You told yourself 25 was a good age to die
Ghosting on the tail end of youth,
The Grey would never touch you.

But 25 is here, and the razor is coppered from neglect
And the pills in the cabinet have long lost their voice from bitter age.

25 is here, and you're reminded of the deal you made with Death at 18
When the weight of life nearly killed you
And your idea of hope was the promise of an early grave.

25 is here, and you don't want to die
But the burden of years that have not yet arrived
Press down on your shoulders like the heavy hands of unwanted men.

And yet.
You don't want to die.

So you rely on your emergency exits
collecting dust under tarnished jewelry and gold-strangled hair ties.

Like old friends you meet up with once a decade, you pacify their need for acknowledgement,
Weaving nevers into not yets with empty promises and shallow reassurances,
Brushing off their needling whispers as they bounce off another day gone by.

Because you're 25.
And you're not done yet.

I sit here among the windmills
Absently weaving wildflowers
       In
         Out
           Pull
             Repeat
My fingers shake and I break
A fine green stem
The downy white head pops off like a cork
And its orphaned body lays prone in the palm of my hand
And I wonder
Is it still a daisy without its head?

       In
         Out
           Pull
             Repeat

I sit here among the windmills
The sun watching over me
His rays paint-brushing
Shades of bubblegum pink into the milky skin of my bare bent back
I think of the moon
How tender strokes would soon give way to needles
Dancing under blood-red skin
And I wonder
If maybe it should have been called moonburn instead?

       In
         Out
           Pull
             Repeat

I sit here among the windmills
Thinking of the God I don't believe in
Guiding my hand as I scrawl
Senseless words across my mind
Pulling daisies from the ground
And looping stems into crowns
I cry for the loss
As I come full-circle
And I wonder
What now?

       In
         Out
            Pull

I stand here among the windmills
Pushing daisies with my dirt stained toes
Naked and free
Barring the crown on my head
And the years etched across my face.

       In
 
I sleep here among the windmills
In a bed made of my own carnage
Silver hair waving back in farewell
And I realize
I'll never be burned by the moon again.

       Out -

All these lies and smiles I eat
Rest in my head like the tombs of the dead
And make a tally in mind, I keep
For the time comes soon, I shall shed
The decay that stains dry lips black
And Pollocks the mountains of my cheeks
Like webs of a spider, left unchecked
A scorn of thorns I will mete
For each scar of a promise unkept
Has nested a home in my dried-up heart
And unlike you, for whom I've wept
Their bitter voices keep me warm

Betrayal grips me like a forgotten lover
I dance in your demise, and rise - untethered.

Fingertips singed with ink trail over paper that’s still crisp with innocence
Spreading the ashes of all the words that were no more than the potential
Laying forgotten among the carnage of its crinkled sisters

With every scrape and smudge of the pen, the heart is at risk
Like a slab of raw meat on the butcher’s block
Waiting patiently for the cool kiss of the cleaver

But this heart is a violent heart
Ruthless in its mission
Forever evading the Doubts grazing their silver teeth across its juicy flesh
Grinning gleefully, defiantly
Fueled by spilled ink and wasted words

Sour apple blades of grass
Kiss her skin like feather dusters
And plumes of evergreens fractal the beating rays
Of summer's midday

Her steps falter, heart beat sluggish
A matching tune
To the drip drip drip
Of crimson tears
Tracking down her wrists,
Gathering and falling off cold fingertips

A bed of silk meet first her knees
Then her cheek
The smell of dirt and anguish
Invades her senses
Heavy eyes flutter shut
And the glaring red curtain
Fades to black

In the rundown apartment on State Street
Where glitter falls down on us like rain
Tattooing our skin in rainbow freckles
And gold streetlights peaking in from the window
Dance across the room
Casting us in a vortex of geometric cut-outs

We sit on a bare mattress the color of rose dust
Scars of wear spiderweb the surface
Releasing tufts of cotton fluff that smell of must

The sweet tang of bourbon creates a sticky layer on my tongue
And ropes of pale hair plaster themselves to my flushed skin
I am soaring in giddiness
For this summer, for this night, for you

Music and chatter drone on below us
A low beat, familiar and nostalgic
My heart tries to match rhythm
But your presence interferes

We lay side by side, my hand in yours
Clammy skin like melted plastic
Fusing into one
“Look at me.”
I can’t see your face
I lift my head, inhale your breaths
Bourbon and sweet, sweet nicotine
You kiss me my last first kiss

Eyes like mirrors like truths
I saw your demons in the fissures
Their chains rattling a soundless roar
Masked by plastic smiles and razor words
A cage of flesh and bone
Growing old and feeble with time
As the demons ****** you dry
I saw the claws under your skin
Itching to consume you,
Itching to destroy

Until one day your pool of strength depleted
The shackles shattered
Smiles, now frozen memories
Words, forever silent echoes
Flesh and bone obliterated
As the bullet hit true

Did he kiss it a kiss he never kissed me,
With lips and tongue, bitter and hard?
Or was it a peck on the jaw, right under the chin,
Hot skin meeting cold metal?
Definitely not a lover’s caress of the temple
For he was no more stupid than sentimental.


