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.

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

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

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

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 forgot I existed before waking up on your front
porch at 6 am. We walked to your bedroom as the
morning light waved goodbye, the first and last time

I will ever sleep in jeans. We kissed like we were mad at
each other: urgently, my hand clenching your thigh
for dear life, pursing our lips because that makes it

slower which somehow means it's more intentional.
I’m ready to wake up for the day and immediately
move my body. I wonder if that’s only something I’m

able to do if I’m not telling anyone about it. Still- it
did always feel so time sensitive, I would be rushing
without any idea where I needed to go except that I

wanted it to be with you. I was hesitant at first, until
I was able to remember what your perfume smelled
like: clean, no matter how drunk I was, no matter how

tired. I’m afraid it might be lingering, but I finally learned
that it isn't beautiful to be so tragic, not even in November.
Now pity feels nowhere near as good as intimacy

does, and intimacy only feels as good as the last time.
I struggle to find a point where I wasn’t naked in every
possible way, but that’s because people usually fall in

love with me if they’re having *** with me. This
time I was too busy remembering how to be on display,
how to play the right amount of pretend and the right

amount of dead. In the dark it’d be impossible to tell
the difference between the way you saw me and
the way I saw you, but I can still feel the sinking.

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.

poetry written while I'm lying in my best friends bed in the middle of the night

II.

the way the words "breaking up" coming from your lips sound; the way they feel the same whether it has to do with you leaving me, or you leaving her

III.

you have to respect her, ah... I see. and then there's me

IV.

poetry written by putting hands to a keyboard and just moving until there's no more roman numerals left is poetry that's written in the middle of the night while I'm lying in my best friends bed

V.

I deserve better

VI.

you deserve significantly worse

VII.

here's how I imagine it- my phone rings.
"I broke up with her."
"I don't think we should talk anymore"

VIII.

I didn't lie when I told you I love you but I don't know what love is. you'll always be my first love, but I really don't know what love is

IX.

but it's probably not this

X.

we didn't talk today and I was glad, I had a good day

XI.

twenty two things written while my best friend snores to my right and I wait for you to call tomorrow so I can rush off the phone and pretend I'm still far away

XII.

this was still my city before you came into this life, so why does it feel like it's all in honor of you?

XIII.

today I read that if a trans person starts taking testosterone they need to double up on vitamin C because it kills their immune system so now I have to stay with you until you start the shots so I can bring over 5 cases of OJ and force feed it to you like the child you are

XIV.

the child you look like.

XV.

I dunno, like, I just don't even know how you're going to react, and like, I'm torn between being really curious and wanting to rip the bandaid off and just not wanting to find out, you know?

XVII.

You know what I think?

XVIII.

another-break-up-poem from the *****-who-just-won't-break-up-with-him

XIX.

one time when I was in 5th grade we had to learn Roman numerals and my teacher made us do entire math work sheets answering in them for like a month. her name was Ms. Schwanbeck and I had her the year my mom started dating that one guy that she married that one time. she was also the one who taught me it's L-M-N-O-P that we were singing in the alphabet song and not elephant ***

**.

I dunno, maybe I'm just not strong enough

XXI.

like poetry aside, metaphors and all that ****

XXII.

maybe I'm just not meant to do it anymore

XXIII.

I do love you, I have this whole time

XXIV.

but don't forget that I have no idea what the **** love is

I cry for you once each night, every night.

I want to write a poem about being
malleable,
so I buy clay. I try to make a sculpture
of what it is that I’m feeling and it looks like
absolute ****, it isn’t my fault
my hands are just too weak to
carry the weight of the mixture I tried to make.
that you once were.
I try again.
I lift and I punch and I mold
and I kneed and
I grab the clay like I’m
grabbing the back of your head,
your hair in my fist so now it’s grey between my fingers once again
and I hit and I switch and I try so hard to make something sturdy  

it needs to be cooked to stand up straight.
maybe you’re just not there yet.

