For a split second
I believe in the glimpse of my past self
with muscles swelling
to the pounding of pavement,
comfort in my skin
and breath flowing freely.

I snap back to a present
stamped “Handle with care”
for the feet that stumble stay fragile.

Maybe this glimpse
is a vision of the future,
the possibility of granting
of a year’s worth of wishes.
“Patience is a virtue,”
I’ve always heard.
Give me the sanity to see through.

The third level of a staircase that rises to five.
Too weak to make it to the top,
Knife in one hand,
Empty pill-bottle in the other.

They find her
Colorless and cold
Upon the empty stairs
With weapons dropped and phone in hand,
Resting on a contact that was never called,
For her fingers were too frail.
Pallid skin chills their hearts.
A note begins “I love you all…”
“I’m sorry” carved into her thigh.
Crusty, red liquid spilled beneath her.
A face devoid of any emotion.

You’re too late.
A heart is steadily silent.
Lungs are stubbornly empty.
A body is willfully lifeless.

They each have their own vision.
Each lie acts an incision,
A mold into division.
They like to think they know her.

They’ve all made the decision
To bombard her with provisions,
But to her it’s just collision,
And it simply only slows her.

They like to think they know,
But on them rains down the joke,
Cause how can someone know a girl
Who’s lost sight of her own stroke
In time, continuing to choke.

I’ve heard it said that we must all
Walk to the beat of our own drum,
But what do you do when who you are
Is better than who you’ve become?

I write for two reasons:
to make myself feel everything
to make myself feel nothing

Once in awhile, neither happens.
Once in awhile, both do.

Take my flashlight -
You need it more than I -
And maybe your path will be brightened.
This darkness could swallow you whole,
But may its bullets puncture me before you.

I'll not leave your side, my dear.
This I promise you.

With all the disdain and deception of late,
I want to, again, place at my side
The comforting cold of the clear,  orange container.
And I’m scared of what may happen if I do –
But I’m scared of what may happen if I don’t.

This life has proven that every day
The world will attempt to convince me that
I’m no different than anyone else ,
That I’ll never amount to anything better
Than these plastic dimples by which I’m surrounded,
That I’m not enough –
Nor will I ever be.

But it’s then that I remember why I haven’t succumbed
During these last three months.
And it’s then that I remember I am irreplaceable.
So just give up, because I’m a diamond in the rough,
Buried beneath this scorn and smile,
And I dare you to dig deep to my soul,
I dare you to let me discover yours.

My eyes are the series of letters you skim,
My hands are miniature font that stares miss.
My skin is a struggle for external boldness.
My mind is a simple afterthought.
My muscles recount lifetimes of information,
each tendon a lesson that presses me forward.
My organs hold treasures of memory jewels,
my vessels an account of their worth.
My legs are the diction of unknown adventures.
My smile is their punctuation and grammar.
My heart is a fact of lesser importance,
my ink its wounded citation.

I’m always here if you should need,
but the few who do so quickly forget.
Someday, my lines will be embraced in the full
and delicately handled with interest.
Read between, above, beneath,
Analyze every washed-out curve.
Study my circles, my twists, my ridges,
and make me into a book.

I am a delicate flower in the midst of fiery winter.
I am the gust of wind that brushes through the trees.
I am a cold burst of water that chills you to the bone.
I am the solid brick wall which beyond no one sees.

I am stuck up, I am humble.
I am weak, I am strong.
I am timid, I’m outgoing.
I’m veracious, I am wrong.

And though I can’t undo the shadows of a shallow heart,
And though I can’t reveal a window to the deepest sea,
And though I don’t know where we are or how the rain should fall,
The roses either bloom with life or wash away the tree.

If forgiveness isn’t in the cards,
The quiet stillness reigns.
I’ll always know the deep desires
Of this messed up game.

*I forfeit,
For I am better than this.

In this free fall
floating around me
is nothing but what has been
and what could be.
A thousand words I never said
are enticing whispers in my ear.
Too many screamers crying,
“You are worthless!”
But my soul bears a strong shield.
They can’t get to my heart anymore;
I know my worth.
The lies swirl in the mist around me,
a cloudy gaze of nevermore.
And I’m just comfortable in this free fall
to a place I don’t know.
So wherever this takes me,
can it please be adventurous?
I need some of that in my life,
a spontaneous mix of alive and thrilling.
So, when I land,
let’s just run.
Never stop and don’t look back
unless I run head on to past.
What am I supposed to face right now?
Where are you taking me?
I ache for the moment I land on two feet
and dash to the day of knowledge.

