the flowers died

when you ripped them up

out of the ground

-

remember?

She says she loves him
Down to the bone in which she’ll begin to carve into
If she is like me
The bone that he grips tightly,
Making patterns of her skin
Whether spirals or mandalas

He touches her like she is weakened porcelain
A plastic doll that is only good for his use
And she lets him

She says she loves him
Because she wants so badly for him to be herself
And I won’t tell her she reminds me of 13 year old me
Who wanted so badly to feel like she deserved to breathe
Stripped confidence levels as low as the concrete
That younger me scraped her knees on
Never knowing that one day she would be the ground
And the thing that keeps cutting her now is me

He sleeps in her room at night
Then he leaves and forgets her and she pretends she does, too
She forgets herself
And I won’t tell her she reminds me of 15 year old me
Who snuck into his jeep,
Followed roads to his home
Then snuck into his bedroom
Then his basement when his mom came home

The way he treats her is the dirtiness I’d carry
The way he leaves her is the sound of the TV
That kept playing while I entertained him and he wouldn’t even watch me
The way this is normal for her
So she doesn’t fight
And I won’t tell her she reminds me of 16 year old me
Who made her body a home for anybody but the people who lived there
The way he uses her is how unnatural it felt
How it feels that he is the last one I remember
That he is the last one I touched in a November

The way he makes her think it is her who decides whether
They rest with eyes open together or not
The way he makes her believe it is her fault
It is her fault
And it is my fault

And it is our faults
That keep us nailed to crucifixes made of not wood
But pain and insecurity
Of being a woman loved solely for what makes us women
But if we were men, we’d be lonely
If we were men, we’d be nobodies

No bodies seem like they carry enough blood and warmth except his
And I won’t tell her she reminds me of 17 year old me
Who would rather change for him than let him accept me for me
Who let him tell me what I should do with my body
The way he calls her back in on some nights like a dog
Is the guilt I felt when I couldn’t please him
The way she is his one night stand, for more than one night
And never a friend
Is the deadness that sprung like tree roots when I found he’d been with her
That he’d be with her, from now on

She is lost in the way he has lost love for her
And I won’t tell her she reminds me of 18 year old me
Who let cages hold me instead of his palms and his cheek
His face and his hair that feels so feathery
That feels like what it should be
The way he makes her question herself is the times over and over again I refused
The spirals on her skin are the circles I have been running in
The way he traces them with his fingers to make her think she could get him to want her is how I became lost
Chasing him then chasing me then chasing something I couldn’t see
Chasing nothing
Chasing something I couldn’t be
And should never have been, a one night stand for more than one night
And never a friend
This is normal for me
The basement and the bedroom and November is where and when I breathe
Where I see myself falling in deep, maybe
Because he doesn’t deserve a mind this ugly

She says she loves him and it’s scary
Because I said I loved him
And I said I loved him
And I said I loved him
And I said I loved him

And I know she doesn’t mean it
And I know she thinks she means it
And I won’t tell her the way she doesn’t know her worth reminds me of me

I say I love him
The circles I’ve drawn are the reason I keep finding myself in the same position
The same spaces I keep walking in, getting deeper and deeper
Like the spirals on her skin

Yes, there are patterns to my pain
Periods webbed together like mandalas
That have all kept me caught

This is normal for me

And I say I love him
But I don’t want to catch him

And I feel sorry for her—
I’m sorry.

Love,
Why do you leave me when I need you the most?
I have been telling my own ghost
About how empty I've been ever since you left my side
Too many tears I've shed I can no longer cry

Love,
Why do you hurt me when I let you fill my heart?
Inside I've been broken and torn apart
Because of how lonely I've felt within
As all your lies help the darkness creep in

Love,
Why do you let me go when I beg you to stay?
Now that you're gone it seems that half my heart has blown away
The roses you gave me have started to die
Did you enjoy hammering that delicate heart of mine?

Love,
Why do you tell me you love me when I know that you don't?
Why do you still promise to fulfill your promises of not hurting me when I know that you won't?
Why do you use me when you don't need me since you've already won?
Why do you make me depend on you for light like the sun?

Love,
Are you trying to feel powerful because someone made you feel weak?
You stole my heart and now my lungs and I can hardly speak
Did you always want to hurt me, was it always your plan?
Do you miss my footprints in the sand?

Love,
Why do you come by every day and not leave until night?
Are you trying to make up for when you left my life?
Bringing more and more flowers won't make it right
How do you feel now that I am not in sight?

