me think that maybe
everything happens for a reason.
you met me at a time where I was
convinced faith was a concept I had no time for
you met me at a time where I thought
everything happens at random and ineffectively
I'll meet you halfway
if it's the last thing I'll do

you met me at a very odd time in my life

you tasted like ******* and I tasted
like blue raspberry jolly ranchers
you tasted like what am I doing
and I'm sure I did too
you smiled and leaned in and
I put my fingers on your dimples
you pulled me on top and I forgot to think
I forgot that drugs that taste like
gasoline when they're "the real ****"
aren't flavors I'm supposed to enjoy
you kissed my nose and said it was
weird because you are so closed off
but I make you want to open up
I shook my head and pretended that
wasn't the millionth time I've heard that one
oh I make you want to throw away your past
and get close to someone again?
cool, write us a happy ending too
I woke up this morning exhausted
with matted hair and smudged makeup
I kissed your neck, kissed your neck,
kissed your neck....
your roommate said she liked me
and I kissed your neck again.
you are movement
you are time
you are start middle finish
you are finish line, winning by a second
you said you don't want to open up
then tell me why you're here?
tell me why you're looking at me like that
and kissing me like that
and holding me like that
tell me why you're touching me like that
your insides are ripping and
you're dying to crawl out
I can see it in your stare
you were not expected
frankly you weren't really wanted
but I put my fingers in your
dimples and I forgot to breathe
I always forget to breathe
you tasted like ******* I mean that literally
you tasted like this isn't a good idea
but I want it so bad and I mean that literally
you looked at me and said
"no like, if I'm doing this it's because I mean it"
I wanted to tell you same thing
but looking back I don't think
I would have meant it

our palms and shins hit the floor, hard
the sound of our bones hitting the wood
echoes and your face shows the pain
you look at me, I look at you
a bandaid, yes, no, an ice pack
our spines and tailbones hit the grass, hard
the sound of our nervous whispers and
the lighter flickers through the night
your face shows your nerves
you look at me and unfold
I start to spiral out of control
but I attempt to keep my cool
I'm wearing 4 layers you'd think it
wouldn't be this hard but hey, it usually is
our lips hit eachother, hard
and then my lips hit your neck
and your lips hit my shoulder
and my shoulder hits your stomach
and your stomach touches mine
the sound of your breathing,
my breathing, sighs, sheets, skin on skin
you're whispering my name so quietly
my ear comes off and stretch out to your
mouth so they can hear more of you
our backs hit the bed, hard
and now you're on top of me
the sounds of the last time we fell fill
the air and you say something about
finally and I say something about don't
jinx this and we both shutup
and listen to the moment
the sound of the moment finds its way
through your bedroom door and sits on
the chair next to your queen size mattress
our heads and our hearts fall out of our
bodies and find their way to
each other on the cold tile floor
the sound of desperate crawling
fills the room and we look at each other
confused
time will never, ever be on your side, you said
no amount of luck or stitches could save me now
my hand cups your cheek and you close your eyes
one day
everything's going to be okay
one day
it will be okay

"what does she have that i dont?"
I imagined asking, I imagined calling hours after the fact and letting you hear me squirm out muffled cries,
the grey area between please, please no and thank you for doing this now

"what does she have that I don't?"
I imagined asking, I imagined calling and begging you to give me a better reason why I wasn't enough to show you that you deserve so, so much better, that you deserve to not be a wreck, but I stopped.

"what does she have that I dont?"
I realized, in that inexplicable grey area between want and loss, there is one and only one thing she has that I never will,

you

I'm going to be okay, if it's the last thing I ******* do, I'm going to find a way to be okay. I can't keep on.

i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough
i'll never be good enough  
i'll never be good enough
...
never be (good) enough
never be (good) enough
never be (good) enough
never be (good) enough
never be (good) enough
never be GOOD enough
never be GOOD enough
never be GOOD enough
never be GOOD enough

i'm embarrassed that i still love you
i'm embarrassed that i still love you
i'm embarrassed that i still love you
i'm embarrassed that i still love you
i'm embarrassed that i still love you

i'm embarrassed that i still love you


i'm embarrassed that i still love you



i'm embarrassed that i still love you