Sometimes I will take ******* clad photos
and post them
just to reassure myself
that my body is truly there
and truly mine to behold
and touch
and gaze at
sometimes I'm called "cute" or "a ****"
but how am I a ****
when all I have given you is
sight
and not
touch

I want to be able to touch my own skin
and feel...
skin
not ghost stories
not scars
or fabric bound
so tightly that I can't move
I want to feel my hand
graze my arm
without that graze
skimming cold fragile
porcelain

I am tired of my thoughts
wrapping themselves
around my throat
cutting into my skin
my thoughts are a rope
that would string me
from an oak tree

Sometimes I run
with my shoes untied
and I race the world
because I love the way the
wind slapping my face
and the inevitable fall onto the concrete
makes me feel alive
because I do not feel
alive
can you see the ruby-crimson
spiderwebs weaved into my eyes
I know you can
and I only know that
because they stick out
like a dysmorphia on my skin
my mother asks me if I'm ******
and it's much simpler to agree
than to tell her I've been crying
because I don't have to explain
drug abuse
but emotions require an entire doctorate

Sometimes when the winds
shakes me and pushes me forward
I wish I was
a porcelain plate
and that I would
fall down and
shatter.

one: i love the sun and light and the smell of dewy grass. i've lost my taste for the dark.
two: my love for the darkness has turned into but a simple appreciation for i cannot love something where i know monsters lurk.
three: you are one of those lurking monsters.
four: i'd rather get high than hear you speak. the burn of the smoke as it chases and then caresses my lungs and the heavy exhale that follows is the only conversation i need because drug consumption is more important to me than my life being consumed by you.
five: i love myself now.
six: i do not need danger like i did when i was a juvenile. danger is an art i have never perfected.
seven: you never loved me.
eight: i learned long ago that the purple tulips you planted under my skin were not your way of saying i love you but they were instead your way of proving your dominance.
nine: i do not like being dominated.
five: i love myself now.
five: i love myself now.
five: i love myself now.
seven: you never loved me.
ten: you lurk in the shadows in my room. even though i do not want to be with you now you stay with me but that's not any different considering you never cared what i wanted.
five: i love myself now.

hear the chime
of the cold constellations
that guide you
at 2:56 in the morning.
taste the worries of tomorrow
overflowing from your mug,
spilling onto your lap
of glitching faces,
distorting your body
into millions of pixels.
touch the signals
from the suicidal satellites
dictating your amygdala
in a requiem
of the winter dawn.

you lay
in a bed of clouds
under blankets
of anxious thoughts.
blue volcanoes
spew out violet insults
telling you
that you won't make it
past the milky way,
so you burn your fingertips
trying to reach for the sun
in hopes
that it will prove those indigo offenses wrong.
third-degree burns
**** your senses
and leave you
feeling nothing.
seeing nothing.
being nothing.
you look up to the sky,
eyes dripping with desperation,
only to find
that the man in the moon
left you
for another life.

and
suddenly,
at 2:57 in the morning,
you realize
that orion doesn't seem so bright to you anymore.

her skin is soft like flower petals
and it smells like
cigarettes and Nag Champa
her hair is always
sitting on her head
in a loose looking tight bun
and her makeup is always
less is more
and her teeth poke out from
behind her pink lips
with a smile
and a laugh
she tells me she laughs just like her sister
but an octave higher
and i want to tell her
that her laugh is beautiful
and hers alone
but she would not listen if
i said that

her skin is soft
and my hands shakily caress it
and i know my palms are cold and clammy
and sweaty
but she says nothing
and so i say nothing
and we sit in the silence
of waiting for the other
to speak
but her lips curl up
and over her teeth
and she smiles at me
with her yellow-cigarette stained
canines
and she tells me
she feels beautiful today
she feels okay today
but she does not really
and i can see it from the way
her almond eyes stare into mine
as though she is digging
my heart out
so that she can take a bite
as though she is scavenging me
for my okay
for my beautiful
but, anjelica
she is my okay
and my beautiful
and she holds
my happy
in the palm of her empty cupped hand

and she tells me she wants to shrink
she wants to fade into the black
as though the only something she hears
from my mouth
anymore
screams to be attacked
and i try to help her
and she told me she was better
but i know that her better
is turning into a cold brick
and she turned into a cold brick
and now she is stuck
unable to move
unable to scream
and she tries to move
as i had tried to save her
but i cannot save someone
that doesn't want to be saved
but ****** i wanted to save
her

my dear anjelica hides now
she hides behind the chopped bangs
that cloud her eyes
she hides behind her newfound slang
and her pile of lies
and she lies to me
she cannot tell me
her thoughts
she says that they are too
scary
and that they even scare her
but what i find the scariest
is my fear of losing her
and if she cannot speak to me
how do i refrain from losing her
she is like a cherry tree
blossoming under the suns beating rays
and losing petals
as harsh winds blow
and i am standing here
waiting for her to grow
waiting for this to grow
into something more than
strictly nothing