Love,
Why do you cry that you miss me so much?
Why didn't you appreciate me when you had my touch?
Are you empty inside from the lost beat in my heart?
Does the guilt and regret tear you apart?

Love,
Have you let go yet of how I will not come back?
When you heard the news did it give you a heart attack?
Did you want me for me or did you just use me for you?
Did you ever really think that I’d love you, too?

Well it's too late now, Love,
Because I've already moved on
I'll leave it to you to realize what you did was wrong
Just as the miles were between us the ground beneath you does so
How does it feel now that this isn't the first time you've let me go?

This air runs thin.
Either that or I have just lost the desire to breathe fully,
Or I have lost it completely.
Whether or not the air is still tangible does me no difference,
Because if it's not then I'm right,
And if it is then I actually have to try.
Cleaning furniture often is supposedly good,
Since raw dust could easily be balanced out with fresh air by
opening a window.
But it does not make the room any bigger,
And it certainly does not gain back the space.
There are two possibilities if I look outside today;
One- the smog has subsided and I can finally see, or
Two- the sun is at its lowest point.
Of course, having no windows in the room is an option, too,
Because if you cannot see the outside then you can convince yourself
there isn't one,
Because if there isn't one then you don't have to leave.
Since it has been two weeks of cooler temperature
it is easier to pretend it's normal now,
Just do not give away any spare blankets,
And do not let anyone know you are freezing to death.
Be selfish,
Because that's all this world has ever shown.
Forget preparing for the worst,
Because the worst has already come,
And if there wasn't any time before then there is no time now.
Your feet are blistered from walking on beaten wood floors,
And there is barely any paint left on the bathroom wall.
You could always get new furniture,
But you cannot replace the entire house.
The cobwebs are saying there are always odds,
And the odds are never in your favor,
But if you had a broom you could wipe them away and pretend for the next few days.
Clean corners go a long way,
Especially when that is the first thing you see when you look up,
And staring at the ceiling is routine.
Everything withers,
That is why last year's birthday flowers are gone
And that is why you stopped eating every meal.
If you cried a little more there would at least be a sign of living.
But the odds have webbed together again,
And some have even found ways to the floor.
Maybe outside is different but it wouldn't make up for lost time,
And thinking only wastes more.
The air has become thin and the sun is at its lowest point,
And there are more pieces to clean.

i think we have misinterpreted. the term soulmate.
we have substituted it with the belief that we are
set out on earth. to find one person. be with one person.
exist for one person. we have created. a false interpretation
of true love. telling ourselves that each person who has left us.
burnt us. killed us. each person who has hurt us. just must
not be the one. that they are not worth us. they do not deserve us.
we do this to quench our fear that burns inevitably inside us.
that there’s a chance the perfect person may not be out there.
and soulmate is just a term used to describe the lucky.

you were the sun

and i was the moon,

you turned away

when i looked at you.

when the stars appeared

you had gone,

maybe alone in the darkness

is where i belong.

They stopped killing us as slaves and started killing us as citizens
When citizens meant slaves but just to a different system
Because the system wanted to give us a taste
A whole new creation of black men and women who know the taste of bullets
Because bullets are the backbone of their existence
Piercing through their backs and their children's
Tell me you’re sorry but it has to be like this
200 years of slavery and we still live like this
I’m constantly asking myself when I die will I be anything more
Than a hashtag and a sweatshirt with my face on it?
Will I still be shackled to the blackness that’s been a magnet for ammunition?
A magnet for the hands that cuff me before I never made a bad decision?
A human designed for target practice?
Told to prove the way the world looks at me wrong
When the quality of my life has already been determined
When we’re arrested for crimes we didn’t commit and over packed into prisons
When the ghettos are already built so they can leave us to be deserted in
When my neighbor’s body is already laying in the street
When Trayvon’s already been dead for over six years
When Danye Jones is left hanging from a tree like from centuries ago
Told “Just don’t be Black”
Because being Black is a threat
You say you shoot to protect
But my people have been starved since the day we were stolen
Taught to work in the white man’s world but never to rise above him
Taught our culture is ugly unless it’s appropriated and copied
Upon this platform built on the backs of my ancestors hung like decorations
Do I know a single black body in America that isn’t scared?
Do I know a single black body in America that isn’t told by this country
Not to be Black
Because being Black is a threat
So you box us inside of a stereotype until we become colorless
Born into a cycle of fearing my life because you hate my skin
While white men are left free to Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Parkland,
Orlando, Charlottesville, Kentucky, Charleston
Told not to be Black
Because the white man is the threat
They dig Black into our brains enough and they hope we forget
That George Zimmerman was found not guilty
Tamir Rice was less than thirteen
That being Black in America is the slowest genocide in history
To not breathe because they’d rather see us die of suffocation
Gentrification because we can't taste freedom
Because freedom tastes like lead casings
Freedom means walking down the street but not being able to do it after evening
Or anytime if it means wearing a durag or hood or black skin
Freedom means beatings
And freedom means bleeding
Bleeding until five officers have gotten enough kicks at Rodney King
Until Martin Luther King's killer feels like the dream has died with him
Freedom is bleeding
And freedom is - - - breathing heavy because I’m running and they still claim to be “policing”
They still claim to be policing
I’m - running and they still claim to be policing
I’m - - - breathing, I’m running, I’m bleeding
… I’m bleeding

