held on to my
patinated heart
for too long
Longer than that thank god
For you
For me with frosting
for you again
friendship or a lisp
hairy chest and a kiss
It’s me again
Monday whatever
Chin-up
Blame me for everything
call me out and
don’t like me
I’m out like lightning
Don’t call me again
without any numbers
don’t like me
Don’t be mean either
Tuesday
Already
scrub the green
days are track stars
To me

wake me up
snoozed another good-morning
tried my own head
like purple
crashed every inch of skin -
how I want it
it’s Wednesday babe
what’s for lunch
what’s for good &
everyone else
How did I move
?
Take me anywhere and I’ll come
take me home & let me melt

It’s another day
a perfect one if you want it

everyone’s waiting on it
I’ve got
Lemonade
I’ve got
All day

Tonight I want to
write something beautiful

say it perfect so you call it a poem

read it again;
How pretty
now that it’s about you

call me
call it love on Tuesday
again like cinnamon
tomorrow like coffee

never too early
late like my timing &
no-meaning-nothing

good morning
cheers too for something

kiss the moon
smack the sun
eat a star and call it breakfast
I dare you

I get so
dizzy and
want to drink you

it’s just Tuesday-hey
but it’s
green and keeps
singing

hi it’s me

hi it’s

e v e r y evening

hey it’s

lee-press-on love songs
to patch up
e v e r y feeling

hi from
me from the floor
& make me your ceiling

incredible
heart-throb
I’m full stop
still feeling
every feeling

incredible
hi there
I’m not scared of
all of these things  

But it’s just
Tuesday

it’s so **** green
& just keeps on singing

I’m waiting
Wanting to swim in the mouth of Summer
I’m waiting

**** out the roots too
pull everything out like you mean it
Return me to space
or wherever I was before this
Return me to my body

I’m ready for sweat
I’m ready for barely

I can’t feel it
but I feel it
Like Deja vu
smells like afternoon & salt
butter it up
stay awake tonight

I’ve been reading this book
the entire time
I’ll underline it for you

Tell me everything you haven’t yet
and I’ll kiss it quietly
be my weekend & my Wednesday

shut me up with another one
still & stuck
do me a favor and
don’t do me any

keep me like a charm
it’s going to taste so much better
warm

Where is my window ?
I need the
wind to blow &
take me with it

flip me over like a
Beetle

where to end or
when to begin

I’m begging in poetry
to let me in on it

another
heedless nightcap
Send me to my dreams soon

Or
give me to the girl at the bookstore
Like a scented letter

but, send me to my dreams soon
I can’t have anything
else tonight

Uphill grinning
spinning webbed-breaths under
Spring's spilling through
rows of roses, tied behind
vines that could rip anyone red
are all the
quiet notes about pretty

& what a Sunday for sailing
blossoms through drying hair and
fickle feelings about an old poem
on a blanket, how fitting

but i'm trying;
i still find rhymes under
fir trees and still get
tired from laughing

i still ask why without crying
denying only while smiling.
this is 29 in a wine glass

stretching the afternoon like my
legs in the morning
pouring out yesterday's moaning
& sure as every bird i'll be
a blinking throat
counting her money

but for now i'm just
two hands
taking an orange home
for it's honey

that slow blink never helped you (y'know)
and thanks but
my voice sounds the same, still
i can't count on
whatever rule about numbers you used
it is useless

and even
a forest of poets couldn't dig it up
or a ship, full of it
i'd swim under the mad waves
away from them

so, by my bones i speak
every language i need
finding more that
love is like a field
kept by wild things
as open as a child's eyes
with
all of this room to
keep growing

it is
February already
& the rain keeps confusing me on
what day of the week it is.
he says over coffee, how the
storms are keeping him up /
making me grateful for Florida summers.
i made mine too strong & am having another, reminds me how you'd laugh & dispute either
ever being a problem.
i am convinced i'm
happiest with my heart beating like this anyway
and on my way back downstairs
i look down passed my knees & think
if feet shook like hands i'd
probably take up flying