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

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 think of you for twenty seconds
twenty times each a day
if I breathe slow enough I can
feel it inside my chest, like
the drop of a hat or the
sound of a smoke alarm or
the turn of my car key or the
way you look past so vacantly
when I know that you can see me

I'm driving through familiar highways
that manage to take me to a foreign place
as if I'm headed to you
freshly washed feet and ***** sheets
inside of my catalogue apartment
every item inside belongs to someone else
but every part of me once did too
I'm sorry that I wholeheartedly believe
there’s something to say about being
old and new at the same time

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?

If I was a coffee drinker
I’d balance your body like a rosetta
I’d kiss your cheek with my
Colombian coffee breath
the flavor of our love like
your crema on my tongue-
notes of rich chocolate evenings
and salty, very salty
your bitterness like the very first time
notes of my coffee cherry-
no, your coffee cherry
the aftertaste like high acidity
your complexity gets lost on
my caffeine intolerance
but I still feel your finish
each time I swallow
I still find notes of you,
cupping me

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.

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

in hindsight, if I fell in love this easy, I should be able to fall out just as easy, but for whatever reason reversal always seems a lot trickier. faith is just something we use to trick ourselves into thinking everything's okay when in reality there is nothing left, so no, I don't have faith that we'll work this out because that would prove we couldn't. I'm not throwing what we are into the universe and leaving it all up to fate, halfway because I'm a control freak and halfway because it wouldn't be fair to our past, to all that we've been through, to shrug and leave it up to chance.

the night I was planning on leaving you, you were also planning on leaving me. we met up in your bedroom when the sun had just gone down and we were both exhausted, before you'd been at work all day and I'd spent hours in a bookstore, it was a very typical night for us to end up together. I didn't break up with you and you didn't break up with me. does it mean something that both of us had the intention to end it, walk out and not look back? or does it mean something that neither of us went through with it? later you told me the day before when you asked me to meet you in your bedroom at 7, you'd been planning on telling me you had to work it out with her. I laughed and told you that when you asked me to be there at 7, I nodded and decided it was the last time I'd tell you I'd see you there.
in actuality that night we had *** for somewhere around 2 hours and I decided that I wasn't selfless enough to adhere to the cliche of loving someone so much you let them go. you called me baby for the first time that night. to date, you've called me it twice.
in a perfect world, I'd be sitting at a red light trying to catch a glimpse of the accident thirty feet in front of me and I'd pick up my phone and tell you I was having an existential crisis because I was ten seconds away from being hit. in a perfect world, you'd smirk and tell me that's a really selfish mindset because someone actually did get hit and it wasn't me. in a perfect world, I'd lay on your chest and listen to your heartbeat and feel content instead of empty. in a perfect world, your arms around me wouldn't remind me of how lonely I am.
I know this love is real, and honest and incomparable, but I also know this love is selfish, and every time I dry heave in my car because your bedroom light is on and her car is out front while I'm trying to navigate, screaming "I have to break up with him, I'm going to break up with him" over and over and over, believing it less and less with every cry, I only end up loving you more, and that's some ******* *******
in a perfect world, I wouldn't have to write this. I wouldn't have to ask you to step outside because my chest feels so tight I think my skin might just rip, and we wouldn't spend 25 minutes of our 30 minute conversation having small talk just to trick my body out of panicking. in a perfect world, I wouldn't say, "she's waiting on you, are you going to be in trouble?" and you wouldn't say, "I dont know, probably. can you breathe?" and I wouldn't reply, "your voice makes everything a little easier," and you wouldn't say, "I don't like that you are in this place," and I wouldn't whisper, "in a perfect world, we would be perfect together, you know? in a perfect world what we have would be perfect. we'd be perfect," and you wouldn't get sad that I was thinking like that again, you wouldn't sigh and say "I know. I have to go soon honey," and I wouldn't say "I know. I know you do. I'll let you go," and you wouldn't say goodbye and ask me to text you when I got home safely, and I wouldn't say I will and wait for you to hang up before whispering, "I love you so much I think I'm going mental".