i don't mind walking amongst the trees alone as long as you are with me. i have left everyone else behind. because i know you're there for me. from your soft tar paper to your sweet tobacco leaves. i obsess over everything about you. for i grew you in this very forest. and i love the sparks that light up between us. and even though i’ve acquired heart disease. i know it was only for the good cause of giving my all to you. i like breathing you in. when i cough your smoke adds to the clouds and my gasps for breath accompany the silence. so i never feel too alone. i am constantly surrounded by the sound of the trees brushing in the wind that i get anxious to make my own. through day and through night i never have to worry about withdrawal because i know i always have you. but in my addiction i am guilty of being oblivious to every single one of your dangers.

i dropped you. and your intentions spread like wildfire. you burnt down my entire forest. and for the first time i could see all of the toxins within you. the way the heat melted my strength. the snap of the trees mirrored the break in my chest. they fell one by one. their thuds mimicked the thunder in my heart. and every rumble reminded me of your lethal comfort. for once all of the destruction you held behind your back was visible. and i had never seen anything more frightening and ruthless than watching hundreds of saplings that gave me life croak in less than a minute. and as the very last of them fell. eventually so did i. i laid down in the ashes as the sky went from light to dark. and the only fluorescence left was from the remains of small. crackling fires. i wondered why you had been so discreet of your evil desires if i had done the kindness of giving my life to you. and then it hit me that you had always known i wasn't doing a favor. but making a mistake. and through my own wants and dependence. i had disguised your evils myself. and as i breathed my last. i thought about how none would have been destroyed. if i had just been careful enough to hold you with more delicate hands.

admiration
seems to be one of our weakest
qualities
not able to see the love in the rays
the sun sets our way
or the whispers that insist the universe
cares about us each
in our own way
in the middle of the night
when the moon watches over us
as we shutter subtle fragile cries in our sleep
that our lips read "why did you do this to me?"

we come from ingrown trees
compacted of broken branches glued
together with moss
and we plant ourselves on the tops of hills
that way when our lovers finally do come
back (because ninety percent of the time
we're dead sure they will)
we can watch the sun set aside the beautiful
home where the sounds of our hearts
seem to beat
gaze into their eyes and tell them we never
could have gone on if they would have held
strong in leaving me
i mean us

so we hold their hands that still have bits of branches
coiled around their knuckles
and tighten our grip fitting in between their fingers
and we admire their eyes
their lips
their structure
them

but when they are not there
when they have picked themselves clean enough
of the sapling remains
and gotten rid of the pieces we so badly hold close
to our chests and made sure to remember
because they were the most rugged
and ridged imperfections of the earth
that way we cannot connect on the same levels as
before because they are now far passed perfect
and no longer intertwined in our bark
and the grooves are smoothed out so the lines have
disappeared with no birds or leaves that fall because
the seasons stopped changing and the wind stopped
whirling and the water stopped glowing and the grass
stopped growing
and everything just stopped

we sit frozen fixed
on the stump that sits stumped
next to us
and pray to angels above and the sun that it'll grow
oh please grow
rain
we tell it
rain
so it will magically reappear even though it's been
cut down
and we yell at the sky for not cooperating
because there isn't one single cloud
and we just stay fixed
on that bump that stands up out of the ground
and we forget that the sun is still there
waiting
wondering
hoping we will just turn our cheek another ninety degrees
and see its pretty fixtures from different angles
and its hands it has to hold
because when it comes to the world

we do not know how to admire any of its causes
we become too blinded in the animosity of who
is there to admire it with
and we stare at the empty space living next to us
but do nothing to soak up the delight-fullness that it is still there to be admired and the truth that
the eyes of our lovers got all of their colors
from those reflected in everything of what surrounds us

you don't understand how much faith i have in you, maybe how much faith i have just in people in general.
it's a whole ******* lot, and all they seem to have done is prove me wrong; that i should not have trusted them that much, that i should not have believed them that much, that i shouldn't have had that much faith.
i shouldn't have faith.