Open my eyes,
Cover my ears,
The berating buzz of the alarm sounds.
Catch hold of my breath
As my soul disappears,
Relentless and futile my heart pounds.

Attack me or choose me,
Love me, abuse me,
Lie, cheat, love –
“Sorry.”
Sorry.
Bruise me.
I just gave up on being strong.

Today is a copy of the humdrum preceding.
Tomorrow the stubborn replay still holds
This worthless,
Pointless
Life with no meaning.
Alone in the silence,
The secret untold.

I dare you all to shake me up,
To break me,
To shatter,
To stab me,
To blame.
The effort won’t breach this wall I’ve built,
The three new cravings,
The mask I now feign.

Fifth of *****,
Full bottle of pills,
Painkillers left would surely fulfill
A desire to feel,
A need to forget,
A wish to lose who I am,
Or will it?

A knife in the drawer.
A glistening blade
I long to drag across my beige, freckled skin,
Deep into my unfeeling flesh,
A thrilling pain,
Patience worn thin.

I finally gave up on being strong,
But I know myself all too well.
I care so much,
I hope so much,
I love so much,
So **** it to hell.

Now the first thing that I shall seek?
I’m giving up on being weak.

I’m 28 years old,
staring 29 in the face,
and I still go to bed every night,
pretending the pillow next to me is a warm body.

I’m not sure if that makes me
pathetic
or just human,
but I do know
I’ll be elated
the day that pillow gets a face.

The light knocking
on my window
from the rain's tiny fist
may be the single,
most relaxing,
contemplative sound
in Mother Earth's
long and sobering life.

There is a heaviness in my shoulders
when I pull into the complex,
a seeking sense I can’t seem to shake.
I park but don’t move;
There must be something inside a note
or lyric
that has some answer,
but it falls short,
just like every night that preceded this one.
I turn off the ignition to hear a silence
that screams too loudly.
I journey to the door,
and the passing of my feet across the threshold
is my emotional “off” switch.

For now
it is out of my hands.

There’s a note
hidden in the melodies
that sing to me as I drive.
It is faint,
but I hear it
louder than my morning alarm.
I can almost feel God’s embrace
wrapping me until I’m warm again.

A smile envelops my mandible
as weary laugh escapes my teeth.
This is what they call clarity.

This staircase -
These cold walls and concrete floors
Are the only things that understand.
My pen forms the words I cannot speak.
This staircase is all that will listen.
It cannot hurt me,
Because it cannot choose to not care.

But soon I will not be a burden to it or anyone else.
The twenty left will be used on me,
And I cannot wait for that day.

My mind is tired
from the marathons it’s been running
around my head,
trying to make sense of a society
so hell bent on hating one another
under the guise of Christianity.
You think everything is black or white,
right or wrong,
conspiracy or honesty,
when the God I know can’t work that way.
Send me to sleep tonight
without a prayer,
because I don’t know what to ask for anymore.
For now,
I’m content with the bed I’ve made
deep within sheets of grey.

It's yet another day
for yet another year
to ban another tear
from the contours of my cheek,
And yet another fray
from yet another war
for the dagger through my core,
just wanting to be bleak.

And every day
I make myself happy.
And everyday
I swallow the weak.

Today is no different.
Here's to pressing on,
round three.

When gathered around a television
among close friends and random strangers,
dressed to the nines with champagne in hand,
the clock strikes midnight,
and the silver ball drops,
person after person locks lips with their love,
so I choose my victim wisely
and have not one regret.*

I left my lips on my champagne glass.

1 in the morning,
And my eyes won’t slumber.
The caffeine in my veins keeps my conscious brain flowing.
And when all else fails, I end up here,
A blank word document waiting to be filled
With some sort of story,
or some sort of feeling,
or some sort of ground-breaking thought.
But tonight I have no great words to say.
Just that I feel safe in this place.
And I think, maybe, I enjoy being alone a bit much,
Where I don’t feel the pressure to live up to any expectation,
Where I don’t have to feel distraught
or sad
or helpless
or frail,
Where there’s no one to impress,
Where there’s no one to hurt,
Where there’s no one that I’ll allow to hurt me.
It’s me,
and me alone,
It’s all I need,
A place to be blank.

I find in my writing
I become naked and vulnerable.
Strip me of pretty words and clever phrases.
See beyond the rhymes, alliterations, and metaphors.
It is in my writing that I discover who I am,
who I once was,
and who I could be.
But tonight?
I just want to be blank,
to allow myself to forget all that I’ve done
and start from a place where no one knows me.
Tonight I want to meet the world for the first time.
Not to begin anew, but to simply begin.

This is where I say goodbye,
And this is where I say hello.

