Is it possible to love in silence?

maybe this is the only way I can deal with it

there will be another tattoo shop
with artists that have no bank account
who ask me to cash their checks for them and another downtown with a whiskey donut bar
or one that was once a mortuary
that I’ll get too drunk at and puke outside of
maybe I'll have *** in the pews at this one, too
there will be another set of grid like streets
that go one way or the other way, east to west
and I still look at the signs even after 24 years
and there will be another historic avenue
that will knock down the local watering holes
in order to create high rise buildings
for ******* boys and girls that
already have credit cards and BMW’s
and other guys in folded beanies
that sell my friends *******
but this time it'll be cold out and ketamine
there will be another set of people that are ugly
but i hope this time they are ******* honest

I’ve always imagined I would end up with someone named Sam. I think it started somewhere around age 13, when I sat earnestly inside of the closet and somehow felt even more painstakingly alone than I do now. I would shower for hours and think of her, I told nobody the depths of our relationship, not even myself. Inside my head she had short hair but pretty eyes and was my height, sometimes shorter, and she drove me to places I had never gone but always dreamed of trying out. She walked firmly and with purpose. I named her Sam because I could still say her name out loud.

Drug addiction, usage, dependency is funny because its infectious, like the trouble behind liking the burn or the laugh of the newest airborne virus finding the immunocompromised, there’s no right way to use. We say controlled, harm reduction, but I'm not really sure there's a wrong way to do it either. They say moderation, cold turkey, some vices are worse than others, but are they? It all depends on what happens afterwards, the consequences, the aftermath. Freebasing is harder than it looks and apparently so is stopping.

Sam wasn't necessarily an imaginary friend, more a person I knew I would one day meet. The first few girls I kissed I compared to her, knowing they wouldn't be able to last because she was waiting for me. I remember when I started a new job and my sweet anxiety stricken coworker, who was an inch taller than me, sheepishly introduced herself as Sam. She had a boyfriend and now she has another.

I thought maybe running a red light would cheer you up. Fairly sadistic if you ask me, but that's no longer a bad thing, it's just authentic. I did it twice for good measure, and each time you cracked a smile. Later I could hear you talking through the wall. I wasn't sure if you knew we could hear you so I moved away to be safe, being safe has become increasingly harder these days, to the point where my vision hasn't focused since I got back to town and I've started to tighten my jaw in order to try to ******' ***. It gets harder every single day.

Drugs smell like ****, all of them, every single one. They taste like dehydration and gasoline and a painful lack of sleep, they taste ******* disgusting. I've never met anybody other than myself that was able to put them down when prompted but I've also never met anybody that genuinely preferred having none. Why are we numbing, dulling, minimizing these feelings? Who decided that was somehow more freeing?

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 think too much and i don’t sleep enough i don’t want this to be organized i don’t want there to be correct punctuation i want to stop editing for a few minutes or maybe a few months so i can write what i’m actually thinking everything i say is masked by something else i can never get what i’m really feeling down i cannot always grasp how empty i feel into words and i cannot always force chills to take over your body by talking about her sometimes the only thing that’s going to come from my mouth is the muffled sounds of my crying and sometimes the only thing that my hands will be able to make is the sound of the door slamming i don’t think anyone realizes how hard these things hit me i don’t think you get the extremities of my words this doesn’t feel ok and neither does you saying i'm good with my words in that tone of voice as if i am manipulating you by simply speaking but it isn’t necessarily rewarding that someone is clapping as my heart is breaking on these pages it isn’t exactly fair that one day people will dance along the highway to every insecurity I feel
sometimes I want this to break your heart i’m incapable of slowly stuttering out my feelings i scream them at you i force these words out of me with no problem at all and i'm sick of it because now you know way too much

I drive a different way home so
that I don’t have to see your face
I have a zero tolerance policy for
mourning these days and that’s ok
you make the same face when you’re
in pain that you do when you ***
I’ve forgotten what it feels like by now

and okay, so maybe you cheated on me
in this exact bar bathroom once
and okay, maybe I am ****** projecting
because that girl still talks **** about me
and I see myself as she does for a moment
and maybe it never actually has
absolutely anything to do with you! at all!
maybe that means you never mattered!
and maybe it smells like B/O and for
some reason that makes me nostalgic
nostalgic for times where i’d plug my nose
and still be able to find the smell
maybe we just ran out of things to say to each other
and maybe this time I’ll let that be enough

there’s a band playing and I feel happy
I park at Edith’s and walk through a no
outlet that I’ve never noticed before
I know where he takes them on his little dates
and sometimes I end up there too
but I swear it’s always organically
I hope you know I’d spit on the grave of my
boss who fired me without cause
I might ask the three year old to say ****
but I can’t fathom being so unjust

I’m going to figure out how to
pick up my instruments again
and that includes my ability to
open my mouth and speak
I’m going to stop expecting the worst
I might not remember what it feels like
but I do know that my taste buds work

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.