almost all of the time now i can think only about the people who have left me, and not because i'm not over them, but because they aren't bad people. they're just not. so what if they decided they did not want me in their life? that’s their decision to make, not mine. never mine.
i cannot judge anyone for walking out when there is always a door in the first place, isn't that what they're used for anyway?
everyone has the right to leave me whenever they want, and i simply cannot complain.
maybe i can criticize them on the way they do it, how abruptly, or quietly, or suddenly, sneakily, if they lock it on their way out or not, i don't know.
but i can’t blame, condescend towards them just because i may not agree with what they want for themselves. it really doesn't matter who i am, it doesn't matter what i do for anyone. i can give them the world, or i can give them nothing but a night’s worth of affection only because i care to make myself feel pleasurable, either way, they have every reason to get the hell away from me.
then i start to think, well, what about me?
does it really even matter anymore to make my way up in the world and try to give off love just as much as i’m never granted it? well, i don't know the answer to that, either.
i know it isn't my fault. but that's exactly the thing; it's nobody’s fault. no one can be held accountable. no one can be blamed. so sure enough i just ask myself where the hell all my tears fell down to. you know, like, what was the point of crying in the first place?
and it's scary to think, people shape your views on love, even though i always tell my friends “don't let anyone ruin your outlook”, they shape it anyway. maybe they don't ruin it, but they determine how you determine it for yourself. not through control, but through the experiences they now pass onto you. you can't erase a memory. they become a part of your life, i don't care what anybody says. they're still there, always, because they're the one who made you feel differently about a certain color or the way the sky looks or why people **** themselves or why this answer is that answer and how that answer gets you this answer, and so on. they change the way you see some things, and those “some things” somehow change everything else, change you.
people say beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, well where does love lay? in the hands of humans who have utterly destroyed just about every single little thing they've touched with their fingers?
what did we create, or, recreate?
we made a monster out of love, a death sentence, a punishment, a curse, a drug, a killer.
what the **** did we do? and why?

there is one person left, one person who can prove me wrong for believing everyone will always continue to prove me wrong. i want them to prove me wrong. show me that not everyone is going to take away my faith.
that fate, maybe, i don't know, exists?
are some things just a word in the dictionary?
i want them to prove to me what everyone keeps on telling me when yet another soul walks another hundred miles away from me, that i “give good energy” so one day i must get it back.
prove to me that, my love, is maybe not just worth something temporary? is that possible?
does anything really last forever?
again, i don't know. i don't know much of anything.
will you just show me?

i wonder

if the miles between us

ever think to let go

just let this pair of

young, hopeless kids

finally touch each other's faces

but every morning i wake up

alone

in this bed fit for one

yet seemingly growing by the minute

and i see the miles don't care

about us or

what we feel

they only care to

keep us away

that's what they're there for

not that they

are trying

to keep us apart

but

they aren't meant to bring us

closer together

either

This train ride
Is the only thing that connects us now
It is the only thing left that’s running
From me to you
It is the only thing that’s still moving

For once I am back,
I am not leaving again
Once I am home
I am not leaving it behind

I made this mistake once
Of thinking I could have left
Everything that killed me
That tortured me and pursued me
All of the pain that subdued me
But escape isn’t possible for the thing
That is in me
You need to know, my love
Because I know, now
This pain created me

And I owe it to this pain to let it destroy me

See I am sitting and I can tell something isn’t right
This train moves too quick and the breaks seem too tight
And as a whole the train itself is shaking to be loose
And if this train tips over, there is nothing you or I can do

We have to let this happen
We have to let us die
I keep thinking of how many people are on here
With more valuable lives than mine

It’s not because I’m lonely
And it’s not because I’m me
It’s because even back in my small space there with you
I’m so insignificantly free

I’m going back
Because I realize this is all I’ve known
This feeling of being nothing
Makes it so much more plausible

Makes it so much easier to understand
I have lived this way forever
And it only makes sense
To go back to feel it there

It only makes sense
To leave you behind
Because if I take you with me
Then we’re both going to die

This train ride
Is the only thing that connects us now
These tracks that run through the one island we’re on
You are on my island, the island I’ve lived on my whole life
And there’s so much of it you haven’t seen
And there’s so little you know of me

Your entire life in a different state
Is my entire life with you here
Because although you have come to me
You know nothing of what I used to be