in hindsight, this should have never started. sitting here now I can tell you 4,000 ways this could have stopped before it became such a gross mixture of gratifying and the most painful experience to date. I read the other day that our hearts form before our brains so maybe my reluctance to listen to reason has to do with my heart crying out seniority and swearing it knows what it's doing. It's funny to think about the night we started and how many different things fell apart before you saw me and told me you liked my smile and asked me to text you. I wasn't even supposed to be there that night. I could call that fate, that the stars had me and you in mind that night when they got my gig cancelled and called me into work, or I could say something like, "in a perfect world, I could love you, and you could love me, and that could be enough"

that coffee gave me a headache and I don't have any sunglasses or ****. this isn't a poem. I should go back inside.

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 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

Does it always wear off?

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

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

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

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

sext: wrap me in the blanket that's in the back seat of your car, call her while I'm staring into space, tell her you love her out of no where
sext: uuuuuuuuhhhhh......I don't want to move in with you
sext: I love you but I'm moving a thousand miles away
sext: I love you so I'm moving a thousand miles away
sext: I'm moving a thousand miles away BECAUSE I love you
sext: I want to bite off your tongue
sext: really bad
sext: you shouldn't have told her you love her when I was already off the ledge
sext: I'll bite your lip, it'll bleed, red will pour down your mouth and your clothes and your horns will poke through and BOOM! satan
sext: baby baby BABY you turn me on
sext: especially when your actions completely correlate with what I was always told not to do
sext: I was told not to do you, but, well....ok we were supposed to hangout at a park like this is a ******* indie movie but this cop told me that park was closed? I didn't know parks ******* close? so we met in a parking lot and you mentioned how your roommate wasn't home and la la la la LAAAAA, we ended up on your living room floor and the carpet was covered in my black lace
sext: I'm wearing high heels, tall ones. I'm 5' 11 1/2", you're, ummm...something. someone. oh yeah, I'm in love with you. well, I dunno about that anymore what's love? I defined it and it said "sext: an intense feeling of deep attachment". ah, ok, got it. I now understand you, love. this was supposed to be **** ya no, like me running down the back your legs in my red high heels, sending chills through your veins and breaking all of your bones. ****** ****, right? **** I ruined it when I brought up love  
sext: uh, it's been 3 days since we've talked. I know you said like 3 months ago that we needed to "draw new lines for each other" and "figure out how to have self control and not pounce the other when we're alone and I play smashing pumpkins" but we've ****** like what, 40 times since? and you told me you loved me and begged me not to leave soooooooo....? those lines need to be erased buddy boy
sext: uhg. you don't get it. I'm tired.  got so drunk I could barely stand last night. slept for fourty minutes. then worked a thirteen hour shift. I'm sorry. give me a kiss. no? but this is supposed to be a sext?
sext: nothing you say is equivalent to a sext these days
sext: take your clothes off
sext: take your clothes off
sext: then take mine off
sext: then take mine off
sext: you wear mine, I wear yours
sext: jk babe the clothes are off we're ******* ******

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

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 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.

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

each movement is carefree
this has been what's coming for me

my hands melting on the page as my eyes close
begging for unconsciousness
but if I don't get this out now, I never will

to be completely unburdened
by anyone, and that includes me
would be simple and easy
and it would bore you to death

to need someone
why do bodies crave other bodies?
a body is just a body
until you get down to the soul
your purple and blue bruised soul

If I don't get this out now, I never will
because honey really does come from bees
and the night you kissed me for the first time
you mentioned how you were deathly allergic
so honey, do you have time to hear me?