I just needed to hear something
soft like
yellow from the lamp or
my love because
I can't stand the haunting hum of waiting
the anxious, ancient hour under my bone
half bent, ticking
picking my flaws like a hurt bird;
it is my time i give away
& unlike my heart
sadly stuck with me
i cannot keep, cannot get
these minutes back

The colors of late September
talking and falling again
announcing each other like
gulls for bread
remind me that I've listened

yet every day is black and black
the mask's unsettling sweat builds and
underneaths a frowning girl
settling into it

yes darling, I see the blue
I see the coins stored under my lips
haven't paid off and
you've painted nothing to hide the holes
i'd ask for your hand in this and squint
but you, you must not have heard it

and here i've been
as cooperative as ants /
as sad as fate
with hands as red as the ibis
falling tired and certainly
tired of falling

My* Monday blues they
start with you.
I am amused I'm not
moved, I
may be reused it is
the day before
Tuesday
I choose blue before
muse I must
stay in my own shoes
I clutch fists it is
no use I trust
come ups from cruel while we
lust what is proof-less
is seemingly useless
I
rust like the useless
like metal, like bruises
so quit acting clueless
I've dropped more than clues and
now I must move for
I cannot keep chewing all of your
lies up for you

it is when I sit with
beautiful things
I am reminded that
nothing ever keeps;
the words might smear or
the air should dampen
and if
you should not believe me
ask the flower what it is like for her
at nighttime and then
ask her to repeat it
explain to her
what it is like to be
lived in

hold me down to the
stage;
today
I cannot make pretty songs of us
like
how much I weigh
I'm one hundred and thirty three pounds
in love with you
I'm
twenty eight years too old and
twenty eight years away from your legs
I'm
blonde
I'm
a lady
a waiting woman
making food,
away from your mouth
I'm making
mistake after distaste for
this pattern this
extra pace for shapes that
never fit us so
when I get dressed and when I
detest it I'm
trying something new I'm
having
nothing to do with you

I'm speaking in
leaves and with dirt against
trying to sleep
repeating the hot hum of heartache
& stopping to breathe
I have been
inside & under
this horrible robe /
its ropes tied too close &
I'm starting to choke /
breaking-down wine & the whys to find
fumbling's curse
repetitive lure-slurring prose
in my own faulted purse
this is a
tree and then paper
a bird and now blood
& all of the bones you've swept up
love,
stick out of the rug

while I chase the sunshine
& clouds framing the
shape of your mouth like
who am I to think she can fly or
get that high
but it's Sunday.
I am
asking the air a favor
that your thinnest shirt might
remind you of me
that the next time you run
the sun could burn you some
that we might get a drink and
blink a thousand times in a bar
is nonsense
is
weekend news
like a shovel to help make your pretty bed
call me your
friend and
tell her yes
wake up again and against it
ask me
if I am
in love

I tried to trace our shadows
left and right from the wrists
but l'm pacing
back and forth I'm
waiting
waving you in.
rearranging my mornings
adjusting my sighs on you
so they sit right on my feet
so I can say love and take it
we
belittle forgiveness
you made the sea find its way through
my throat
you took sentence after sentence from my hair
& burned a beautiful mouth
turn my hands to rust
my body to weeds
and anyway
fate is for the birds
it's seems
when the bats start biting

oh limp morning, take me early  
I taste June like burning
sometimes soft like cinnamon
filling up for hollow afternoons.
French-kissing myself and
all my, finely laced thoughts about you
all of that heat spread in pots
I call a garden & slowly I let you
spread me thin again

spilt on
spinning
another metal-goodnight another
"I hope we're alright"
darling it's Sunday
honey it's numbers like,
four and
ten; it is fourteen, I'm spent
I'm done saying I'm
bent and yours and-or-hers, I'm
again I am, against this
might as well say
tired, my god
I'm allowed to be quiet
I can't fix tired or change what's burnt
I won't
move for you if it hurts
I won't
if it hurts
& I can float from humility but
I won't if you serve it
I
do not think it is worth it

love isn't every when you're tired
but I dance I dance with love every hour
foot step on footstep, right now
you're on the couch
you're on my mind you're always
doesn't mean I'm being still
am I and am I ask me if I'm ever still
and I'd still tell you sometimes
I'd still say
sand and
please
I'd say I
love you too and
everything