You think I don't know
what it's like to hate someone
but miss them with everything inside of you
and realize that you don't actually hate them at all?
You think I don't understand the concept
of a contradicted soul?
But, you see,
the difference between me and you
is that the person I miss is worth so much more
than I think he'll ever understand,
and, if I had to,
I'd spend the rest of my life convincing him so.
But that will never happen,
since I'm not really here.

As you pull me close,
Carefully tighten your embrace,
Softly kiss my forehead,
And tell me I’m okay,
Tears fill my eyes,
For all I can think is
“Why is this the only place I feel safe?”

It isn’t mine.

When I finally find the stable ground,
I make it my means to make myself fool,
So, commence the run, and don't turn around,
Because no one is looking back.

Sometimes I miss her,
Because she at least believed in something.
She had hope for herself
In spite of anything she felt or had to suffer through.
She found the worth in it.
She cared so much.

Then I pity her,
Because of her naivety
And how in the end, she was left with nothing.
So, I buried her.
Deep down, she's still there somewhere,
If you'd like to take the time to dig,
But she's barely breathing.
She cared too much,
And that's why she'll soon suffocate.

Your repeated stabs
Bled bullets of blood,
But the beating won’t bring me
To my battered ending.

Never have I felt so broken,
So worthless,
Than when you gave up
All those years ago.
But I moved on.
And if I could erase it,
All that would stop me is that fact that it led to him.

Despite the ending,
I would walk through the fires of hell
On pins and needles
For that boy,
For he was my best made decision.

Breathing life into me,
He taught me I am treasured,
He gave me the courage to stand up for my life,
Defeating your still relentless attempts at tearing it away.
And I can now breathe on my own.

I used to think I knew what love was,
But I never truly loved until he swept me off of my feet,
And I have yet to let him put me down,
Though he’s let me go.

I finally thought our friendship
Reached a strength that I didn’t know it could,
But you never cease to disappoint,
And I’ve gotten so used to this
That you’ve finally succeeded
At getting me to care less.

Congratulations on being the one figure in my life
To continuously bring me to tears,
And make me feel no better than
The smeared shell of the creature
That you’ve walked all over.

I finally found my fight.
I’m done being disposable.
You’ve thrown me away for the last time.

Tonight, I knew I was a hypocrite.
As I stood there with my callous stare,
Mind in a world that will never exist,
The urge to turn to every worshiper around me -
Warning them that they’ll lose it all,
That happiness doesn’t exist,
That love doesn’t exist,
That peace doesn’t exist -
Overflowed inside of me.
But what did I do?
I lay idly quiet, as always.
That’s what’s expected of me, right?
Because how dare I attempt to look for the truth!
How dare I expect honesty from any of you fools!
And how dare I tell you I care.

Where are you now, God?
Where the hell are you now?
Can you hear me, or do I need to scream at the sky some more?

Hypocrite.
That’s all I am.
These ink markings are a beautiful lie,
A beautiful attempt at a reminder of who I can be.
But I can’t be.
I won’t be.
Not in a place as cavalier as here.
This world is a ruthless place.
It’s **** or be killed,
And I’ve murdered what was left inside.

Silently.
Swiftly.

I don't want you to tell me I'm hot.
I just want you to care.

I don't want you to talk about my body.
I just want you to see inside.

I don't want to hear about her.
I just want to be comfortable again.

I don't want you to take advantage.
I just want you to miss me.

when I sleep, I
hear sounds of crashing
and war
to the steady, beating

d*** beneath my breast.
oh, the fear

you instill and the
outrage I feel
undo me.

whispers in
ash-covered bullets of sweat scream
nonsense.
thinking is death.

free me.
reach out.
our moments are painfully slow.
make up your

mind,
e**ntangling me.

I still wake up
in the middle of the night
from nightmare
after nightmare
of your unbeating heart,
and every time
that I wish I could speak
to the demons
that leave you breathless,
my sweating soul
sinks with gravity,
and fear sews shut
my lips.

That moment
When you know everything you’ve been fighting -
Every tear, every laugh, every thought, every desire -
Is finally catching up,
And the words dance on the tip of your tongue,
But this fear inhibits the release,
And if you just had something provoke you,
A single solitary word,
That’s all it would take to let it all go,
To let them know,
To just say it -
This ever fleeting desire within
To let yourself feel,
But you always let the fear win.

Please, sir,
Can you just say something?
Say anything to goad her?
She has all of the words right there,
But the beating of her heart tearing through her flesh,
The blinding emotion that emerges with your presence…
It scares her.
She doesn’t want to become that person again,
The one who always depends.

Please, sir,
Just say something.

Please, sir,
Say anything.

