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3.4k · Apr 2013
Simplicity
Justyce Regular Apr 2013
Simplicity
I was never a simple person
but I craved simplicity like I craved my grandmother's strawberry jam
I loved school, whistling and everything taller than me
They reminded me of my father
I hated screen doors, cracks in pavement and goodbyes
When I was four he left me all those tainted things
but I loved him

Four years later
my mother asked me what I wanted for Christmas
I told her I needed a baby brother
I used to spend every night while he slept
at his feet
When I was eleven, my mother moved us to a new city
There were a million games of cops and robbers
and my first boyfriend, Spencer
He had blond hair and eyes so blue they put my brother's to shame
He told me he loved me under an oak tree
kissed my cheek and got so red in the face
I thought he was going to burst

My mother was in University
and had the softest piano hands
Her eyes were glossy from all her tears
I collected them in my jewellery box heart
There were rust on my edges
and hers
I was a rusty by product of drunk unintentions
A mathematic, scientific accident
Not a young mother with high hopes and goodluck

On Sunday afternoons I played hopscotch
on my babysitters driveway, I was nine
On Sunday evenings he brought me to his secret lair
He'd secretly touch me in all my secret places
I hated him
I think he hated me too

When I was six, I wanted to be a teacher
Ten years later, a man with a medical degree
told me I couldn't have babies
I couldn't look at another child, so I figured teaching wasn't my best option
Plus, I've never been a fan of teaching children not to make a mess
I spent my whole life making sure it wasn't messy

When I was fourteen, I wanted to run away
I wanted to go to Europe
with my best friend Oskari
he cut his arm and told me he couldn't really bleed
he didn't feel anything
I wanted to bless him
I wanted to read him Jane Austen in an open field
Under a single sycamore tree
We never made it

When I was seventeen, I ran away
I moved in with my father's mother
He has her eyes, just like me
That same year I met a boy
Who rode a stolen steed to my grandma's couch
Made love to me all night
took on me on walks and sent my heart off to the races
He made my life a little simpler
Continue reading...
1.3k · May 2013
I never wanted to write this poem
Justyce Regular May 2013
I never wanted to write this poem
I told you to Lend me your lips
and I'll teach you what love is, I said
I'll let my eyes become your moon
if you'll lend me your collarbones
so I can use them to build a bridge
to the mountains inside my heartstrings

Love, I wrote you an anthem
for all the nights you made my knees sing
and I swore on every dying man's last breath
that I would never change the tune of that song
I was a fool for letting you love me
I knew I would break you in
You told me in life we can't always win
but I thought we were
Because winning was found in the mornings
when your skin looked like feathers under lamplight
and nights when your eyes glistened from that red wine
and I swore I would never let you drink it with anyone else

I told you I couldn't catch a break
and you told me life wasn't a baseball game
I don't have to catch anything
but oh did I ever want to catch you like a firefly
in my glass heart
The day you left I whispered that I would never stop writing you poems
you were always giving me inspiration
You still are

Yesterday I breathed a ghost out of my lungs
and I swore the cigarette smoke could fill up the sky
I thought maybe you'd see my signal fire
telling you it's time to come home
Telling you it's time to listen
time to listen for the last night
When you pressed your cheek against mine
and told me not to call
and I thought the words were poison dripping from your mouth
I was screaming but nothing was coming out
and I knew I couldn't live another day the same ever again

Because now that you're gone
my lipstick can't even stick right
and my sonnets are words numbed by hopelessness
and this poem is a poem I never wanted to write
You were right here standing over my shoulder
just a few weeks back
I have no idea where I lost track of the time
but it's gone
just like you
Continue reading...
1.3k · Mar 2013
Finally Free
Justyce Regular Mar 2013
Finally Free
We were suckleberry sonnets
Crabapple tree climbers
Little girls in pink frills
With fire drills in our heads
from our mother's
They told us
"don't let a boy touch you"
We were rockets aimed for the moon
We always came a little too short
I always thought it was just me

Part of me always knew
I always knew it couldn't be right
I was nine
I wanted a boy to teach me things,
things my father never could
He was fourteen, I'd known him all my life
I liked his trampoline
But his hands
I ******* hated his hands
They tugged and pulled at me during hide and seek