I've felt as, left-over as
last-night's left-hand & her
reclaiming, uncanny way of
well / of
my oh my, what a
good morning, I'd love to but;
I'd just need my heart back

it's the cartwheeled chaos
slapping against,
counting again to see if it works-
I'm calling my bluff I've had
enough of all the nothing.
you're the little tag on my red
the writing in black
every time it is grey until
there isn't anything left of you but
a hundred poems
the striped gills of my sorrow and
some slang cause
I ain't got it in me anymore

Last night's courage not to call you
last night and every;
peel off pretty, it's six it's 7,
Is something
is tired, rewind her

I can lie down, longer
she's got it, going on.
stitches and weekends
never with you on the weekend
isn't cotton
it's-red
isn't your mouth either

living up handstands
living down longing
is really
something
is lonely
in yellow
I don't want, sometimes
I still want you shouldn't you
ever want me
isn't poetry
isn't easy
on
weekdays
and every
on
blisters on
forget it
my lips on
holiday

I believe that
every bone has a story
that even the sun gets tired
and
that's why it rains /
I saw you waltzing
in and out like, you'd gotten lost
you keep sayin' in
everyone else's tongue so I'd
finally forgotten what you sound like;
it's been, all chop & pour anymore so,
I gently shut all of those, doors against
locks I'd given away the keys to.
they'd find me out the window,
into wet gardens of snails and worm
a stolen bird with no nest
doesn't want a handout
just more time to
make back her bed

I'm in a little bit of a rush here
still I'm
trying much softer /
speaking in grey, untying my
tongue
biting the side with your name on it /
be something other than beautiful
say something other than rain
liar's lullaby, a
fool's morning
feeding off the extra
& I'm to do it over again ¿
twice removed.
in your shoes.
under my spell.
over coffee.
put on the Beach Boys this time
drink *****
stay up 2 hours longer
I'll see you again, I swear
when there is, less grass and
when you call her
do it in the other room
the cold one, way in the back

Something told me to hold still when I met you, that it would only sting a little / like maybe the sea wasn't wet or something

daffodil midnights, upside down on the bottle, listening to my lips spill dread over your pretty hands, how my knees remind me that I can't reach them

I'm over feet
over toes / oh no here I go
overload I'm -
in-over my head I'm,
against my own limbs, sometimes

but it was only the wall
it's just a couch
a few shots, your jeans, my kingdom
2 airplanes, a couple of hours
my head in your hands
my heart on the floor
broken secrets, happy birthday
happy birthday
I love you, I loved you
I can't stop playing that goodbye

I imagine outer space to feel like this.
like;
no matter what, I can't lie down.
seeing a star that close made
all else seem
so much less bright.
I'm unimpressed.
I just want to love again but, you left that spell on me.
my eyes don't see color anymore,
my arms aren't reaching.
you printed poems onto my bones.
my mouth won't let me say marvelous and my hands quit thinking.
I'll turn to dust like this darling.
I'll be a little sandstorm on your
shore for awhile and
dizzily dissolve into your
winsome crashing.