You know nothing of what I’ve done,
What I’ve become
Where I’m going
What I want
In this life that keeps insisting otherwise

I realize this train is my lifeline
Once it stops, the movie is over
The song is done
And there are no more wonders about
If we’ll ever be something

No more worrying
No more drinking
No more thinking of me
But never being open to talking

Maybe you don’t think of me
As much, I thought you did
I thought you would
I thought I could do it

I thought I could do this

This train ride
Is like my veins in my body
Like the alcohol that runs throughout his sitting next to me
I am looking away from him and pretending it is you, instead
I am pretending the smell
Is the taste and array of your breath
This is our connection
Watch it go, farther away

Watch it disappear
Watch it get smaller and smaller
Watch it move on to something other
Than what’s always been right here

Watch it sway, watch it crumble
This train is me
And I realize you’ll be sad
You didn’t get to see it leave

Once I am done,
I am not starting over again
Once I am here,
I am not ever leaving

Once I am alone,
I have pounded this road in, jack
Once I am home,
I am not coming back

my skin is not perfect
some parts are smoother than others

i find it so peaceful
how you can touch me in every place
yet it's when you feel the roughest parts
where you kiss me and tell me

there isn't one thing you'd rather be different

You can have this city
If it means I get to breathe
If it means, I get to reconnect
With this other half of me

For twelve nights now
I've tried to see
How I can be so enjoying
And so fulfilling,
And yet so empty

I am both the entertainer
And the curtain drawer
The nail and the hammer
And yet I've never felt better
Being all of the ground under

I am safer and this feels normal
To live in the background like shadows
And I'm following you around
But I know you'll never catch me
Because it's simple, why would he

It's simple that, to you, I never am to be found
With all of this beauty that surrounds,
Why would you ever think or care to look down

Why would you ever even think to look at me
When I am so much of distortion and thorns
Rather than pretty petals and leaves
I'm more like the remains of a rose's corpse

I'm more like the broken branch on the tree,
I'm more like
The bottom of the sea
I'm more like everything other than anything
You had seen in me

I'm more like nothing
I'm less good at holding,
I'm more broken
I'm less alive, and—

I don't want to seem like
The demon of the night
But angels don't break like me
Angels save, angels love

I'm nothing but love that
Is never enough

So you can have this city
If it means I get to lay beneath it
If it means the water washes me
And there's no trace or a footprint

For over twelve nights now
I've tried to see
How I can be so enjoying
And so fulfilling,
And yet so empty

And so I'm going home
To be with family
To be in my room, with my ceiling fan
That knows just how mad I can be

I am safer and this feels normal
To know I could actually lock my own door
And these four walls have seen the way I've grown
And what I've kept inside me for so long
And it's simple, why would she

I've been doing this for eighteen
And it's simple what it means
Home is where I brew
And I will die here, too

I imagine the lights as the last few things I see before I die
The twinkle in my eyes, shut
And there isn't anymore blood

There aren't anymore cuts
Or broken designer luck
Or time to make up for what you've done

Might as well do it now
Because if it keeps going like this,
I am not going to make it

I'll do it on stage
Where all the lights are turned to me
And I cannot be unseen

I'll do it while I sing
My favorite tune or lullaby
My voice will send chills down their spines

I'll be singing my last goodbye
And going out like real performers do
The big finale follows me to my bedroom

It'll happen slow so you can watch
So you can see me grow distant from it all
So you can feel my loss

I bet you'd never thought it'd happen now
That there must have been more room for me to stay
That would mean you have been blind to me dying

Every single day

trust me with your heart.

i will have did to you
all you have done to me,
and in the end,
“strangers”
will have been forgotten.
our love
will last.
broken and shattered hearts
will crumble beside our empty hands.
hopefulness
will enlighten itself within our souls.
darkness
will not exist.
love stories always written in books
will be named after us.
insecurity and misery
will not form in shadows at night.
worthlessness
promises that
i cannot keep you
happy.
you will never be
miserable.
you will be
loved.
do not ever think you could be
hurt by me.
i will be sure you are
always on my mind,
and with your broken heart
believe i will love you

(now read from bottom to top)