He whispered
"Stop crying"
(I was always asking for it)
He could see it when I smiled
I guarded my smile like I guarded his secret
My nine year old mind didn't want it anymore

I wanted him less than I wanted to erase it
Erase the things he'd planted so mischievously
I was an empty nine year old casket
I rode my bike like a hurst
I wore my turtleneck like a bulletproof vest
I thought he couldn't hurt me there

I was an angry sailor without a single burst of wind
A single burst of freedom
It's all I wanted
all I ever needed
I needed someone to free my from the grips of the Devil
I prayed to my mother's God
He didn't answer for two years

I thought he would free me like the night
I thought he would let go like a never ending story
But he's always been a part of my story
My suckleberry sonnet
my first love
my broken mother
all my nightmares
Thanks, *******.

I don't let him ruin me anymore
He doesn't own me like he used to
He no longer steers my so easily swayed ship
He's just a piece
(A *******, of course)
But only a small piece of me
I ride my bike like it's a steed now
I don't wear turtlenecks
I don't own a bulletproof vest
He's gone
I'm still here
Continue reading...
1.2k · Sep 2013
I threw you to lions
Justyce Regular Sep 2013
I threw you to lions
I listen to Keaton Henson when my head is spinning
My head is constantly spinning
There are 124 moments in a day where I have to close my eyes
because all I can see are his hands
I hated his hands, five fingered noose
When I was eleven my goldfish died
I cried for seventeen days straight because I wanted nothing more
than to take my life back
just so he could have his
I used to keep my closet doors open to the idea of monsters
my feet off the edge of the bed as I slept
so when they reached out for my child toes
I could ask them to save me from the real monsters I saw every day
When I was 14 I recorded my final words on tape cassettes for my family
so I didn't have to breathe anymore
it was too much work
I was too much work

Now, I drink red wine to awake my soul
and I kiss the lips of the wind when I walk
so I don't have to see it as anything but a lover, a friend
Now, I miss the way his hands enveloped mine
and his body felt like beach rocks under my soft water tongue
and I needed his truths but I couldn't look at his bright suns anymore
I'm a lover of the night
and now, I sit up and write about him instead of sitting next to him
because I'm afraid of the music and I'm afraid of perfection
It doesn't seem right to have things handed to me so easily
in tightly wrapped packages with bows and ribbons string
so beautiful like a journal
Now, I leave my light on when I don't sleep
I don't sleep
He was the only part of me that made any sense
but I wasn't used to making sense
so I threw him to the lions
and prayed he'd never let me love him again
One day he'll know he's better off
Continue reading...
1.2k · Sep 2013
Wasted
Justyce Regular Sep 2013
Wasted
You'll find me in the garden
pulling up the roots
claiming my boots are the only thing in my life that's grounded
because 7 months ago when you were wasted
blowing smoke out your lungs
telling me you loved me, that that was enough
I should've started running because you hated cigarettes
and you've never been one to believe that love is enough
I thought I was enough
You thought I was tough but I'm as timid as my Sunday school heart
I thought you were a brilliant piece of artwork lover

Lover, I made you a time machine
out of paper mache and paper mached my heart
and handed it to you with my full regards
You're sick of the yardwork I wanna do
I'm sick of picking up your muddy boots but I'd still
shoot myself to the moon as long as you'd follow right behind me
Maybe we should just take up drinking so you can love me
full time instead of the part of time you actually do
and I knew you were a natural disaster the first time I laid my eyes on you
in the back of the bar
ripping me apart like a city
and leaving the crowd to pick up the pieces of my heart
I wish you still loved me when you were sober
because when you're wasted I can taste it
the fallacy in your throat
the lips that feel undone
and you
and how we used to be so right
and how now it's all so wrong
Continue reading...
1.2k · May 2013
Cigarette Butts
Justyce Regular May 2013
Cigarette Butts
It's been 4 months and 17 days since you were last in my time zone
All I can think about is how warm you must be in San Francisco
never dreamed you'd actually go
In Colorado there's 2 feet of snow
and the remaining glow of the figment of a halo
you left for me
I've been picking up cigarette butts for 4 months
I thought I told you there was a ******* ashtray for our ***** habits
now every cigarette **** I pick up reminds me of us
One.
your eyes, blue telephones lines directly connected to Autumn skies
Two.
hands dripping from the paint wars in our backyard
when you splashed yellow paint on our boring kitchen floor
so you would stop looking at the door
I should've noticed the signs
you were gone long before you ever said goodbye
Three.
your elbows, feet and knees pressed against mine
under blue bed sheets
Four.
that cold December morning when you said the weather was an exact reflection
of the feelings that you were holding
and you couldn't face this anymore
so you slammed that back screen door, chipped the yellow painted floor
told me you loved me
just not anymore
Continue reading...
1.1k · May 2013
The Boy
Justyce Regular May 2013
The Boy
Four years ago I kissed your eyelids
and told you that when we grew old
I would tell them to bury my dead body right next to yours
so we'd never have to sleep apart
A part of me always knew you wouldn't last that long
You reached your rough hands to the clasp of my bra
and danced naked with me in our livingroom
I met you when you thought needles were magic
and you thought God was found in a cloud of smoke