strung out on
drunk stung-drumming under this skin
isn't mine when you touch it
fight the belting, beg again
memorized muscle and music
trying and failing
melting and falling
repeat the crawling song;
confused teeth, knees
leaving feet, forgetful hand-smothered-feelings \ religious breathing, heart-beat bleeding, gentle breeze please lift my ribs with your pleases after my name leaves your gut after my nails peel you off, an ode to pretending, for stopping;
a better use of force
a better Wednesday waiting
sistering indifference and swelling on sheets never made for pigments preferring the latter again, and I
I haven't felt this way since my leaves fell
since the water settled under my belt
before & after lonely
refer me to laughter when I cannot breathe  & cry about how it'll never work

ecstatic, lateral / irrational longing
ticktock time bomb waiting for your
slack to tighten, get back to me

whiskey-stung bottom lip under
white sheets and thunder
hollow hands hold out heavy-
drowned secrets from my left lung
make the nights last longer
make the air even against the thought of what you sing when I'm leaving

recount the loudest bouts from which I crumble
worship one thigh at a time, my god
why don't they come with a warning;
the morning put stones on my bowing
another good reason to kiss you
another's lost lover, ocean story
red-wave cravings
I'll pay in great shades of grey & plunder
shave my legs and go
right back under

sunburnt stitches girl
you're early grasp I'm
itchy grass
& I can't, I'm mad
I can't I can and cannot stand
how it still goes
I keep quiet I
still walk barefoot on this shell-sharp sand
still crawl through the memory of your legs
back of the head regret, on top of another body
it's just coffee it's just
time after time
never the right amount of miles

I want to
stop loving you now
cause sometimes
I wish I could scream the word out loud
use your name
so they know all of these were always to you

you're about as
quiet as lightning
& just as much ;
you put the light in it
I'm counting down from two-thousand,
slowly
quitting breakfast and everything early
that bird can keep it like:
what am I supposed to do if I can't have you
what kind of a sudden is it breathing cause I have to \
****** the gasps I caught you stealing-
Saturday mourning on Wednesday's feelings
saying
I like Monday cause, Friday's fleeting

I own the rest of my hair, you know
you own my body
I'm as open as the screen-door you broke
& you did handstands for someone else already
otherwise I'd listen, cause
I can't find the lyrics in splitting
can't find the best in bleeding
that love was airplane-waiting
that love was
silent begging, restless leg\
restless blinking
rip the
day out my weeks baby
till all I keep lie sleeping

I've spent my morning on adjectives,
trying kindly to describe her. I couldn't make them fit. I'd lost the joy in remembering us & saw under my eyes what difference the kitchen floor made. Quite sad a way to look at something so beautiful. One heartbreak away from holiness, I'm afraid I've forgotten how to long for something. I found metaphors under the rocks I'd grown too large to hide under and sometimes it's just worth digging in dirt to find the proper use of my indignance. My not-so-subtle search for dignity. & after all the cigarettes and kicking, I made my coffee and a vow to myself. That I would leave my bones where they were from now on. That I was a woman, full of blood and empathy and feeling sorry for myself was useless. That I hadn't fallen in love after all. I'd leglessly tripped face first  & from now on, I was going to watch where I stepped.

3pm *****
a ballerina learning to slow-dance in jeans
is the stolid way you call me pretty

I've known better, never to settle
as I order another, please
I can forgive me
But we've just been kissing
& pity breeds missing you, weak

I'm never bored, never sorry
watch you pull me from the ground
much like those Macbeth witches
I could have guessed
you aren't around

but you talk like you're so sorry
only to wipe it off of your belt
Steel-toe folktale, go home
& tell it to somebody else

the heart knows what about love ?
that bleeding fiend, knows more about drums
ask my thumbs, ask my lungs

I'm holding a hand or
the back-end of the blade
& waiting, waning
away from away

We aren't made of sunsets
or cartwheel hangovers
I didn't find you standing under an apple tree & you never held me the longest
even when I prayed for it

a leftover beginning, midnight snack;
lie down under a beautiful stranger like you love her, like the air between the sweat & sheet meet my intention of a mouth doing everything at once isn't love but
somehow it's better

aren't you
sorry for leaving ?
I've dissolved like salt
because I've become it
I'm fluent now, in being silent