I will never have a love life.
I will live being lonely because I do not believe in soulmates,
I do not believe I am on Earth so another human being
Can **** me when they please.
All of my relationships
Don't work.
And it is not that I wish they would have,
It is that with the very last one
I tried.
I do not believe in soulmates but I will live lonely
Because a person could have been put on Earth for me
That I am not meant to spend the rest of time with.
I have cravings across bodies of water that make it easy to see
The sky is not big enough,
And the winds carry nothing but emptiness and leaves.
Love is not all that is wrong with my life.
If I had love, I still would never be
Myself.
I am not satisfied with only close friendships because
Still, they cannot understand all of me.
My dishes and plastic cups all have tiny holes at the bottom,
With which you can pour water for days on end
But it will never reach the top.
I leave every cabinet open,
Because I do not like closing things.
I can't have *** with someone unless I love them,
And I won't ever have a love life
So I have convinced myself otherwise-
That virginity is just a social construct designed to
Make us feel bad.
I am worried about my mind.
It seems destiny is all only for me and my writing,
And not at all anything else.
I am worried because I do not want to be
Miserable until I die.
I am worried my Depression is what
Makes me a good writer,
And that I will be like
Edgar Allan Poe,
Hemingway,
And we will all die alone.
My sadness
Makes me intelligent,
Makes a personality that is not too boring
For a poem about sympathy.
I exist in crooked dimensions,
Where another person could try to
Want me with their fingers but it will most likely
Die out at their eyes.
I feel everything that is broken.
I feel nothing,
I feel I do not like my neighborhood.
I feel a nice neighborhood is not enough for a
Creative mind.
I feel my worries will **** me before my body does,
And marriage is a lie.
I feel I am not seen as art anymore,
And that all of my paintings of van Gogh are just
Desperation to try,
And failure.
My brain is interconnected with
Pain,
So much so that you are happier Drunk
Than thinking of me.
I do not Drink to form my sentences,
Despite what you might believe,
They are all just as Sad when I first hear them.
I believe that God is tired of me,
Or that I am selfish for using him in my writing.
I think He sees my cracked ceiling,
And expects me to believe it’s Him.
I think I am pathetic for remembering
That crack in the ceiling was from me.
He knows my walls are collapsing,
But I am still laying calmly inside.
My paintings hang around my head,
They are falling-
And I am not so afraid because I am
Falling, too.
I am worried about my Writing.

Sometimes I think-
about the world and if it's
ever wrong about things.

I wonder if sometimes
it splits apart the wrong people
and if it lets those who
continuously harm and are
toxic to each other's existence;
toxic to each other's happiness
stay together.

I wonder if it always expects us
to fix its mistakes.

But if the universe can mess with
love, how are we ever supposed
to find the capability to overrule it?

Nature shows me just how destructive
the world can be with its wind
and its hurricanes, its tornadoes
and its blizzards.
The same way it stretches and squeezes,
shrinks and grows,
compresses and exfoliates,
supplies us with and strips us of the
oxygen we need to breathe, it does so
to the love I feel for you.

It gets back at us for all of the
damage we've done to its beauty.
It slowly picks the leaves off of
our trees of interest the same way
we cut them down to build a home.

But this world is the world's home.
The same way we've stolen it, the world
steals you from me.
The same way we "try our best" to use
alternative energy, it plants you right in
front of me, teasing me the same way
we humans do to make it seem as if
we care about extinction.
It gives me insight to how it feels, being
forced to separate from the rest of its
universe, feeling singled out,
punished that it had to be cursed with us.

See you were my home. The same way
the world could live and grow within
itself I could do with you. The same way
the sun rose with light and the moon
stood by in the dark you did with me.
The same way the world could show
its destruction and warmth I showed my
insecurities and passions with you.

Our love was symbolic of nature. The
strength to power through anything in
its way. And the world decided it wanted
you for itself.

The world noticed your uniqueness and
potential and unshakeable love. The world
noticed your mind and your eyes and your
heart. The world noticed you.

So from now on the stars will paint your
smile in the sky. From now on the sky will
become the shade of blue that's deep in
your eyes, the shade that's a mix of the
ocean.
From now on the world will take care of you,
as you do to it. It will take you to different sights,
to see different sunsets, hike to the tops of
mountains tipped with warm and positive energy.

