i think the ocean is alive and thinking
all the while
the ambivalent recollection in the mirror
looks at me and thinks
“yes i truly will love you forever”
i know so cause she told me.

hello.
i’m your next almost.
i’m your next could-have-been
your next never-was.
don’t fear my dear.
i grew out of the ground
blooming tow(for)ard you
as if you were the sun
and you trod upon me.
that’s.
fine
print at the bottom
of the page.
that’s me.
the cliffnote.
off the cliff
i go
off
to never never land
it never was
a place for us
to land

hello.
i’m your next not-a-chance.
i’m your next give-it-a-chance
your next missed-your-chance.
don’t fear my dear.
i bled from the sky
falling tow(for)ard you
and you pulled out
an umbrella.
that’s.
fine
tooth comb
finding in the honeycombs
the sweetness
that could have
dripped onto your lips.
that’s me.
your honey
your sweetness

hello.
i’m your next the-one
your next there-is-no-one-else-for-me.
don’t fear my dear.
i am your next.
not your last.
and as for me
don’t fear my dear.
i’m your next.
i will be
someone else’s next
too.

i’m always a little worried
about a car crash
every night feels like the movies
like the perfect time
to crumple up and cross
and while the road is so dark
and your fingers dance away from the wheel
i wonder if my worries
will finally be put to rest

he may be the head-over-heels
this-time-it's-real
what-the-hell-do-i-feel
kind of in love with her;
he may be the lose-his-mind
without-her-shine
create-a-world-within-her-eyes
ki­nd of in love with her;
he may be the always-and-forever
nothing-better, scarlet-letter
kind of in love with her;
or maybe he's not.
who's to say?

once or twice you
were in my arms
i remember so clearly your hair in my face
the scent of your shampoo
and the touch of your fingertips
coming to rest on my cheek
once or twice you
were an almost that i went home wishing for
a maybe that i should have latched onto
once or twice you
made me think it was close and it was real
and you kissed my nose when
i thought you were going to kiss my lips
and i’m not complaining because
i think anything more would be
too much
but still if you wake up today
wondering if you should have
you should have.

i wonder if
what i do or
don’t do
will change the way you
think of me
look at me
feel about me
why do i have such
a tendency to feel
lonely only when i’m
not alone?
i’m thankful for so much
but not much at all
is thankful
for me.

if it makes any difference

i like you either way

look at this
this condensed structure of bone
and syrup
with its jaw slack
and it’s eyes so empty
gather round and take a glance
at this creature
stumbling about in a trance-like state
of corrupted effort and damnation
it is the spirit of exhaustion
and disappointment
it hides in your closet

it certainly hid
in mine

you look at a marble
and you see a moment
it rolls across the floor and
you know that it's time spinning by
like a memory you haven't witnessed yet

you know sacrifice
like no other.

i was underwater.
swimming with the fishes
with the stories
of names i’ll never
quite be able to place
and then you dove in with me
just as i was wading to the edge.
you swam around the room
a rainbow trout
amidst schools of minnows
i love them all
but you’re just such a pretty color.

i let my feet dangle in the water
as you kept diving deeper
you’d look at me
from across the sea
send a wave toward my shore
i feel it crashing into me even now.

standing beside me
both of us swimming in
different depths
you looked right into my eyes.
i knew if i just held you there
for a little longer.
just a little.
i felt like the moon
dragging you toward me

i swear to god you almost kissed me.
i swear to god i would have let you.

has no one ever told you that you’re the
most beautiful thing in the universe?
has no one ever told you that?
see
i find that so surprising.
because.
when i took a moment to stop being so
entranced with the way the light crystallizes
on the leaves of the hammock trees.
when i took a moment to take a moment
and look at you.
*******.
“oh
oh my god
why, aren’t you just the most beautiful thing
in the universe?”
aren’t you just the most beautiful thing
in the universe?
aren’t you?
my child eyes
the same oceans that have seen storms
my child eyes
must be newborn
because you
oh my goodness
you seem to float with the clouds way up
there in the blue abyss
hey,
can you toss down your string?
sweetness
i’d very much like to
join you

you snake your arms around my neck
wine stain on my lips i said
i love you
i got this year for you brand new
it’s enough to know my name
is on the tag.