She needs this release.
I beg you.

If you were a poet
and I the words,
would you wrap me in metaphors
to keep me warm?
Would you sprinkle my edges
with hope and love?
Would you warn me when judgment
comes far too strong?
Would you claim my existence
to those who abhor?
Would you flaunt me in cultures
all over the world?
Would you edit my errors
to hide my faults?
Would you give me syllables
of beautiful awe?

Would you twist me to fragments
of vengeful lust?
Would you scribble my ink
to darkened blood?
Would you tear through my home
and throw me away?
Would you burn my stanzas
to ash and ****?
Would you strip me naked
to bare my soul?
Would you forget the stories
you lost in my hold?
Would you laugh at the lines
between which you see?
Would you shadow the shivers
so eloquently?


Would you care for the letters
you etched into me?
Erase me?
Erase
Era
E

The past is young, arrogant, and naive.
Anger cures what the gullible believe.
Truth betrays, but lies deceive.
Isolation framed by the mask I weave.

When I come home from a hectic, loud day of teaching all evening,
I let my iPod play on shuffle,
hoping God sends whatever song I need that night
as a conversation with my soul.
I like to think music is His way of talking to me.

Looking up at the previous sentence,
it occurs to me how stupid that sounds,
but I do it anyway.

Sometimes,
God doesn’t talk.

Sometimes,
I don’t listen.

Sometimes,
I’m overcome with the strangest sense that He is telling me
I am exactly where He needs me,
difficult as that may be at times,
and the steadfast anticipation I have in my picture of the future
couldn’t possibly compare to the painting
He is gracefully and meticulously creating for me.

Have you ever woken up from a dream
where you didn’t realize you were asleep?
Where one minute,
you think you are rolling around in bed,
frustrated that you’ve woken up at 4am,
wishing you could magically get the screams in your head
to diminish to a whisper,
but an alarm grasps at your eyelids
until you realize that you’ve awoken
and were asleep all along?

Is that what this life is right now?
Am I going to wake up one day,
and suddenly the insecurities,
the unimportance,
the nothingness,
and the apathy
will be gone?
Will I wake up and stop being an afterthought?
Your I’m-here-for-you’s,
I’ll-help-keep-you-busy’s,
and I’ve-been-praying-for-you’s
don’t mean anything to me anymore.

I finally have everything I have been awaiting
for years,
but it's not enough anymore,
and yet,
here I am – again–
realizing the only friend I can trust
is myself.

I finished high school a decade ago;
I thought I was too old for this now.

Sometimes I whisper the words, “Are you okay?” into the empty air I breathe just to hear what it would be like to feel someone care, but who am I to change the convention of the polite and smiling reply of, “I’m good. How are you?” Would anyone really know how to react if I actually said that it depends on the day you ask me?

The truth is,
today
I’m not okay.

I don’t know what I will get each time the… (I would say the sunlight opens my eyelids, but let’s be real here; I don’t really sleep anymore.)… I know why this happened to me the first time, but now? Maybe it’s because I learned how to feel again. I guess depression doesn’t really need a reason, though, does it? At the very least there is a big difference between now and seven years ago.

This time, I know my worth. This time, I’m fighting back, instead of drowning in it. This time, I am strong. And this time… I don’t want to die.

This time, I am actually reaching out for a hand to silently hold mine just to comfort me for even a minute. The only problem is everyone else has a life too. People love to say, “I’m here for you,” and, "I’m praying for you,” but they are too busy to actually to that.

Every day I get up just before the crack of dawn to lace my running shoes and pump my legs long enough to replace the stale state of my lungs to something fresh and clean. It’s the one thing I feel I have control over in my life.  It’s my chance to get out and feel like I’m a part of the world before the rest of the world wakes up and reminds me that I’m just a tiny piece of it.

For most of my life, I’ve felt like I am the missing piece to a puzzle that I can’t find. I’ve always felt different in a way I don’t know how to put into words. It’s just a sense of myself I don’t feel I need to explain. Not long ago, that feeling started to go away, but I think God may have misplaced me when he tried to fit my pieces together.

There’s a silver castle on my way to freedom, but I can never quite reach it, and there’s a silence that swallows me whole each time I steal a glance in its direction. Today, I am not okay. Tonight, I just pray that the next time my feet step out of bed and onto the soft carpet of the home I finally found for myself, I will feel a little bit better.

I suppose that’s all I can ask for at this point.

You
make me feel everything,
all at once,
in ways I've never experienced.

I
don't like that.

I don’t remember how it’s supposed to feel
when you’re falling in love.