And the world will be enough for you.
And the same way you'll admire all of its
beauties and comforts and blessings, I
have done to all the different parts of you.

i was young and
didn't know what i was doing
i made it all mean
nothing
i made it
easy
i let them hold me and then
do what they wanted

and there's this ache
not being able to let you
touch me
you are
the person i want to remember
touching me last

it's like i'm watching you
through a glass window
and i can't feel your warmth
or just
your ******* ******* touch

i want
to feel something

i want
to be clean

you are my ticket
out of here
away from
unwanted memories and
unwanted company

you give me
freedom
i can think clearly
with you
and for those few minutes
or hours
or seconds
depending on the moment
i get to forget
about who they were
and what they did
because all that matters
is right now
and us

and so when i tell you
you don't know
how much you mean to me
it's because you don't

they killed me
and left me laying dead
all used and worn out
and torn
but when i feel
even the slightest sway
of your fingertips
on my cheek
i am alive again
and i feel
as if i never lost anything
or better
like they never even touched me

you never saw
what i was

i was nothing more than a place
to make yourself comfortable
for a few nights

i didn't have anything
particularly special

i was boring
lifeless
easy
colorless
nothing

i was nothing to you

and i don't think words
could ever tell the pain
you have made me feel

it is just empty
so empty

being your home
i thought i'd at least feel a little less
dead

but dead i am
completely dead

i don't have anything
particularly special

i am boring
lifeless
easy
colorless
nothing

nothing to you

and now nothing to me, too

He feels like water,
In my palms that soften at his touch
Cleansed of old fingerprints and DNA
I thought I wanted to keep

In my blood,
Sliding through and warming me
With more pressure in certain spots

I am so warm
I cannot remember when I was freezing,
If I was freezing,
I must have been too frozen to feel it
I must have been too busy sleeping

I must have been asleep,
Because in what I feel now I know I have missed this
I know I almost missed it

In three months I swore myself to be healed
In healing, I had given up my right to feel
I haven’t felt some things and then
I felt it all

It felt good, then horrible
Then good again

Now it feels like water,
In my palms,
In my blood,

It’s easy

And keeping me from dying

I am weak.
The dead poke fun at me,
Every time I try to envision them,
Which would be every week.
I am stolen.
Because you can tell me you love me
And I will tell you why you don’t,
And you can tell me why you don’t
And I will agree with you.
Is this what they meant by “life”?
Is this what my parents wanted when they had me?
You can tell me I am young but that doesn’t make me.
My mom thinks everyone is just surviving,
She thinks this is surviving.
I am not.
I am not strong,
Because every time something always goes wrong,
I want to **** myself but I can’t,
Because they believe the pain does not last.
But it does.

I don’t ask why I am not enough for you,
I just focus on how I am not enough for you,
Or anyone,
Because I am stuck in between metal bars,
Always feeling like the heat is too strong in the summer,
Always feeling like something is trying to **** me.
I don’t ask why I am here,
I just focus on how there aren’t any set reasons,
But I never really ask for a reason why.

A reason why I am not okay?
I am prisoner to the peaks of life I cannot control,
Prisoner to the human body, to its brain.
And how who I am and who I want to be cannot connect.
I am prisoner because life is not what it seemed,
And I had no way of knowing.
I am prisoner because I never asked to be here, did I?

My morbidness hides nothing at stake,
Because I still wake up each morning,
To a world that feels like it is moving in slow motion,
To a life that doesn’t feel like my own.
My morbidness does not mean I am going to die,
Because not all of us have the strength,
Not all of us want to have to do it ourselves.

And I have my selves,
Because they are all hopeless yet laughing,
Breathing yet dying,
But it isn’t anything you’d want to see.

You’d want to believe I am surviving not suffering,
Because that’s what allows you to tell me
I have purpose in being here.
That is what allows you to think things will get better for me,
Whether or not they will. (They won’t).
That is what allows you to still love me,
Because I am not totally gone when I am.

But if love could save anyone,
There wouldn’t be a broken me,

There would be no such thing.

I see you in my sleep
Entwined in blackened rhythms,
I see you standing right in front of me

Then darkness grabs you quick
And I am drowning in a black sea,
I see you in my dreams
Left thoughtless to images of stranger things

Is this what my mind imagines it to be like when you leave?

I see you when I sleep
When closed eyes leave no witness,
But always keep you right in front of me
And watch your life and body dissipate

Soon you are invisible
And I am drowning in a black sea,
I see you in my dreams
Listening to seraphine and metallic malaise

Whistles blowing sound like wind dancing through rain

This is where dark figures live
I dine with them as beasts
We dance at dusk together
And move on to grab each other
I let their hands move on my hips
And love the ways they grab my waist

Then darkness grabs us quick
And we are dancing in the black sea,
Swimming with our demons
And all of the men of my dreams

This is where dark figures eat
And quench the hungry beasts
I notice that they’re starving
And invite them to feed on me