i was born with the sun behind the trees
i was neither miracle nor mistake
just felicity
it’s sad that this sadness is mine
it carries me on through midnight
memories and years
i’ve has almost plenty
nobody at nineteen
now me at twenty.

everything is temporary always
even if the marker
can’t be erased
the mirror can still
be broken.

it’s a kindred sadness
not a cousin,
but a friend

i could just put on your jacket
i shouldn’t but i will
i’ll explain that it’s cold outside
that i just didn’t want to carry it
or i don’t know maybe
i could finally admit that i think
you should just let me keep it
i think it’ll end up in my closet
someday anyway

this december there won’t be much
airwaves and frequencies
at most i’m afraid
but i won’t mind
this december i might not even exist
but i’ll be there either way
oh i think this december
i’ll let the chill
follow me home
so that come january
i’ll already be cold enough to
let you go
when you leave.

trees hang down
over the cavern beneath my bed
and i know winter is near.

i breathe in the dust
that i am too tired to
brush from my weathered hands.

oh, yes, winter is near.
i just wish i knew
what that meant.

when you want to be kind
be kind
but when you want to be mean
be kinder

i woke up on the underside of an avalanche
i always try to go to bed with an olive branch
but the morning brings a thorn in my side
every time
every time

eu lhe adoro tanto quanto
o sol adora o mar
está chovendo mas
eu ainda posso ver vé-la brilhando
ela não é uma rival
ela nos assiste com amor
que mesma maneira
eu lhe assiste.

you say “let’s go for a drive, put the top down”
and i do and i drive
and you tell me to slow down
that i’m doing it wrong
and that sounds like a perfect example
of who we are now.
i gotta stop thinking it will be like
the other times before
things fell apart.
it hurts me more than it hurts you
and i know it hurts you more than anything.

i would like my body
if it were anyone else’s
it’s just that it follows me everywhere
if i could get five minutes alone
i think i could find it in me
to miss her.

do i love you?
oh, i’m not sure
please don’t ask
anymore.
my heart is weary
and my body needs to
rest.
gently now
take my hand
and hold me close.
do i love you?
oh, i’m not sure
but please stop asking
before i tell you
the truth
(oh, absolutely my dear.
absolutely)

the imaginary leftover confetti is still in my hair.
it’s been two days and i still feel
the brush of your hand on my fingers
in the elevator as i held tightly
onto what had become my entire life
over the course of three months.

and i’m brought back to the night
when you just barely stopped being a stranger
gliding down the steps
you asking me what i think of
this thing that would turn out to be life changing.
god back then i had no idea
that i’d be breathing underwater
taking shots of victory and mellow yellow
as you stared right at me
and never have i ever wanted you so bad.

lounging in hotel rooms and
turning around to look at me in the backseat
midnight flying down the interstate
i remember thinking you kept revealing
more of yourself than i thought i’d get to know
i remember thinking i could fall asleep right there
and trust you to wake me up if the city
came back into view

i want to send you the song i’m listening to right now
but i know you wouldn’t answer
and i know i wouldn’t blame you
i have a whisper confession to make
baby i think you might have changed me
more than my actual life did.

i don’t miss you.
i’m busy.

see, for you
i would change anything about me
but for him?
for him, i would never have to.

i want to write about
something that didn’t happen
it is important that it did not happen
i swore, i promised
that it never happened
i’m just scared that one day
what if it does?

i am a creature of shame
i sold my own name
for the sweet sweet price of comfort
in the arms of a mother
and a father and a brother
and only dust remains
i am a creature of shame

i am a creature of guilt
if you will not then i will
and then i will repent
the way i was intended to do
apologize to you
but the words fall still
i am a creature of guilt

i will just waste away
like puddle into bed frame
and with your arms around me
i am filling in my grave
here i lie united with the dirt
not quite six feet under
cause if it’s shallow i’ll return

but i am a creature of the earth now
i will nourish and rejoice now
for i am one with my creature of passion
rise from the ashes
until nothing remains
i am a creature all the same

it's a bad bet,
a silly gamble,
a poor chance,
a sick game,
an unfortunate guess,
a misplaced trust,
yes, it's a bad bet,
betting on me.