If I knew you wouldn't
one-
get scared and run away
or two-
get bored and ask for your CD's back
I'd give you every last bit
but I have to hold some in,
to make sure you stay

words are hard so you use your hands
and looks,
and the tilt of your chin
and the shaking of your knee
words are hard so I choke out syllable
until you hand me a glass of water
and I simply sing out your name

If I don't get this out now,
I never will
I'll follow the leader,
I'll obey my command
did you expect me to make this easy on you?
oh honey, I'm not that sweet

I'm the venom in your morning Cheerios
I'm the paper cut at your favorite part
I'm the black in the morning sky
honey, I'll only make this harder,
as hard as I possibly can.

look at me.
look right THROUGH me.
I'm focusing on all of the wrong things and I'm putting all my effort into them, the wrong things, all my time money energy patience into them (the wrong things) and at the end of the day I am exhausted and have nothing left for the right things and that makes it all my fault. everything.

look at me.
tell me that when you see me now all you see is the color of my lipstick wiped onto napkins at the top of your trash can and my mascara all over your pillow- or, well, my pillow, the pillow of yours that I used, and tell me that you still haven't washed the pillowcase or even moved the pillow, that you sleep in a weird S shape to avoid bumping into the pillow (as if I'm still there), and tell me how you were brushing your teeth and she was sitting at your desk and you saw the napkins and you just stood there, you left the water running so she didn't know you were done, and you stood there and watched the napkins. you watched, and you remembered my face with the mascara streaming down and you remembered me trying to yell but not being able to stop my voice from cracking, and you remembered the look in my eye when I gave you up.

LOOK at me.
tell me that if you lost me it'd be like losing your right ******* arm, it'd be like losing your car keys and having to be at work in an hour or maybe like locking your keys inside of your car and slamming your head against the window because at the end of the day this is all your own fault. I'll tell you that I like being your passenger seat and you won't understand but I will, and our song will come on and I'll forget about the napkins for a second and that ******* pillow that needs to be washed and let myself just, stop. let myself stop, let myself focus on the wrong things for a few more days because the right things are a lot of work and I'm not sure how to motivate myself if the outcome isn't positive and immediate.
but, well..

look at me.
I'm trying, right?
I'm doing something right. because tonight when you walked passed me and didn't say a word to me I got teary eyed and locked myself in another room just to take a breath and realize that I don't even want you anymore. so who cares. I cried, I wiped my face with a napkin, I threw it away, you're the one standing and staring at the crumpled and wet remains of what we were and what happened to us, not me. not anymore at least.

look through me
and tell me again that you aren't sure if I was ever really happy with you. know that you're right, I wasn't, but believe me when I say I tried, and I tried, and I tried some more, but at the end of every day you still only left me raw.
so I gave up on you.

I walk up to the scene of the crime
and there’s a shaking figure with a knife
and a body that will end up in a bag
and there’s a gun in my hand
and there’s blood all over the ground
I say to stop, you’re under arrest
I say to put the blade down and
stand up as slowly as you can

I didn’t write for 3 months and
it was the slowest time of my life
I only write about *** when I’m
not the one that’s having it
which is depressing, I know
now you’re standing there and I’m
yelling at you to leave, to walk
back to wherever you came from
and you’re crying as hard as I’ve
ever seen you cry before and your
reaching your hand out to me but I
absolutely refuse to grab it because
I’m angry that you’re here, you aren’t
supposed to be and you say you’re
drunk as if it makes it any better
but I really just want you to leave
but you want my hand so I give it to
you and end up letting you sleep
in my bed because
I feel guilty that
I don’t feel guilty
I feel guilty that
I don’t feel guilty at all

so I’m standing there with the blade
in my hand, to his neck
and I just kind of let it hangout
push it a little closer, make him sweat
and I move my wrist slightly to break
just the first layer of skin
then down to say, the fifth, not near
close enough to draw any blood
in my defense I didn’t think
anyone was nearby
so I smile
and I take my ******* time
I give him the wink he's wanted
and slowly I shove it in
somebody walks up and is yelling
to drop it, to stand up as slowly as I can
whatever
I give him a big kiss
and I shove it in again

you met me at a very odd time in my life

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.

