The best poems of mine,
were written in my heart,
only for you to read;
you forgot, where it was kept,
and left without a word.

Hers was the first face I found
freshman year at FSU.
I'll always remember that garish orange and green gator shirt,
and pin with the picture of a bulldog,
hanging from a noose.
I thought, oh Jeez, she's got school spirit,
and I shuddered at the image,
of cheerleaders, and sports stars, recieving preferential treatment,
but my first impression was far from the mark.

She had a smile for miles and eyes to match.
And a laugh that could shatter a frown.
And she laughed any chance she got.
The few pictures I have left of her,
she is laughing and smiling in each...
That big toothy smile,
and that magical laugh...

I remember the first time she kissed me.
I was playing my guitar on campus,
back when everybody did it,
not just pretentious *******
trying to show off.
She came up behind me,
and did the old hands over the eyes routine,
and of course I knew her voice immediately.
She turned my head and kissed me,
for the first time,
and I could hear the whispering,
and feel everyone's eyes on me,
and it felt pretty **** good.
How I wished someone had snapped a picture,
for the FSView, with the caption
" Future valedictorian kisses scruffy hippy freshman.
Entire student body baffled."

I was baffled.

She was the talk of the campus,
she spoke her mind always,
and she was active all over the campus,
doing this and that.
I asked her one day,
"Why do you make your life so complex,
when do you rest?"
and she said
"My life used to be complex, because I made it that way.
But believe it or not, with all I do around campus,
really my life is simple and fun. If I didn't love what I am doing
I would stop Will. Life is too short for complexity."

I laughed, and I thought to myself,
this woman is more complex than she lets on.

We went out for my entire freshman year,
but she graduated my sophmore year,
and she got a job in London, and she moved away that summer.
I said I would visit...I never did..
She said she would write...she did, once,
to tell me she was getting married,
she even invited me, but of course I didn't go..
She enclosed a photo of her and her fiance,
and it was clear what she saw in him..
he had a smile almost as big as hers,
and of course she was smiling too..
Of all the images burned into my memory
that picture is the one that hurts me most.

I wrote back, wishing her luck, and I told her I couldn't come,
I never heard from her again, but I prayed that night,
that he would treat her right, and if he took away her smile,
I prayed he would suffer, until he put it back.

Every time I close my eyes, I see that picture...
that smile...
I hope she's smiling, even as I write these words.

There was nothing plastic
About the way your smile showed
Or about the way your arms felt
But a voice in the back of my head told me so
And last weekend
I melted a carpet I thought was wool
You could have fooled me
Except now there is a hard, shiny, iron-shaped mark
Plastered into the carpet's soft mat
To be honest, I was a little disgusted
When I pulled the iron away and found
Strings of green and red clinging to it like bubblegum
And to be honest, I felt a little disgusted with myself
Not to mention you
When I left a handprint in your soft back
And strings of skin still sticking to my palm
Prove you, my little plastic boy, are just a doll
By all the tests that matter
A human illusion too easily destroyed
By an excess of warmth

Did you get those scars on your knees from praying?
Or ******* your fathers **** inside the barn?
or did you pray while doing it
that he would choke on his own satisfied face?
did you sit inside his church listening to him preach
hypocrisy to family and friends
while you swallowed back that bitter taste he left in your mouth
the one that tasted like an anger so pure it made your eyes water?
did you wait patiently for him to finish his speeches about
salvation, jesus, god and being sinless
whilst you prayed in that godless church, he would miss a step
fall and break his neck?
Was that thought the only thing that gave light to your eyes?
did you think these things while you brushed the dirt and gravel off your knees
wash the blood in the toilet
Put on your Sunday dress and look at yourself in the mirror
with empty eyes
that knew nothing but hate
and a shame so heavy it made you hate the act of breathing?
because every time you did it reminded you of the weight on your chest that no amount
of air
could
get
rid
of
(like the time he sat on you when you were sleeping)

Do you think that gods disciples and prostitutes have the same knees?
Do you think anyone can tell the difference?

Does the cross around your neck ever threaten
to get so tight it chokes you?
so hot, it burns your skin?

Too much praying gets you to the same place
when you're left with nowhere to dish out your pain
and too many unanswered questions, on your knees
on your ******* knees
about fathers and gravel, dirt **** and spit
*We all get ****** in the end

I lack a certain meaning
something in my eyes doesnt shine as bright when people look at me it makes them want to look past me and I hate how average things can be and how I lack that certain "Oomph"
When all I really want is someone to say "Its alright darling the stars were made the same way as you, theyre just sometimes too bright to look at, too beautiful. Like staring at the sun too long."
And I am happy and content and excited and now I am crying at this computer screen.

I have lost memories and things are a darker shade of gray than they were before,
and it smells of ****,
this life im living.
But there's this nagging feeling like
"You're way too young to feel this way"
and I like to pretend it isn't some gay drake song
This ******* useless head, that detached side on the left that tells me to be quiet when I cry too loud,
or to let it the **** out,
inbuilt therapy.
Yeah.
I only hope that my language carries out to your ears and you pluck my words from your brain like that certain hair you didn't like growing on the inside of your nose and outside of your ear and you should listen dear
listen and hear.

My dreams are laughable because I am only seventeen
and realize I am a cliche and that protective screen
I had been
wearing when I really thought I hadn't, well its gone now.
So my dad was right about how many things I don't know about the world,
"The world is full of awful awful things"
and I thought I understood him then, well now I do.
Now I do.
There is a harsher kind of light that shines on the things I see,
some sort of UV process, reflected back at me, and It makes me sick, and nauseous and heavy.
I carry my cynicism like I carry myself, like its a stranger I'm supposed to know
But the best things can be carried off, If you really don't know
what you're talking about.

I think I am special because my **** doesn't smell as bad as everyone else's.