If it’s an unrelenting need to lie beside someone
whose touch tingles every inch of your skin
until goose bumps lift each hair follicle so high
that you get chills down your back,
where their breath’s embrace so sweetly warms the chill away…
then I’ve got that.

If it’s also an incessant fear that you will mess up so badly
that you feel all insecurities race through your vessels
until they reach whatever lobe of your brain
that controls your emotions
and cause you go completely insane
until the moment you get to speak again…
then I’ve also got that.

In this silence
All I can hear is the echo of every word.
Mine. Yours. Theirs.
Who the hell do you think you are?
Who the hell do I think I am?

A  polished,  old  inkwell  sits  spritely  stag,
ready  to  give­  everything  it  knows.
Its  blood  breathes  brilliant  carving­s  of  words,
its  sight  blinded  to  the  next  encounter.

The­  tip  of  a  quill  c h i p s  a w a y  a t  i t s  h e a r t,
but  it  never  b
                           l
                             e
                               e
                                 d
                                    s where  it  shan't,
And  even  though  it's  shattered  before­,
there's  nothing  a  little  mending  won't  fix.
In  bustling  lives  we  often  forget
what we're handed is simply a privilege,
and  where  there's  give,  there's  take,  inevitably­
it's  easy  to  cleverly  take  for  granted.

Consistently  s l o w  from  brim  to  bottom
but  as  long  as  you  keep  dipping ­ your  phrases,
you  must  remember  that
eventually
what's­  e                                                            d.
               m                                                     e
                  p                                        ­       l
                    t                                      ­    l
                      y                                  i
                      will  need  to  be  **f

I don't care
how many times
you reassure,
I will still think
there's something
wrong
with me.

Words are trivial.

Pour me one.
I need to unwind.
Let loose,
Let go,
Break out of my mind.

Pour me another.
I want to forget
Your taste,
Your touch,
Desire’s one threat.

Pour it again.
I’m nearly carefree.
No fears.
Just laughter,
And fall to my knees.

Hours pass.
My room is spinning.
The heart of glass
At last is grinning.

Without a worry,
Devoid of care,
I tear out the heart
Beating to bare.

It throbs in my hand,
The reflection I see,
The same forlorn fool
Staring at me.

Darkness descends,
Shadows of unrest,
An all-too-brief slumber,
A drum in my chest.

And right where we parted
We unite once more,
Concerns that I left
Now piercing my core.

The intoxication
Of a hard imbibition
Can cause me to lose every inhibition.

But deep down,
Not once,
Can it ever forget
That I’m already intoxicated –
Constantly,
Completely,
And consciously –
By the immense love
I still have for you.



Sober again.

It’s been a rough year– especially this month and, furthermore, this week–
but there is a single, irrelevant moment that my brain has been playing on repeat:
You were making dinner in the kitchen, music saturating the room –
most likely some smooth jazz ballad you’ve crooned a million times –
and you took a break from the stove to try to dance with me.
Embarrassed by my inability to dance socially without being awkward,
I swindled my way out with an excursion to the bathroom.

There aren’t many things I would change about the last few months…
not the inebriated tears I couldn’t trap behind my eyes,
nor the hours I spent listening to you ramble on about
everything that excites you,
which is everything.

It’s the simplest moment I regret the most…
I just wish I would have danced with you.

Did you ever wonder
why you never saw me when the stars were lit,
or when black framed the crescent of an ivory echo,
and nocturnal critters sang to the sky?

Did you ever wonder
if the sparkle in my eye was actually the diamond
I secretly kept to fool those with light
that could reflect from their smile?

Did you ever wonder
why the laugh in my throat reverberated
with fallacy and fear and coercion and confusion
until my mind believed it true?

Did you ever notice
that I wasn’t really around until six months ago or so?
Do you know why?
Do you even notice it
here and there still?

Replace-ability and invisibility:
the top two qualities of an introvert.

Did you know
that I was dead,
and there’s piece I couldn’t revive,
and that piece can eat me alive,
but my power won’t let it?
Did you know
it crawls under my skin,
and the itch can be too much,
so I scratch until I bleed,
and I spill out all of me?

Sometimes,
we’re not “just tired.”
Sometimes,
socialization equals solitude.

So,
we drive home to the beat
of a soft, piano-covered ballad
on repeat
and repeat
and repeat
and repeat,
just to let the musing sink in,
until a single, meaningless, unprovoked tear
comforts our cheek
in a cozy, embracing blanket.
And when we reach home’s quiet hello,
the only solution
is to bathe in the silence,
let its aroma fill each crevice,
let it inject into our veins,
let us breathe its sweet clarity
until the world turns right-side-up.

Only then
have we filled again.
Only then
can you hear us.