i wrap my fingers
around her wrist
and pull
because there is more of a world
to show her
than she would like to see
and i tell her
that she will be safe with me
but she does not believe me
for how can you be safe
when you aren't even safe by yourself
i do not want to whisper
sweet nothings in her ear
i want us to speak somethings
because all we are is nothing
all we are is nothing
but my dear anjelica
i want her to be my something

she is the world
and she holds much more in her hands
then she could ever imagine
and her skin
smells like cigarettes and Nag Champa
and i wonder if she loves the smell
as much as i do

the light pitter-patter
of falling rain
echoes in my fingers
and numbs my tongue
as i stare in the broken
mirror
that holds my reflection
almost as well as your glazed
eyes
and i can feel the numb
of the sharp biting cold
and i can hear the echo
of your cracked voice

in you i crash
i'm a plane that's lost its engine
and you are the soft plain
in which i land upon

in you i fall
and by fall i mean in love
i fell in love with you
i was the tree alone in a forest
with nobody there to hear me
that toppled over
and believe me my crushing bones
made a sound

in you i break
a sentimental wave
that just tears me down
like a deteriorating building
that would stumble
with a push of a palm
but for you
it was the crack in your voice
it was the crash of your belief
it was the disappointment in your eyes
it was the fall of us

i could have diminished
with the snap
of your fingers
not because you controlled me
rather
my love for you
controlled my body

and i hear the echoes
that scream over every
feeling i have for you
every feeling
that reminds me of you
the echoes of your voice
your laugh
your shouts

i try to forget
and believe me do i try
but i feel as though
i shall never forget
you have cast a shadow
upon my heart
that can never disappear
because as i may
feel in the dark
others around me
shine their light
and ever so easily
does your memory
appear
and shroud me to believe
all of the

negative

i still have dreams of her
but she's different now
renewed somehow
¿happy perhaps?
that's quite the stretch
her eyes no longer scream
rather they sing of
daylight and bubble gum kisses
the dark circles
that had burrowed under
her eyes
were uprooted
and gone
her smile is wider
and genuine
her teeth no longer reek of
cyanide
and paper cuts
her lips no longer curl sadly
around each punchline
rather they wrap around each word that
exits my chapped lips
her lips are no longer
chapped
instead they are soft and whole and healthy

she straightened her hair
and chopped it to her
shoulders
as though each of her problems
dropped
with her delicate curls
as though her past would be as lost
and as irretrievable as her hair
she tells me
that she's never felt
better
and i know that her kind of better
is dropping everything and running
and turning into a cold brick
because once you're a brick
the only pain you can feel is when your bones
chip
i fear i've lost
my dear, Anjelica
to this destructive
"better"

she straightened her hair
she straightened her hair
she straightened her hair
and it's cookie cutter straight now
chalkboard flat somehow
she keeps it on her shoulders
her eyes don't scream
and in my dreams
i see us dancing but
this is not a dream anymore
who am i to escape to
now that my dear, Anjelica
has a light gleaming in her eye
and that same eye
is whispering to me of
dreams
dreams
dreams
and life
wonderful colorful life
and she tells me
that her favorite color is
yellow
because it symbolizes
hope
and i begin to realize
that perhaps she is
"better"
and perhaps this is for the
"better"

but i am selfish
and i am petrified that
i do not understand
this new
Anjelica
this happy
Anjelica
i do not know her
she was the only one i knew
and now i am
simply lost
for how can i
write
about a stranger?
i am the
stranger

she paints yellow flowers
on her window
and she lies down
and she sleeps
as i sit there
i see that
one thing has remained
the same:
she still looks
damaged
in her sleep

there is a bed that you haven't slept in twice. i should have asked you who taught you to
lace up your shoes in an instinct
that feels just like a memory,
your luggage is always packed.
you love out of a suitcase, always
ready to pick up and move. your hands are stained with their last
names you have boarding flights tattooed
on your palms because you're so used to
leaving, there is never a good-bye it is
always departure gates and terminals, and i'm writing this in on connecting flight over the ocean because close to nowhere is
the closest we've been in months
just to tell your passport that i understand
how you cannot love me. i could
taste it in your gas-station coffee breath i could
feel it in the hesitance of your fingertips
you are always close to the highway you are always waiting to hitch a ride with a new girl who will write poetry about how badly you feel like permanence and i
am always trying to unpack you, begging
you to stay one more night.
i understand how you cannot love me, i stay on the ground and you buy plane tickets with spare cash, with a turbulence that makes me
want to fasten my seatbelt.
there is a bed that you haven't slept in twice and i whisper to the sheets
"i thought i could've made you stay."
your face is always towards the
humming of the window and
i like to imagine you can hear
me if you can hear me, you can leave all you
want. you can travel across the world and exchange your
heart for currency, you can walk through
security and stuff your belongings into the closets of cheap
hotels. i understand how you cannot stay because you're always too busy leaving,
but there will always be a place for you to
unpack in my chest.
there is a home that remains unoccupied.
there is a bed that
you haven't slept in twice, i keep it unmade in case you
ever feel like coming back.