this is the poem you're too self indulged to write
then everything is going okay it's easy to cover your ears and let your eyes play tricks on themselves and go to work and do your homework and lay in his bed the day after she did and not think anything of it, but once he says that one thing or does that one too many times you manage to pull the horse blinds off and see what's happening.
this is the poem you're not self-indulgent enough to write
love is tricky. it may be one of the most common concepts us as humans cannot seem to figure out but us, as humans, as a species, we need love to exist. without the eyes and hands and time from another person it starts to feel like we aren't really even here, that maybe somehow by being independent and alone you start to fade away, like another person in the crowd whose face you'll never quite be able to remember- but when you're in love, every color seems to go brighter and the feeling in the pit of your stomach makes you drive faster and your legs shake ten times easier. it makes time slower and faster at the same time and the sky seem bluer and the world a little neon.
maybe this is the poem you're too blinded to write
love is not supposed to hurt. love is work, and somewhere along the road you'll have to kick and fight and scream to make that love work but in the beginning, the little bit, it's not supposed to feel like glass on skin it's supposed to be smooth and silky and for whatever reason us as humans, as species, we decided that the more effort we put into something that's difficult the more important to us it should be and the more attached we should feel, but sometimes it's okay to let go. I'm telling that to you, but I'm telling that to me.
this is the poem you're too tired to write, because when you spend your time working and going to class and fighting for the only person who you've ever really felt but you've never been able to keep a grip on and it isn't fair because you deserve to be able to hold onto something other than your own hand, your eyes start to grow weak, and so do your arms and your legs and especially your heart, because when love hurts, when love becomes something that's really terribly bad, what's left? what's supposed to get you through the day when the one emotion that's supposed to lift you up leaves you aching and collapsed on the ground?
this is the poem no one should ever have to write
I struggle to call love an emotion, because in this sense love is a verb. like "I loved with all that I had until I couldn't stand anymore and then I was just collapsed loving you more and more and than you held her hand in front of me and didn't talk to me for three days and I thought if I loved you anymore my skin would burst and I'd just be on the ground aching and hyperventilating and screaming your name wondering why everyone makes love seem good because love is just bad, it's just broken glass and long drives because if you cry anymore your head will fog up again, it's wanting to write but not wanting to write because you've reached the point of a horrible mixture of exhaustion, sadness, pain and adoration that you can't even get the pen to the paper, it's feeling so much that not even words can explain it, like driving by his house because when you see her car out front your arms go numb and for whatever reason you like to make it hurt even more, for some ****** up reason, for some ****** up ******* reason you're a dumb ******* miserable human who only let's herself feel more miserable and let's herself fall more in love and refuses to end the vicious cycle of you and him and him and her and you only wanting him but him wanting you and also kind of wanting her but wanting her more than you and knowing that and just wanting to collapse on the ground. for the 6th time this week, and it's only wednesday"
this is the poem I should have written the
minute I heard there was another one
the minute I found out that love has conditions and that sometimes love is felt when it should not be felt. sometimes it'll pop in your head during a meaningless task and you'll realize you can't run from inside of your head no matter how much you wish you could and during those moments you won't think to write this poem, you'll just collapse. you'll only collapse and call him and tell him you miss him and he'll say something too fast and too quiet and you'll realize she's in front of him so he can't say he loves you back and it'll **** you. but you'll stay on the ground. and you'll stay with him.
this is the poem you're too guilty to write, and too confused and too in love. but you waited and you waited for someone to come and for it to click and for you to get him and him to get you and when it came you didn't realize there'd be conditions, and when you had them in front of you, you didn't realize you could say no to them. so I guess in a way this is a poem you waited to write, but you never realized it'd be so bittersweet. that sometime love poems aren't about love at all, but about losing it and the pain of it all, and being the girl who goes there, and the girl who met him and became really really good at pronouns but really bad at tenses and deciphering between first person and second person, and started talking in third person a few dozen poems ago and forgot how to get back into her own skin.
this is the poem you should never have to write, and if you ever do I hope you notice and you leave. because love might be tricky, but love should also be great. you should only ever be at the brink of collapsing before they come over and pick you up, you should never be on cold tile on your roommates bathroom floor too exhausted to stand up and screaming too loud and crying too hard to move when he's in bed with her, sound asleep. she's warm, and his arms are around her, and you're shivering on cold tile, and you're writing a poem you never thought you'd have to write.