I was 17 and the curls in my hair were designed by mother
I had my "father's eyes"
and my "sister's cheekbones:
but you liked my hips and the heart shaped freckle on my lower back
the way my brow furrowed before I fell asleep
You liked the parts of me no one could whisper "were passed down through the gene pool"
You were 20, you had track marks like sleeves up your arms
and your frail frame was a byproduct of your mother's addictions
and your father's love was formed on the thick skin he made you wear
Your lips tasted like peppermint
but I loved your heart.

When we got older you got down on one knee
and promised a lifetime of yourself to me
No one understood that I would have given a lifetime of fighting for you
if it meant there was even a small chance that I could mend those wounds
Even if I had to suffer every evening tear
every glistening moonlight
that you begged for more
because even though the needle   in your arm made you weak
I saw the strength you held me up with
and I saw the lips that craved for better
and I wished a lifetime of happy endings
because you'd had a lifetime of sorrows
I wanted to capture you in a  musicbox
because you always made my heart sing
and there was kitestring on your finger
that you promised you'd never forget
and I thought beyond everything  else someone must understand
so I wrote this poem to show the world the beauty I saw
despite the flaw
and my parents dreams for "better for me"
They didn't know the things you'd seen but they were right
I never said you were perfect
but when that hot July sun came
and you married me under that sycamore tree
and promised that you'd spend your life quitting
but never on me

So now I'm collecting red roses
for all the petals you left on my bed sheets
and I'm cleaning out the shirts in your closet
because I tried for years but you never wore them
You didn't get it
I loved you with a fire so deep in the ground
I swore I'd never let it burn out
and it hasn't
but in the end time couldn't let me keep you
Time wouldn't let you keep yourself
so now they're digging a hole in the ground
and I have to leave you there without help
because there was a boy with a needle in his arm
that couldn't face the past
and he cast a long shadow down a forever path
and even though he promised forever
he had given me the best that he had
So I kept his kitestring for another lifetime
when we get to sleep together again
Continue reading...
1000 · Dec 2014
today
Justyce Regular Dec 2014
today
tonight there's a fire in texas
& it's screaming out for the all the bodies it's lost there
in some grand american war
in someone else's glorious battle

the backyard tree was too high for you to climb
& so you took a jaunt to the brooklyn bridge and jumped
to see what it was like to fly

& tonight there's a fire in her chest that bleeds
for her father's bones to be buried next to hers
even though for years he didn't know her name
or what her laugh sounded like
i guess he forgot to check the post

& tonight there's a broadcast on the radio
the presidents been assassinated
& somehow that's your fault
for being to open about your love for your best friend, tom
who also happens to be a boy

& tomorrow there'll be an earthquake in memphis
& it'll be because there's too much *** on tv
god must be flapping his wings hard enough to shake
our great and grand scheme of things

& yesterday a little girl lay awake in her bed
counting her ribcage to make sure she can see every bone
she's praying she won't lose track of them under the meat