Blood and brain guts
Pollocked across the sheets
Soaking into the unfinished headboard–
Drops of ruby peppering the walls–
Eyes vacant, like ***** dishwater


A kiss from you would have been a gun to my lips–
Perhaps I dodged a bullet
When you decided to love yourself more than me.

I feel bad for the Moon who burns my skin
It wasn’t her fault, but rather her lover’s
Skin once milky white -
Now swathed in blistery red
What was once a warm embrace -
Now needles in my veins
That deceiving Sun
Who once kissed my flesh into a blush
Has abandoned me to the agony of nightfall
And here I sway among a sea of grass caked in Summer's tears
Shaking my fist angrily at the Moon
Whose glow neither harms nor heals me -
But reveals her lover's trickery

She always hated her hair
How the sheet of gold would shackle her down
Like a fly in a trap
Sticking to the shine of her lips
Getting lost between the valleys of her arms
Burning her scalp as she tried to yank herself free
From her flaxen prison

I always loved her hair
How it would fall over the ***** of my arm
Like a waterfall
Vining its way around my limbs
Teasing my chin and then my lips
Fluttering against my nose
Asphyxiating me with her scent
Sweet peach Heaven

I think I miss her hair the most.

You kissed a bullet
And the ricochet shattered
What's left of my heart

The darkness thins with the break of dawn
Kissing me awake at last
Limbs stiff from unseen shackles, I ache
No longer smothered by that violent silence
Where night’s claws pecked and chewed at my frozen flesh

I hunger for the world outside my window
Throbbing with life untamed
I hunger for the endless day
And dread the night to come

Hours like sand sift through fingers
I grasp onto the light with a fever
******* the sun’s marrow for strength

The light fractures under the fall of dusk
And darkness welcomes me once again
The ritual of the ******

Someone once said that we all have a crow
Perched on our shoulders
Cawing incessantly in our ears
Failure, worthless, your words are stupid
No one will like them
GIVE UP

Someone once said that the crow needs to be shoved off
Pushed away
But I feared it would only return
So I grabbed it by its bony neck
Stared into its beady black eyes
Where a rapid, ravaged face reflected back
No more, I snarled at the little *******
NO MORE

So I murdered that crow
Ripped it limb from limb from limb
Felt its plume grow sticky and brittle
Took great pleasure in it, quite honestly
Basked in the gore and glory of it all

Now I rise
With my blood speckled, feather encrusted fingernails
Obsidian fluff dancing in my wake

No ******* more.

Maybe Heaven's only a moment
A speck of a memory on repeat
And we're none the wiser
For time is a concept concocted by fools

And if Heaven's a moment
Then I hope you're in Hell
Strangled by all the moments you'll never get
As the Harpies pluck at your dishwater eyes
And lick the rotten marrow from your bones
Forever feasting on your futile regret
For the future you blew apart

On nights like tonight
Where the clouds kiss the Earth
Painting my skin in silky sweat
Smothering me
Electricity bristling fine hair
Whipping it around like it whips the leaves of trees
The rumble-grumble of remnant thunder
Bouncing off chrome castles
Echoing the drums that once thrummed
Under my skin
It's nights like tonight...
Like tonight...
That I remember
The tempest that once roared in my veins
And the stillness left in your wake

My words are like smoke
Tendrils of murk branching out
Disintegrating at my touch
I try to grasp them, each and every one
Forge them into weapons to slay the world
Carving truths into skin, deforming souls
But they slink away and leave me hollow
Like wild beasts, they can't be tamed
Shoved into little boxes of rhythms and rhymes
They fear me as much as I fear them

Maybe the trick is to sit and wait,
Let the fog consume me
Use me, forge me, I beg you
Make a weapon out of me
Scar me with your truths, warp my soul
Dig your claws in and pull my strings
Rip me apart, if you must

Whatever it takes
I surrender.