Then darkness grabs me quick
And I am drowning in a black sea,
I look and he does not look at me
And I know, now, that I’m not sleeping

you left me here in the dark

every single trace of you dispersed

i made the mistake of looking to see all the stars in your eyes

and now i can't stop questioning the universe

your eyes are like the ocean
crystal clear and blue

my only favorite color

i decided i wanted to paint them
so you could realize how
it feels to look into them
and see the waves and the ripples
and know a part of the earth is
held within you

i spent 72 hours with that canvas
and the brush became my best friend
and blue paint covered my skin

when light reflects off of your eyes
you can see stars

so i painted 13 luminaries in each
for the 26 arrows i felt
stabbed in my back

i painted one tear inside your left eye
to symbolize how i hide mine
every time my heart cracks

because love, when i showed you my painting
you gave me no minute to speak
you said ‘wow, that's amazing’
and told me it reminded you
of her eyes
and how the sight of them
and that smile
made you weak

i gave you the painting as a gift
for you

i just loved your true colors

two weeks later when i
answered your call
you asked me to help you
hang it up
in her bedroom

i even picked out a blue bow
and cringed as i knew this would be
our very last tie
you said it’s easier to show love
through poetry or paintings
because people themselves
are too blind

i sat there and thought
you were right
and being blind is what
tears us apart
but just as i made
the mistake of my feelings
you never realized
it was you

you were my work of art.

Last night I couldn’t let another body
Touch mine
Even though his was just as soft
His hands did not graze quickly over
They stayed put in places for seconds
Sometimes minutes at a time
Like I was the earth itself

My body is not meant to be touched
Or so, I tell myself
Letting walls down means being held
Being held means holding
I don’t want to hold him

I don’t want to hold anyone
I want to be alone
Alone is safe haven
Where depressing pigment is worn in confidence
I want to be alone with myself
Where I can win and lose in two,
No matter which of the halves are left on top

I don’t want him on top of me
On top of me means I am under
I have been underground for months at a time
Trapped by different permanents
Whether demon or person

I don’t want to be a person with feelings
Feelings mean being pried open,
Mean my nails have grown weak in my door crevice,
Mean the floorboards are ready to be lifted

You shouldn’t try to lift me from this
As if you could
As if you would

Last night I couldn’t think of another body
Touching mine
Even though they may be just as soft
Their hands graze quickly over
And find new homes to stay in by nightfall
For days, sometimes weeks at a time
The home inside me welcomes barely

My body was not meant to be touched
As long as I told myself
Cages are meant to be kept around me
Locked in means locking you out
Write poems about wanting to hold me

I didn’t want to hold anyone
Wanted nothing but to be alone
Alone is safe haven
Where depressing pigment is worn in confidence
Being alone with me is part of a muse
That replays how people break in two,
No matter whoever’s halves are left on top

You knew not to be on top of me
Not to ever let me be hurt from under
I have been underground for months at a time
Scarred by different permanents
Whether demon or person

I didn’t want to be a person with feelings
You were careful not to pry me open,
Undress drapes unhooked like shower curtains,
Upon wet stone floors begging me to slip

You wouldn’t ever let me slip
As if you could
As if you could

My best is half as good,
But that is to be expected from a girl
Whose parents never made her feel confident about living with a person
For the rest of your life.
I feel alone a lot,
And I am dependent on human connection only when
I start to feel misplaced by the universe.
I think in terms of galaxies rather than people,
Rather than in terms of me.
I'm useless-
But only because people can't use me.
They don't want to.
Why would they?
My hurt is not very visible,
But there is a lot of it in there.
Sometimes I play connect the scars
With my imagination,
And I remember I've failed in every aspect of my life,
Because I failed in one aspect of my life.
I'm tired of motivational social media posts,
And there are times where I don't like being around anyone.
I do not know how I am supposed to live with a person for the
Rest of my life.
I love someone,
But my best is half as good.
I like sitting in the dark in my solitude,
Because I feel like I'll be alone forever, and I am trying to prepare.
I want to be prepared for it-
So I can tell myself I'm happy,
So I can tell myself I'm meant for it.
I am tired of questioning if I can survive,
Or if my bedroom is my safe space,
If I will have this window view forever.
I am here because I feel like I failed you,
And if you are going to love me,
You should know this is how I feel at 8:39
On a Good day.
I'm tired because my Depression is still a piece of me and I'm
Ignorant.
I laugh about it,
Because I do not want anything to be too serious anymore.
I am a writer because I am Sad,
I am creative because I am Sad,
And you can't ever be Sad like me.
I am watching lightning out my window
And thinking,
How beautiful would it be if I could do that for you?
I cry a lot,
More than normal, I think.
I want to know if you are going to love me.