& tonight i will drink a tall glass of wine
so i can feel something
other than all the pain we've created for each other
oh, what has become of us?
Continue reading...
979 · Jun 2013
Honestly
Justyce Regular Jun 2013
Honestly
There was some kind of emptiness in my eyes last night
I could feel it
like a tornado sweeping over a deserted land
My deserted hands feel like a grand piano
playing a tune only you can understand
I dreamed of it once
a boy with blue eyes brushing away all of my sacrifice
and I swore I wouldn't let it slip away this time
like my mother did, every single time
Her daughter rushing for the exit sign
me
A time bomb left ticking
like a clock without a 12 and a song without the tune
and you
without me
I know it doesn't work
so I carved your name in the Earth and poured concrete into the words
because I can't ever let myself forget this
I can't let you forget this, we have to make it
As far as I'm concerned
your lips are a cave filled with crystal clear waters and a soft floating pillow
for me to lay
and I swear I was made to stay there
fit this way
like a puzzle piece fitting perfectly in it's perfect place
beside you
I can't remember fitting anywhere else
and your heart it melts in my palm
and I call out to some god so then maybe I can figure it out
how it's possible to have been so blessed
by your breath and your chest
and the beauty I recollect when I think of our first night
me floating in my flower dress
I wore a flower dress when I ran for my life
and I found yours and I like the way it tastes
I must say, I must stay
Honest, honestly I once whispered to a willow tree
about this boy I met in a dream
I swear it was always you
It's always been you
Continue reading...
973 · Dec 2013
tell me that it isn't over
Justyce Regular Dec 2013
tell me that it isn't over
remember last winter when you folded my wool socks
& whispered that my tiny feet were whimsical
i looked at you & thought the same
& i spent so many nights trying to find my mind
in the cold winter & you’d whisper
& bless me with stories from your childhood
you were a lamp post at the end of my street
& i was a doorway you always liked to hold hands with
we were delicate like that
i was smoking a cigarette
& sitting on our door post
half in love & half out of my mind
half in our home & half out of time

& you were a hot cup of coffee
on my cold paper tongue
a desolate flower crying out to be young again
i was dying on the inside
you were just dying
all the love we had laid vanquished on the pavement
soaked in my lover's blood
cars aren't supposed to collide like that

but i see you now
painting my kitchen that bright red
******* my longing bed linens
******* me
writing poems on my knee caps
counting fireflies
closing your eyes

just tell me it isn't over
Continue reading...
926 · Mar 2013
I think you might be an ocean...
Justyce Regular Mar 2013
I think you might be an ocean...
I desire to slip my feet into your cool waters
taste your salty skin on my tongue
I want you in a way that removes all my strength from me

I think you might be summertime
You're tall grass on the bottoms of my feet
You are a sonnet
You're a tall oak tree, branches tugging at my hair
You are a symphony
I long to touch your starry skies,
see the stars in your eyes
I kept a log of your summertime smiles
But there was also your summer rain
It fell from your eyes for miles
Nothing ever changed but me

I think you might be a boat
You were so good at driving away
You warned me that first night
when you snuck in through my bedroom window
I should have known better
I just should have known
I was just hoping, hanging onto every word
that fell from your satin lips
Hoping that you'd put out your anchor
Stay awhile at my docking station
But you sailed away again
into the midnight rain again

"Danger is my middle name"
you said
I believed it
I have to close my eyes so I can breathe again
Prayed to God I'd see you again
I haven't seen you yet.
Continue reading...
826 · May 2013
What it feels like..
Justyce Regular May 2013
What it feels like..
Today I watched rain spatter like paint on my window pane
and I remembered how you looked the last night I ever saw you breathe
I remembered how you told me it was like heaving for air
when you don't have the lungs to lead
Yesterday I watched a feather fall from a birds wing
and I thought of how you floated through life
wishing you could fly away
I couldn't give you those wings
the wings you needed to pull the strings life couldn't give you
If I could've said "I know how it feels"
to be the beaten up vet looking into an empty bottle of whiskey
with the empty heart flooded with never ending sounds of a gun
to be the adopted child torn away from his mother
the woman beaten and battered by a man called friend
I could've said "I know what it feels like"
but I never did
and now I'm sitting here with your casket on my shoulder
Praying to God that someone will be bolder
than I ever could and hoped someone would
because now I'm sitting here collecting daisies in an open field
under your favourite sycamore tree
and I promised you I would write letters when you moved to Tennessee
You never made it
I carved your name in the pavement where you picked up that dying bird
and told me every single word of the songs your mother used to sing
about putting life in everything
You told me you couldn't do it
If I could have told you I know what it feels like
to lose your focus on the 9th inning of that World Series we call life
Instead you used your knife and carved a ****
and laid yourself in a bed of ashes
and I swore to God I'd never erase it
I couldn't erase it but time
It was always ticking, tick
tick
tick
If I could've wrapped my arm around yours
threw you on a boat and brought you to Venice
so you could have seen what beauty was
or I could've given you a mirror
Continue reading...
776 · Dec 2013
To My Back Bone
Justyce Regular Dec 2013
To My Back Bone
Last night I let an ice cube melt in my palm
so I could put into perspective how quickly things dissolve
I never want us to dissolve
I always want my hips to be your favourite place to rest your lips
and I need my back to be your road map
I, the tour guide to all the places you want to go
I need to be that person you send postcards to when you're gone
saying you can't wait to get home, to this
I want to be that person that you miss
I want to be the butterflies in your chest, fireflies igniting your sky
I dream to your perfect mess
always, not just today
I want to wear your favourite dress
I want to bless you with my breath
I want to watch you catch your breath when you see me
I want you to call me "honey"
I want you to say "honey" like it's suckle on your breath
I want to be the sweetest thing you've ever tasted on your neck
I want you to tell me "lover, I never want to rest
without your head against my chest"
I want to promise "yes, I can do that"