i spend most of my time
trying to not take up too much of anyone else’s
i’m not a fragile human being
i just live a fragile existence sometimes
there are so many things about myself
that i still have to learn
like my blood type
and effective coping mechanisms
and anything good about me at all
i’m sorry my low self esteem rubs off on you
and lingers like a perfume scent
in the cross-stitches of your sweaters
but you have to admit
wearing sweaters at all in this weather
is a crime of its own.

i tell the hummingbirds in my belly
to keep track of all the places
they've started fluttering

a doorway in virginia
where you stopped and gave me that grin
and i heard your voice calling me "honeybun"
for weeks

a couch in memphis
pulled out and covered like a ghost
i felt transparent as you slept
and rolled over to me
but you curled around me like a flower petal
and that's a smoothness
i can still feel

a backseat in south carolina
an alternating current of whispers
about things we can't change now
and jokes about things we
wouldn't want to

a living room in knoxville
your assortment of alcohol was
displayed on your cheeks
rosy and pink and i wrote a poem
about it already, about how
i wanted a hand on my knee
but i was fine with little giggles
on the walk home

on a plane in california
you were thousands of miles away
but i needed you to tell me
that i'd make it home safely
and you did

a late night diner on melrose place
french fries and opinions
i told you something important
and i don't think you've forgotten it

four a.m. in the back of the library
talking about biology
and our favorite things in life
we'd laugh until nothing was funny
and then we'd just be honest

in a booth in the middle of a mcdonald's.
i had forgotten this one.
i had been wondering recently
when our friendship actually started.
what were we,
before honeybun?
before sharing a bed?
before car rides home?
before too much wine?
before i needed your steadiness?
before too much backstory?
before hours of biology i never even learned?
before that first time,
when our group of friends
said, "let's meet at mcdonald's"
and it turned into just me and you?

when did the hummingbirds start fluttering?
when will i learn
that they're not going to stop?

i don’t like poems that rhyme
sorry sorry sorry
i know a **** ton of people write
poems that rhyme
it’s like
a thing.
but i think rhyming
makes reading
too easy
and i think rhyming
makes writing
too tired
“you feel the tempo rise and fall
something something that rhymes with fall”
imagine
this living breathing poem
squishing itself into the
constricted sound of “all”
ah luh
don’t you have more to say?
do you spend your entire life
learning words that will never
become poetry because
they don’t rhyme
with fall?
don’t you
have more
to say?
i have
so much
to say
i’m sorry if i can’t
write poems that rhyme
maybe i’ll give it a shot
next time
(around)

i am soft
and so so vicious
my wounds are rarely self-inflicted
more often self-worsened
but you’re making me smile
you’re making me giggle and lose sleep
in the best way
i am soft
and you make me even softer
one day i just might melt
in your hands.

my brain and it’s incompetencies
have a lot of fun
in my empty skull,
these days
they remind me that i’m always
missing the one card
that would make a full house
the rooms are empty
but i’m in all of them.

i part my lips
and in the same breath you suggest that
we part ways.

unpart my lips.
part the sea.

i agree.
your sweater sleeves
never did shield the breeze

all i know is
everyone around
me is unhappy
and i guess
i am too

i was riding through the city earlier
and i thought of you. thought maybe
if you were there,
we’d get off at the stop for the art museum.
we’d look at the paintings
and the sculptures
no, i wouldn’t be so cliched
as to say i would be too busy looking at you
to look at the art
because i would, of course,
look at the art.
it’s just that you would fit right in.

i thought maybe if you were there,
we’d get off at the stop for a place
we had never heard of
we’d walk until we found an ice cream shop
and you’d get two scoops of chocolate
and i’d pretend to judge you
because all sensible people get sherbet.
thought maybe we’d walk the sidewalk
and i’d point out all the dogs
and take pictures of you even though
you’d shield your face
thought maybe i’d pretend
i didn’t just try to hold your hand
thought maybe you’d pretend
you didn’t want me to.