Paced myself over and over
breaths because I have to
naming them after you,
because I forgot what need was

flatline me another time, love
tonight so I can sleep &

these are weekends;
those are mouths meeting.
I'm going to quit calling it love
& call for a favor cause

the wave is wild like the whale
just ask her;
I'm riding all of them on
shoreline shoulders
a continent of rhetorical knuckles
buttoned toward my throat

no mercy in floating through the roof
it was never a boat that saved us
only bones
my moral roots
doing whatever you say

I've quit calling it falling
all of the
gulping that I fend

Now that I've bent all my limbs backwards
I'm having to break them all back in

buried in what I play the fool for
always the liar and then friends

dreading that I should fall asleep
knowing that this must somehow
end

always i'm
packing up my reason,
freely & giving up my time
I'm tired of
dragging this body behind me
fearing the
damage it's done on my spine

silver cup reflection
sip watcher
I'll have it, I'll take two now

let me die beside
something beautiful
even if it won't love me

& say thank you
a hundred times until tomorrow
good morning
late thought hangover
my mind can't wash it

I don't want to say
poetry
during poetry
but nothing helps, so

count down like a rocket
for something less than
a show of sparks
honey, it rains like we do it's
only March

gorgeous doesn't
do you
justice
when I just wished for the chorus
singing our lousy song, I
stayed up late with it
I
counted the sheep
they fell asleep
I'm
clutching the sheets
stop thinking there's a
Dreamgirl
quit pouring that red-cheek idea
down your throat
a few more
fast
the song should end soon
sore knee love
should end soon
professional pretender
bending blinks
more drinks, bartender
loving you gets
expensive
I'm paying with my
well-being
I'm being lied to by sunlight
cause I can't trust anything
after it leaves

that afternoon mouth
summer fruit and
what else can I pull through these lungs
a cheek-full of
five full breaths, impossible to clear
another Saturday smiling
I get it
there's girls as
pretty as
you everywhere

my gasps they
actively react to you
academically,
accidentally I think
facing the tall-bed-duet
dragging your
thigh towards
my cheek
was beautiful up
side down & it
took me
she,
took me
we're,
falling asleep

A leftover prayer
under your knuckles
under blinking
that day it rained a little
you squeeze me below &
I spent the entire night in love
with you
I wouldn't call it daring
after the foam builds,
little skeletons drifting out to
spell your name & I
asked for coffee
to keep safe my lips
to

shut me up

I said enough when it wasn't  
my like for a mountain of
mouths to **** time
& I'm still standing in the hallway;
happening upon where it went
or
if you could have helped it
I know I couldn't
when I can hardly stand or
stand it
built a lump of love in the blue dark
during wine
she's just
a woman in jeans
a heavy thought against my knees or
something I think I need to
belong with me

I'm not a child
woman I'm
this wanting thing between
two arms
shaped like a body
I've been alive with the breeze for
centuries, darling

my love wasn't being made to make you feel foolish
you can't learn from that
wash your hands now, it's midnight
I'm
out the window
I wonder
what you wanted
and hold the whiskey in my mouth
singing be mine
for the company
cause I don't want to be ashamed to love you

& I'm tired.
Tired of sleeping after sweet dreams /
I'm sitting up now because you know I can't sleep  
who wants to sleep after a beg like that
I'm not built to be listless
I'm built for better, I'm strong
& you're
the 4pm sun in October
you're the reason I whistle in a hundred colors
It's a beautiful torture to miss a hand so much
to wear rings for the memory of fingers and to crave a cheek, not only for it's mouth but because feeling you allows me to breathe easy

it's enough feeling
forgotten, (you'd think)
seeing her brush go
everywhere but the paper;
wondering if I missed something /
love makes me a believer in naive
less sleep, questioning everything.
questioning wander it's
no wonder I don't dream it's
games atop bodies
it's no wonder I drink;
I've been screaming for you
every day of the week
choking on salt from the waves
in your sea of bad timing

the truth's not poetic.
I can't fight for you
when I'm being folded

I just don't feel
strong or
not stronger
just
some memories
wear black &

what's getting over when
i've stopped climbing ?
my feelings aren't
being tucked
they're
getting up