I think we're both semi automatic guns
loaded for love
locked in a time frame
like a love grenade
I want to throw away our keys
Continue reading...
766 · Dec 2014
cheers
Justyce Regular Dec 2014
cheers
this is not a poem. it's more of an anthem, to honour all the nights i set my hair on fire with the wind & to raise a glass to all my glasses of wine brought on by poems written under candlelight. i'm not a writer, i'm just a woman paying tribute to you & all the ways you made my chest ache with infatuation & my finger tips tingle with skin-on-skin interaction. this is not a poem, i am not an artist. i am merely recollecting, reminiscing all the nights my skin was wild with alcohol & my breath was breathing out endless love letters & my guitar was singing out holy hymns. i was praising something. i was praising my body & the way my arms always unfolded for you & the way we always seemed to fit together. even when we didn't. but no, this is not a poem. i am not romantic but i was madly, romantically in love with you.
thank you, thank you, thank you kind friend.
Continue reading...
742 · Oct 2013
I will never be her
Justyce Regular Oct 2013
I will never be her
I'll never be her
the way her skin unfolded under your candy hands
I'll never look that beautiful
My eyes won't close for your tongue the way hers did
and I won't collide like blowing winds the way she did
I won't collapse from the pressure of your hands on my temples
I won't forget the scent of your skin
I will never be her

I won't give you all the things you are so accustomed too
because I was accustomed to them too
I won't whisper my secrets to the wind and know you'll hear them
I won't cross fourteen borders and drive down dark alleyways
to find your soul for you
I can't be her
but I'd still cross a million oceans, fly a thousand planes
just to see your smile one more time
but I won't ever be her
I won't gawk at the things you do
but I'll get angry when you forget about dinner
or forget my birthday
But I won't hold it against you forever
I won't remind you of your mistakes over and over
I will remind you you're beautiful
the most beauty I've ever seen in a man
But I won't be her

But I will be this
I will be the one to wipe the snowflakes off your cheeks
for every Christmas I get to keep you
and I will hold your hand through every hallway
alleyway, tear and dream
I will kiss your holy temples and run with you through glory pastures
I will be the moon under your feet
and the most beautiful love you could ever imagine
until you fall for something else
or until you don't
I will never be her
But I will always love you
Continue reading...
740 · Aug 2013
Broken Record
Justyce Regular Aug 2013
Broken Record
I think I might be a broken record
because the holes in my hands match the ones from the cross
and I'm thinking I might be continuously letting my soul die
for the ******* sins of others
Not to mention myself
I'm not Jesus
I'm a locust stealing the fruits of an unripe seed
Planting the hearts I stole in the chests of others
and I swore upon my brother's life
that tonight I wouldn't break them
the chains of the lost that I so easily found
I've got a track record for letting everyone I love down

Remember that hole you put in my ground
you told me I was hurricane
not a good thing could come from me
I knew it
I knew it
like the last breath of a lover
I was hovering over your head
waiting for you stop breathing so I could steal your last breath
and didn't I know it