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.

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.

he reaches one arm stretched underneath
my neck and the other he drapes loosely around my shoulder, meeting his hands in the middle and effectively holding me
his chin digs into the curve of my spine and his breathing is shallow, as in if I turn to grab something I will wake him up so

I don’t move. I hold my breath, I listen to his dog whine, I gather all of the questions I have that I’ll forget by the morning,
I should be writing a lot about the first man I’ve ever loved but all I can think to say is
this is not me
I do not write happy poetry

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.

her hair is longer than I realized
and it smells familiar
my stomach feels off as I
stare at the posters on the walls
because I’m not sure where to look
(she’s so naked as am I)
I decide the top of her head is fine
then I decide to let my heart
murmur which I've been
avoiding since they diagnosed me at 7
but I'm exhausted and orgasming
really takes so much out of me
I decide I’ll only do it three more times
then I decide just this once

I do it all again the next night
because I’m trying to live my life
that doesn’t fully explain my reasoning but it’s all I have to offer
there’s dozens and dozens of
different versions of her and I
want to put it into writing that I
only ever liked two of them
I’ve never before liked each and
every part of a person
I've also never even been
close to admitting that
so I think this is at least one
part progress poem

she’s playing with a kid and I know
it’s supposed to turn me on but it’s
just making me feel physically ill
I wear my bathing suit bottoms
as underwear
she texts me that she’s not
even ******* wearing any
I’ll sleep in her bed if I want
to only because
there’s not really a point to
sleeping in mine
it'd be nice if I wanted to,
but I don't
so I go home

she chain smoked her entire
pack of american spirits
lying completely naked on
her ***** nylon carpet
I realized about halfway in
that I didn't want to touch her
I turned to my left to a shrine
of Joan Jett and then
I choked on her **** piercing
for the very last time
she got upset and tried to
question what went wrong
for the first time in my life
I just shut the **** up
because blaming it on her
star sign felt too insensitive

it hurts more to not
it has to

I wake up on a thursday and it’s raining, in a good way
It’s not too hot and my jeans are fitting loose. I walk through
the aisles of a dollar store to purchase new bowls and
cookie sheets and pots and pans because I got
overwhelmed and threw out all my ***** dishes again
sometimes it’s just so much easier to start new
I’m trying to teach myself how to enjoy simplicity
there’s a peace in complete neutrality
I wake up on the day I’m supposed to at the time I’m
supposed to and I feel proud of myself for the first time
I still will worry that I’m not completely capable

It’s been raining for days and I can’t figure out how to make it stop
sometimes I want to be loved in the worst ways, is that okay?
my skin cracks like bones and you can pour alcohol into my
open wounds as long as when I crave toxicity you’re there for me
my one and only shining example of human connection
we go to sleep without saying goodnight, I grip my own body
so hard for a second I forgot I was in this house alone
I need to wash my hair, stop feeling so scared
I grip this plastic rosary that I stole from hot topic
so tight that I forget I couldn’t hate god more if I tried

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 saw the way you looked at me and remembered that I MUST be that small, as small as you see me!

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 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.

you look at the bartender vacantly and
order a double Jameson shot
because you hate everything about yourself
I know this because I watch
but only to see the glass shatter

the bathroom of this bar smells like our love -
me, dressing in clothes that are easy to get off
tile that is stained with bile, cascade hops
a continuously leaking toilet and bright red walls

having my heart broken feels romantic, inherently, like
mourning, pleading, missing
it’s all just flirtation, ****** frustration
this is foreplay, these nights alone

I smell like **** and *** (same thing) showering
alone I noticed the age in his eyes, in his skin
in the way he scolded me, in the color of his teeth
and how I don’t think I’ve ever heard him say my name

there is nothing more ****** than the dial of a phone
there is nothing more enticing than two truths and a lie
I’m the most I’ll ever be the minutes after I come