I am outside a high school party with a cigarette in my hand and my sweater trailing on the ground. I belong to the night; to the teenage desperation you find right through the front door inside every single one of those boys and girls eyes. It is dark outside but I can make out everyone's faces simply by the light of cigarettes. I close my eyes for a second and inhale. I can barely make out the silhouette of the person I wish was in front of me. My eyes open. You are not here. To my left there's an alley and a short boy is throwing up the 22 shots that are tallied on his forearm. His best friend is video taping it. I don't think I'm really here. Is this the alcohol speaking? I didn't feel this attached to you 3 hours ago. My mother thinks I am at work. I don't feel bad at all. After everything I have done, lying is simple. I've become accustomed to being a lie. A boy is trying to get two girls to make out and that offends me. I'm not here. I'm not anywhere. I'm with you. I matter to you. I matter to someone. I am something.
I open my eyes.
A guy is handing me a beer, so I take it. I should be going home but that girl looks like you. There are four boys to my right free styling. One of them is actually really good. I try to weave through the people to find a familiar face. I find one, and he's handing me a bottle. I don't know what it is, but I drink. It burns.
I'm outside again sitting on the curb. The streetlight that shines above me is a dark shade of yellow that glows off every wall. It reminds me of the night. The moon is looking at me with an intensity I've never seen before. I have a text from you on my phone but I don't want to open it. I don't want to be able to feel this much. I go to find the bottle again.
I'm laughing a lot now. I found the bottle. The familiar face is laughing too. Her boyfriend broke her heart last week.
Your silhouette is standing in the corner. It's beckoning me. I open your text:
do you need something?
I close your text. I close my phone and my eyes and my arms and my heart and I throw my empty beer can at that silhouette of yours.
I'm outside again. Familiar face is going to take me home.
The cigarette is glowing orange and I'm dancing to her car.
You don't love me. I don't care.

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

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

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

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

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?

I wake up in your twin sized bed-
I know I have been dreaming.
there's puddles in the bed, on the kitchen floor,
in the palm of my hands, you look at me with eyes
I'm not sure I recognize.
we've barely met but I slide my fingers in anyway,
and this time I see your eyes where I've seen them before:
rolled into the back of your head.

I wake up in your bed again and immediately
I know I have been dreaming.
I'm covered in sweat and *** (how many times have I written that)
it smells like B/O and cigarettes (this time in a good way)
we can't find the pipe and a nug of **** ended up in my water.
I look around for things to write about later
and notice refrigerator magnets.
I spell my name and leave.

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.

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

Control
Everything comes back to control
There are pins on a board
Places you took me
Needles in my skin
Places you touched me
But, no
This time I'm not losing it
Maybe it's because you're only a foot from me
Maybe I still have some hope
Trials and errors
Everything comes back to trial and error
You were a trial
I was the error
I'm realizing in time,
Everything really does fade to black and white
I'm realizing
Everything doesn't happen for a reason
This wasn't fate
This wasn't a higher power
Here I sit,
Ready to pour
And your back is turned to me
Nothing's the enemy
There is no ******* enemy
Walking through empty corridors,
Filled with paranoia
I'm not afraid of going numb again
That'd be the best case scenario
No,
I'm afraid of feeling this
All of it
Like a slow, steady beating
Like a nail on my kneecap,
A hammer in your hand
Like it was all just
Nothing
This was your trial
And I was the error
Like a hammer in your heart
Like your heart morphing into a hammer
One swift hit
Trial and error