I guess this is a warning to all the future people I meet
if you see me on the street, don't be drawn to me
I know what it's like to fall in love hopelessly
cause I hopelessly fell for you
in that same hopeless way he fell for me
and I don't know how to breathe
cause the tongue in my mouth isn't mine anymore
and the words I used I write down feel like someone else's poems
I've been writing down every minute that follows me around
I used to wanna leave this **** hole of a town

You helped me figure it all out
Continue reading...
731 · Dec 2013
dear to you
Justyce Regular Dec 2013
dear to you
I swear we were mixed tapes in our past lives
Mixed tapes handcrafted by secret admirers
I swear someone delicately knit you together in the womb
Someone must have because the lines in your forehead
are like intricate details someone had to have thought up
and your neck is a subtle waterfall bending to kiss the earth
like a gift
Your lips are a gift
a sonnet someone was dying to kiss on the cheek
I was dying to press my lips to your cheeky soul
your fragile bones
Every inch of me begs to keep you
tucked into my back pocket
like a wallet photo you show you to all your dearest friends
your complete strangers
Let me keep you like you keep your favourite love song,
like you keep Bon Iver on constant repeat
I want to be something so dear to you
Continue reading...
684 · May 2013
I live beneath the ground
Justyce Regular May 2013
I live beneath the ground
Tonight I feel a heat in my chest
a heat that lets me know I've dug too deep a hole
a hole I've buried myself in
beneath this bladed grass
this serene soil
this poisonous air

Yesterday, I watched every strand of your hair
watched it become a sandcastle
rising and falling in the wind
and I thought to myself
I could love him forever
That's when I recognized I'd let this go too far
I'd let my love for you drown out all the walls I'd spent so long building up
and I loved it
Continue reading...
675 · Nov 2016
Fear
Justyce Regular Nov 2016
Fear
I feared you in the same way I fear too much broken
I feared you in the same way I fear my own heart beat
I feared you in the same way a small child fears the push
Mother's hands on lower back
Bike wheels spinning spinning spinning
Too much fast

My anxieties are the only thing that keeps me warm
My bones are eternally full of chill
But my panic keeps me sober, somber, here.

I feared the way you bent over backwards to make sure I was breathing

I always knew I was wrong
or something in me wasn't right, my chemicals unbalanced
because my fear seemed to always overtake the fact that you were madly in love with my obsessions
Madly in love with the way my hair would stick to my cheeks in the midst of mad apprehension

So I sat down at my piano in the middle of a panic attack
And wrote you some songs and poems and such
I imagined I wasn't an erupting volcano
I imagined I wasn't your biggest mistake
#love #fear #anxiety
Continue reading...
647 · May 2013
Two Years
Justyce Regular May 2013
Two Years
Tonight there's an ocean separating us
and a fire in my backyard to honour all the ways you kept my heart ignited
For two years I watched you press your lips together before you fell asleep
so yesterday, I pressed a flower petal in a glass frame
and hung it above my bed to remind me
of that summer you brought me to the Coast
looked out at the ocean and whispered you dreamed to be a boat
or a plane
anything that could take you away
I dreamed I could change your mind
I was an open field
You were my raging sea
I should've known time would rob you from me but I hoped
that if I attached a rope connecting you to our bedpost
you'd always find your way back to me
but I realize now you can't stop a ghost from floating
and you can't stop the wind from blowing
It was bound to happen
like I'll always be bound to you
and you'll never give a **** about me
Continue reading...
620 · Dec 2013
because you feel like it
Justyce Regular Dec 2013
because you feel like it
last night you pressed your coffee cup
to your cherry lips
& told me you kissed men when you were mad
girls when you were sad
& jackson bailey when he felt like it
you said you never really wanted to feel like this
like the night was a war
& you were just another solider fighting for some light
in your life
there were two good things that happened
sadness
& days when jackson bailey just wanted to hold you
instead of forcefully unhinge you

