It was the monday-est
of mornings and
I left empty
but for five hours of sleep
and a bit of
momentum

and when I watched you
pick up a handful of
white-hot coals from the fire
  and hold them like
  soft wet
     petals
in your hands
I screamed and
begged for you to drop them
because I didn't
  couldn't under
     stand
that you were only trying
     to burn
  the sickness out
from the gravel in your   gut

and I didn't
  couldn't under
     stand
how when you woke
your hands were white and clean
  as if straight from the
  womb
because when I
coaxed
the fire to grow
my finger brushed
a white-hot coal
and (where they kissed) was
raw and red for weeks

but now I do
  can under
     stand
that the gravel in your   gut
made you immune

while the
  soft wet
  petals
in mine made me fragile
as if straight from the
  womb

and something tells me
I won't be building a fire
  with you again
anytime soon

I liked the way it felt
inside you,
curled like a cat
  
it was hot so
I was sweating
   which may sound gross but
  it was hot so
you were sweating too
and my sweat
    mingled
with your sweat
and became us-sweat
and we both knew that it was hot
and sweaty and gross
   but
inside each other we were comfortable
so the
    us-sweat was okay

until the morning came and with it
fear and silence and the us-sweat
became
        me-sweat on you
and  you-sweat on me
and I just wanted to jump
into the ocean
  because the
ocean,

when you think about it,
is really just a giant ditch
filled with salt water which
  is pretty much the same
  as sweat except
  people don't think it's gross
so in the ocean no one
cares whose sweat is whose

and maybe if it
had been just a
little bit cooler

  I could have stayed
forever inside you,
        my breath
trapped within the mercy of your body

I didn't ask much of you.

On the wings
  of summer winds,
I tried to breathe you out of me
         and
seal my lips tight round their own solitude

  but (and I learned this one the
hard way) you
can only hold your breath
              so long
   before the body takes control.

                            No-
I didn't ask much of you at all.
     I only wanted you
     to let me believe-
     even for just a moment-

that you liked me best.

I said your name aloud too many times
  it started to sound
  alien
and feel like old chewed up bubblegum
stuck to the bottom of a shoe
   spread thick
   between the cleats
disgusting
and irredeemable

how many times
can I tell myself something
   before it becomes
a[lie]n thick
and sticky like gum
     and so disgusting
-ly untrue

there are so many
things
I don't know how
  to do yet
but I know how
  to truly love the sunlight
and I know how
  to build a fire
and I know how
  to care about people
just enough for them
to never really hurt me
              so maybe
being scared to talk to strangers on the phone
isn't so important after all


they say
that hair follicle drug tests are more accurate
than anything you can **** into a cup
   because your hair
   follicles
   store the history of
   everything you've ever done
so I want to rip out
a lock of your hair
but a small one, so it only hurts
a little bit
and I want
to put the hair in a metal jar
and bury it in the ground
   just in case one day
   they come up with a
   way to see everything you've ever felt
   by looking at your hair follicles
so I can dig it back up
                   and prove
that you felt
       something
for me.

you're alive too
and sometimes
that can be easy to forget
but there's one thing I know
I know that when I touched your skin
you got goosebumps
because all living things need to be touched

     and I often wonder
if you ever remember
how very alive I am

it knows the taste of human flesh
and it eats me, raw
from the inside out
sitting in my stomach
   and tying me in knots
   and prying me open
   and leaving me to rot, hoping
for some sort of cure
a divorce
between this wretched body and restless mind
         now
my innocence hangs by a flammable thread
and the moon is burning the faintest of reds