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 -/

an old man with Alzheimers and a panic button
on his watch walks into the bar slowly
the bartender leans in, drops a napkin, presses the button
and looks the man in the eyes as he orders a diet pepsi
The man’s eyes shift every two seconds-
from the TV, to the bartender
to his watch, to his hands
to the TV, to the door
to his watch, to his hands
for seven minutes, record timing on her part-
an older woman in running shoes and a
visor rushes to his side
and whispers in his ear that he isn’t supposed to leave
she tries to pay, the bartender says no
they leave together hastily
she is ashamed, every time
but he is only confused

you carry the film camera I bought you
clenched between your teeth where you keep
all the rest of the cavities I gifted to you
falling out from the gap between my legs
underneath the piano painted coffee table
staring directly into the vinyl sunlight until
it starts to burn like its the fourth of July
when I'm there and the temperature is right
I don't want to have to blow it out
I left with the skin still on my teeth
so I'll come back in order to rip it off
are you satan testing me , too?

she tells me not to leave but
I’m miserable.
there’s no cold water in this
entire city and my throat has
been sore for centuries. I’m not
me if I’m not thirsty, calculating
the difference between our
languages and the chance well
ever find a way to communicate,
my mouth is like the Sahara and
there’s really nothing that I can do.
I’m not me if I’m not yearning,
looking for subliminal messages
inside of afternoon delights that
only mean we both drank beer
on our one hour lunch break,
I’m not sure I’ll ever be able
to breathe in this place the
same way again. at least not
without a planned escape route
in every building, every street,
every ******* bar, and it’s been
a terrible way to live thus far

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

I’ve sat with this screen open at least a dozen times in the last few days (like I used to) but the only thing I’ve managed to get out is the words I miss you written over and over again

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

my body is so hot that it’ll heat up the entire
room if we’re too lazy to turn the fan on,
I think you find it endearing and luckily
I’m pretty much used to all the sweating

you switch the light bulbs in my two lamps
because the ambience or mood or maybe
we just don’t need anymore warmth in here
and I lay, strategically covering
the parts of me that I don’t want you to see

it’s mid february and we’re both in blazers,
holding hands with new haircuts and some
of the healthiest appetites I’ve seen from two
people that are pretty comfortable
with the ache of starvation

it's the beginning of may and we're both
five lbs heavier, yours went straight to your ***
and mine went to my emotional baggage
we try not to speak, we try to just listen
but nothing feels as filling as just being heard

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

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

you’re the only one who has ever made it seem less daunting

It’s been sitting inside of my chest like TV static
for what feels like a lot longer than seven days
I’m picking at my skin because it keeps my hands busy!
I’m chewing on my cheek because it keeps my mouth busy!
I spend my time missing you because it keeps the rest of me busy!
the dull aches of solitude, of emptiness
have been weighing heavy on my shoulders
in the silence, in 2 pm’s with nothing to do
in menthol cigarettes to try to smoke less ****
in bar culture
and every room
and crevice
and person inside of my mother’s home
my cries used to fill my studio apartment
to the very last inch of its 200th square foot
I’m sorry that I tried to call you
I know you hate that
I don’t think you want to talk to me
It’s been sitting inside of my chest on repeat
ringing for what feels like weeks
I’ve slept with the TV on with nothing
playing for the past seven nights
because it makes me feel less alone

my teeth and your saliva both feel tight in my mouth,
as I see you periodically checking your rear view
mirror to look if my face has changed or if
I'm still playing the quiet game.
I am.
sometimes I talk when really
all I need is a touch
she took her clothes off slowly,
the front of the record said "are you alone?"
in scratch handwriting,
not the time. it's just really not the time.
and I'm trying to learn how to sing but I
can't even begin to talk, it's too hard to
think when you are close to me and
I mean that in a really bad way,
I think of her terrible boston accent
and his ******* ******* kids
and the scars on her legs she never explained
and that crazy look in their eyes
I hangout with guys that carry guns, now
and they try to feel me up when their girlfriends aren't looking
I’d love to sleep for an entire night
I’d love for all my time to just be mine

this is all a diary—-

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

I pick splinters out from my skin
with just the tips of two of my fingers
you're supposed to be careful with that
you can accidentally push it inside of you
and then what happens?
well, you scoop your skin around it
you dig until you make yourself bleed
which means I feel pain when you feel pain
and then I call it solidarity

I'm only good at this because I have perfect vision
and a nearly flawless photographic memory
and things to do, I have a lot of things to do now
each piece is only a fragment of a larger object
I promise I barely squeezed when it splintered
I'm no longer too sad to distract myself from it
and I think that might be the same as being happy