if i could have just held you
let slip under the sheets a sudden disbelief that
love wasn't about unbinding a woman at the seams
it seems we're all just little pieces
of some drunken mans broken dreams
& i want you to be free
i want you to breathe like that
with your skinny little frame
pressed up against a jukebox
bobbing your head to some incredible time stopping tune
instead of trying to erase the way the moon looked last night
i want your cotton shirt hanging on a tree
& your long brown hair floating on the breeze
& i want someone to kiss you
because you feel like it
Continue reading...
571 · Jan 2015
I have nothing left to say
Justyce Regular Jan 2015
I have nothing left to say
**** this.
*******.
we were never meant to be.
or so you've told me.
I want to curl up in a ball and never know you.
Continue reading...
556 · Jan 2014
the fire called us
Justyce Regular Jan 2014
the fire called us
they say "never fight fire with fire"
but I fought the fire in my chest
with the fiery heat of your bones
&they; were right
you should never do that
you end up losing your last love breath
to a lovely, cunning smoke
Continue reading...
522 · Dec 2013
you are the last song I want to write
Justyce Regular Dec 2013
you are the last song I want to write
you are the light breeze on my swollen lips
& the heart pounding it's lost lovers last breath
inside my chest
you are the evening calling out for all the rains
to bless their drought and lack of all beautiful things
but you must know you are the most beautiful thing
I have ever had to never wait for
& I will always dream of kissing your neck
rolling up music notes into handmade cigarettes
so I can watch you drunkenly smoke
while you tell me everything you've never dreamed of

I want to be that thing you dream of
as soon your pillow hits that New York bed
ten thousand miles away from me
I want to be that thing you can't get out of your head
& when you kiss me I want your kisses
to be the last ones you every package up and send to somebody new
I want to be something new every day for you
so let's turn down the bed sheets
say goodnight to nights apart
& let's just sleep
forever in each others arms
Continue reading...
506 · Jul 2014
In Love with Love
Justyce Regular Jul 2014
In Love with Love
I'm trying to recall a moment where I really knew myself
I used to count every single sun kissed lamppost
I used to taste every single wine drenched kiss
Now my nights and days are all jumbled and joined up into one
And my lips cannot recall a single second of solitude in a slumber
I used to love the way my guitar sounded when it was raining
I used to love life and the way it flipped back and forth
Following no specific pattern, creating no schedule
Now my life is a calendar of days I can't remember
and nights I slept through not even knowing what the stars looked like
I used to count the stars

I guess all I'm trying to say is I used to be in love with love
and now I have to fight to keep it
Continue reading...
505 · Jul 2014
Love always changes
Justyce Regular Jul 2014
Love always changes
we were counting silhouettes of all our lost lovers
you were tying your shoes into 23 knots to make sure you never lost your step
again I was collecting bed linens
trying to sort out our newly found lies
how do you forgive when you keep replaying in your mind the things you can't forget?
how do you forget
& how do you draw 17 new lines
create new boundaries from the past you longed to have left
but I counted a million stars I'd kissed upon your neck
painted lightening bolts
across your summer sky
I swear we loved each other once
I swear still love you once a day
but part of me has lost track of all my days and nights
you used to be my only crescent moon
I'd stick out my thumb
& no matter what you'd always fit in and fill up all the space
Some nights I wonder if it'll ever be the same again
Continue reading...
292 · Nov 2018
I'm going to be a nurse
Justyce Regular Nov 2018
I'm going to be a nurse
I don't know exactly how to deal with what's happened
You were there, breathing, shaking
But I don't remember thinking anything was different
You reached out for my hand and I was reading a textbook about how to help people with mental illness

I held my breath for 368 days
But the thing is all I see is red
It clings to my bed sheets, it clings to the rug
It holds on to the bathroom floor
It remains on the closet door in a hand print
Footprints across the hallway floor
Why can't I see your face instead of the blood?
Why can't I see you smiling?
Why can't I remember that far back?

The thing is it's my job to recognize brokenness
Not only recognize but mend it
I'm the sewing needle for the torn up heart
But why didn't  I bring the kit?
Why didn't I have the right colour thread?
I'm so ******* sorry that I didn't even show you that I loved you
Continue reading...
195 · Dec 2019
Hardwood
Justyce Regular Dec 2019
Hardwood
The hardwood underneath my back is a ballad
It is listing a long letter of words along my spine
all related to missing something
I arch my back to release the air so I can create more space for you.

You left me on a Tuesday
and I can't recall what day it is now but I know you're gone and the days have passed like the sun shining through a glass house, sort of beautiful, sort of broken
Let's be honest
You said it was you but we know it was me
My wool socks remind you of your grandfather
I hardly ever write
I drink wine far too often for one human and of course,
My lips never quite kissed you well enough
Who wants well enough
Nobody and I don't blame you
I blame myself because I spent 1563 nights complaining about dishes
Who the **** would wanna live like that

I swear I tried, I guess
Continue reading...
191 · Nov 2018
Beginnings
Justyce Regular Nov 2018
Beginnings
I keep trying to get back to something
Like I have been lost for five thousand years and I'm just trying to catch a glimpse of myself again
But the thing about being lost is that maybe you're never found
Maybe that's how honour yourself
By forgetting the snake skin you shed five years ago and accepting that this is how you live now

I keep trying to write poems about my broken heart
I keep trying to write poems about unrequited love
I keep trying to write poems about drinking too much wine
I keep trying to write poems about a person I once loved

But my heart is more whole now than it has ever been
He loves me back
I'm not drinking to deal with my **** anymore
I have found the one person whom my soul loves

So maybe I'll just write about my new skin

It's soft and it loves him, wholly, entirely
I am in love with you and the way you shake back and forth like a willow tree
I am in love with how you look when you sleep
I am in love with your mind and how it spins and turns at a different rate than mine
I am in love with the fact that we have to work at our life
I am in love with the child you helped me create
I am in love with our life

So maybe I should just leave the **** in the past instead of seeking it out
Continue reading...
164 · Sep 2019
Piano
Justyce Regular Sep 2019
Piano
I am eyes & bones & Sundays
I am floating, forever furious at my feet
for making me walk instead of fly
I was a child the first time I saw a door close in front of me
I think that's why I fail a lot
I think that's why I fear
a lot of me is breaking always
Fading always
changing
never

I think I remember the first someone let me down
It was Tuesday & my back was bending like broadway dancers
I was cuddling my pillow to see what it felt like
To hold something
To hold something longer than my father
I wanted to stay forever but it only lasted 3 years
I think he's why I fail a lot
I fear a lot always
I think that's why I quit piano
Because I think I think it's okay to walk away when you're uninterested

I am bounding heart & blood & Friday nights of wine
I am my father's daughter
Disintegrating endlessly
Changing never
Always moving away
Continue reading...
147 · Sep 2019
I used to breathe like this
Justyce Regular Sep 2019
I used to breathe like this
I used to breathe like this:

In out In out In out
sTeAdY

I used to collect paper clips and turn them into upside down butterfly wings
I used to know you
I used to count each freckle on your hip and pretend it was a kaleidoscope
Turning
Colour changing
Chameleon
You are a soft suckle sultry summer sunflower
Spreading seeds with your hungry hippo ***** bite

I used to breathe like this:

In in Out out In in Out out
wHiMsIcLe

I used to kiss your sonnet shouting lips
I used to fist fight on Friday nights when whisky was whispering
Remember that
I used to love you
Remember that
But I'm
Turning
Colour changing
Chameleon

Trying to count how I used to breathe
******
Continue reading...
144 · Sep 2019
Cotton Candy
Justyce Regular Sep 2019
Cotton Candy
Magic magic kingdom
Here we are
It’s mother ******* Disney land in this cabin home we’ve built together
Dust and bones lay idle here
Kissing the ground on which I place my feet
You’re always kissing the ground on which I place my feet
We used to know the palms and backs of hands
Marriage does this to us
Makes us weak
Makes us forget that we met on our backs looking at the ******* sky
Astounded by our endless time
I love you still still the same as air
Still the same as cotton candy and carnivals
Continue reading...
133 · Sep 2019
Take One Tablet Daily
Justyce Regular Sep 2019
Take One Tablet Daily
This tiny orange bottle is the downfall and the uphill
It's the mini medication monsoon
It's the heart attack headache heart break
Beating broadly on my chest
Just like you
It keeps me balanced
Not like an acrobat on tightrope, fighting
Like a strong wind blowing trees
Breezy

Then I forget it
I forget one, two, three
Tiny white tic tac time bomb
And that's what I am
A bomb
Blood, terrors night
Me, terrors you
Who am I now
I forget my own tune
Tuesday's traffic accident
Monday's manic
Bedridden, am I

Sunday I am human
Flesh, blood, bones and beating heart
I am not a byproduct of depression
I am not a byproduct of disaster
I am full and whole and writing
I am floating on my back in the river by my mom's house
I remembered the tiny "take one tablet daily"

I am not depressed
Continue reading...

— The End —