I can want to call you but not dial it now, which is progress, but it helps when I remember how much I ******* hate you!
I told somebody recently that I always look back on times of growth with a fondness, with a spotlight, even though during them I can only feel the sting.
I want everybody to know to not take anything I say seriously because I don't trust anything I create and that even includes sentences, but whenever I grow up I will demand to be treated as such. I'm not used to how it feels to have an impulse that I don't act on-
I do the same thing each weekend, some of my friends find that to be depressing but I like to think its means we're in a sitcom. It's our own certain patterns and routines and I'm easily able to romanticize it, I think it's sweet, others think it's stationary.
I ran into my ex tonight, the one who I believe has a very low IQ.
I could cry if I wanted to, but I'm not sad. I want to mourn each version of myself that I've left somewhere else (including the one who was with that ex) and I'm absolutely terrified of the ones that I still have to deal with, I see glimpses of them each time I get a new tattoo.
I nearly cried because a song came on that made me think I wanted you back, this happens every so often and I have yet to figure out yet if it's real. Sometimes I think the fact that I get back there (or here, more or less, because I did start to cry) has to mean something, that maybe I did actually love you in a way I haven't ever before or maybe might not ever again, but other times I blame it on my mental health or menstrual cycle or the fact that I'm 22 or maybe even sleep deprivation or my own self destruction patterns or possibly personal insecurities or A literal human need to connect in a way that I'm also simultaneously avoiding.
I like her. I do like her. I just like ME more (and you, but thats only because you match my level of cynical and I find that pleasing because everybody is either morbid or positive these days), and that's new, because I still barely like myself! I usually forget to look at myself in the mirror for days in a row. I've seen my reflection so many times in the past week. I might be getting taller.
I use too many commas and not enough periods or maybe even too many of both but I want to write without worrying who is reading! I want to write in the way that I believe I could, never ending sentences that mean something and hit people in the chest the way I want to be ******* slapped, ******* beat down to my core, you know? I saw my ex who threw me down stairs tonight, it's that one, the really really stupid one, not sure if you remember. She's gained weight since the last time I saw her and I asked if she was sober within 60 seconds of speaking to her, I've gained inches and gotten like 25 tattoos,
I can't wait to be happy.
I only hate you because you don't love me too.

Sometimes I hate everything about you.

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.

im not sure if I can do this

Today just isn't that day.

I got a migraine on the drive
so I had to turn around
my visions been half gone
for four half hours and
the whole time the whole
world has had a heartbeat
is it this pulsating in the
gunk behind my eye, the
space you'd hit if you took
a spoon to my socket
and scooped, that's causing
the entirety of my brain to stop
working, at least in the way it once did?
I've managed to survive enough
of my own cycles
to start to be able to estimate
what will come next-

I really want my life to be more
than wasting time,
walking instead of driving and
drinking instead of not,
if you tell somebody, who is
important to you,
that they are in fact,
important to you, and they
don't say it back or really say
anything about it at all,
is it safe to assume you are not
important to them?
is it then therefore safe to assume that you
aren't important to anybody at all?

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

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

if I can put what I'm feeling into words
I can get rid of it, I think, I'm going to
try that instead of what I've been doing
I want to live a hundred different lives
starting over every time I feel complacent
give reincarnation a jump start and
decide to feel new instead of numb
I'm not happy so I start searching with
such intensity it scares me off instead
is there clarity in another place? I think
there's an inherent problem with searching
looking through piles of clothes and stacks
of paper and boxes of ******* you should
have thrown away, I would have, I live in
a twelve by twelve room with ten belongings
my best friends neighbor is a hoarder, I
wonder if he can't think through a thought
without having to stop to catch his breath too

Does it always wear off?

I.

My roommates dog licks, it’s just what he does. He lays on my floor and licks his paw until there’s a puddle of saliva and residue dog food on my pink Ikea rug I bought for fifteen dollars. Do details make it worth it? Or what does? It’s April and my roommate doesn’t groom him so his hair is completely covering my new maroon satin sheets I bought at a thrift store for four dollars, all clumped on my bed, just like I am in this exact moment. I have no details to offer about what is going on inside of my head, I only know I want to break my bones over and over again until they are better. Until they can offer more, or less, or just take me from point A to point B without the faint sound of crunching anytime I feel something.

II.

I’m not sure if it’s valid, rational, real or not but I felt it so I’m going to say it out loud anyway. I get here each and every time I don’t take my antidepressants, but I got too drunk and puked for 24 hours so there was no chance I was going to be able to down the one and only thing that makes my bones stick together. I’d say I should drink less but I don’t believe I’m capable of making it into a problem, I’m too busy exaggerating my position in all of these people's lives and breaking my own heart when I realize I stand for so much less. It’s usually my fault, I know that. We interacted for 25 seconds outside of a bar we once ****** at before they retreated off to the better, cooler, stronger-***** people I can only manage to feel contempt towards. It’s exactly how it should have gone, everybody tells me at least, I disagree, but it still made my spine curve. I talk like this because I’m completely out of serotonin.

III.

I write about *** a whole lot because I think it’s one of the few worthwhile things in this stupid ******* world. I’m only on this planet still for human interaction, which is why it’s absolutely terror inducing to be alone, but these days words have gotten me nowhere so I guess I’m content using my body instead. If there are no humans left to connect with, does that mean I’ve hit my expiration date? I worry nobody will make it worth it but that goes back to me putting my happiness into other people and I remember I still have to find a way to make these bones better, more capable and durable. I want an independent skeleton and to wake up without feeling the need to check the time. I’m not sure if there is a single person in this world I feel able to be myself around completely and I know that is my fault, too.

IV.

We can discuss the dynamics of the word “deserve”. I deserve more than this, you deserve peace and quiet and a world unmatched, I deserve an explanation, a cover up, a new start; all of these with such force the word starts to feel empty. Like drinking tap water. I remember reading in a poem somewhere about how many months, years, sacrifices it takes to be able to deserve to own another person's choices. Truthfully, we never actually deserve anything from one another. The only thing I am worthy of is these brittle bones. The only thing I have to offer is a constant worry in my chest that I am unsafe. I look around me and feel terrified of the world outside- the wind, where does it come from? These people, how are they doing it? What person woke up one day and decided life would be worth it, that we could create a civilization and a planet to make home for absolutely no reason or purpose and throw billions of people into it as well? I’ve been saying this life is a job I am not cut out for since I was 14. Even the items on the shelf right in front of my hands are hard to grab sometimes and I feel like I should start doing stretches in this supermarket but I am too exhausted. I am too exhausted spending my time trying to get to know who this person is that I am, this body I inhabit, this mind that is unfortunately the only one I have until I can figure out if reincarnation is real, or just something I tell myself to feel better about the bones I’m stuck with. I deserve new bones, right? I deserve more than this, right?

V.

Maybe it’s clockwork; mine and his and her hair on my bed, the dog panting to my left probably out of boredom because he has absolutely nothing to do, getting drunk and puking in the mens bathroom, not talking to them for three days, my perfume and deodorant and body wash all being rose flavored and the knowledge that this is just who I am inherently and the constant fear that that means I’ll never be able to grow out of it. I hammer my hand to see blood, I look at the bruises down my leg and on my chest, I wonder if I don’t take my antidepressants for seven days if I’ll have the courage to test my theory. Probably not, death is terrifying, but I’ll still try to call you and get ignored and I’ll ponder what I ever did to deserve such treatment. Am I too available? Yes, consistently. Am I too much, too loud, do I take up too much space and say the things nobody really needs to say? Yes, yesterday I called my boss an alcoholic and he laughed but nobody else did. Everybody else gave me those eyes that everyone gives me whenever I open my mouth, the eyes that make me feel like my skin has managed to come unglued and everybody is seeing my weak, frail bones I repeatedly break, I repeatedly try to heal, and gawking at my efforts. I put myself out there too much, too. I say I miss you when it doesn’t need to be said, I feel love when it has no business being felt. I crave my antidepressants that I still haven’t taken.


VI.

You say words for shock value and that makes you no better than any ****** white guy but I exaggerate how many girls I’ve slept with to anybody who cares to ask so I guess that means I’m the same as you.

VII.

I didn't feel the need to look at a clock a single time today but I ate two full meals and smiled every time that I wanted too, maybe if I had ever managed to get a passport so I could leave this country or even if I worked for the census and spent everyday counting people I could explain to you the unfortunate size of this world that refuses to die off better but instead I'll say that there's a rag in your pocket just in case because you spill a lot and while you're at it you're catching my crumbs, I'm singing along to the universe for reminding me to unclench my jaw and relax my shoulders and let out the breath I've been holding in and loosen my ****** grip there's bruises all over your body, I think today I realized I will always prefer to be this filled with love and dread.