i thought maybe if you were there,
we’d stay out until midnight
and admire the lights still on in the buildings
as if they were stars.
i thought maybe if you were there,
the city would bring out the quiet in us
the gentle liveliness
thought maybe you’d think
the sky was devoid of stars not because
of light pollution but because
they fell into my eyes
or something.
that’s what i’d think.

that’s what i thought maybe.
but you weren’t there.
so, lost in thought, i rode around
until it started to rain
and then wondered why i got wet
on the lonely walk home.

rush hour interstate
and winding backroads
both have seen me sobbing
but neither has seen me
feel anything at all.

i think about him when i hear a love song
and it makes me smile
but then i think of you, too.
and i lose my breath at the thought.
i would love to settle for him,
but i know that song would come on,
and i would slither away from him
inch by inch
until i found my place beside you.

i said i am really sorry
and what i meant was
i love you more than my heart can handle
it had been all about me
and then you took the stand
and losing my breath never felt so romantic
do you know? do you know?
i can’t apologize for the way my attention
is always and only on you
you know you know
every day i thank the lord that you exist
i’m sure you hear the prayers
i can’t describe it
you are so much
you are everything
thank you for crying
and thank you for being mine
but in some secret kind of way
you’ll never know how much you mean to me
just know that you are the least replaceable person that i have ever met
and every time i say goodnight
i’m really begging you
to stay.

everything is sticky sweet in the summer
blackberries in the backyard bushes
and honeysuckle lips soft as the breeze
nothing quite as tender as morning molasses
oh, the way it sticks
to me

oh, how badly
i want to show you
the truth
that the sun does not shine for you
the sun will never shine for you
and you can live with that
oh, how badly
i want to show you
that you can be kind
******* you can be so kind
the kind of kind that
blooms the flowers in your chest
and leaves petals after your every footfall
oh, how badly
i want to show you
that things will only be okay
if you let them be okay
let them be okay.
let youself.
be okay.
oh, how badly
i want to show you
to tell you
to pound it into your ******* head
that
you
are
allowed
to
be
okay.

you know that it’s you, right?
when we were joking that
we were test scores and
one of us was good and
one of us was the best?
when you said you didn’t want to think about it
when you said
“that’s an emotional vulnerability
for another day”
and i said
“okay but we know”
and you looked kind of
like you didn’t?
you know that you’re the best answer
the right answer
right?

i’m entirely out of breathing room
i even miss your suffocation
beads of sweat are worth the wait
your warmth and inclination
to breathe a breeze on my neck
your memory record-scratches here
months and lives have passed
i’m still living in last year.

He told me I was his best friend
I’m sure it was just like on campus and I d him he was my best friend which is true like on campus and he’s so kind and sweet and I love him so much
He’s the Jake to my Amy
Kylie said he was Lindsay Lohan and I was his Aaron like right off the bat no question and we’re a pair
He makes me so happy
He wasn’t going to drive but he drove me nd didn’t drink because of that even though I told him we could switch and I felt bad because he had fun at mtsu but he told me it was okay and he kept saying it and I love and value him so much
He dealt with me drunk and he’s so cute
His face is so sparkly
I want to hold his hand
Imagine if I did
I sat beside him on the couch and we were close and pressed against each other and he eventually moved later to another chair and I know that it’s because he didn’t like it but omfg what if he just knows better bc he feels things
I know it’s not true but I’m writing my drink thoughts
I left my gum at Hannah’s house but it’s okay
I had approx 3 cups of wine and a cup of *****/7 up/cranberry juice and half a cup of *****/dr pepper
I love him. I just do. It’s a fact. I’m so fixing grateful that we’re friends.
I’m a *******
“You’re my best friend too, I don’t talk toanyone”
“Really?”
“Yeah”
“Ok ok say it again”
“I don’t talk to anyone”
“No the first thing”
“You’re my best friend”
“*** I love u I’m gonna give u a hug from back here thank you for driving everything and I love u and I’m gonna miss you -“
“I’ll miss you too”
“And just thank you”
That was the convo before he drove away and I went inside and I sent some messages to him and I’m sitting in my cozy room still tipsy and  thinking about him and that’s all

Even sober, I love him more than I’ve ever loved anyone else. He may be it. I sat with him on the couch all night and I don’t remember a lot but I remember us laughing and me looking him in the eye and loving him unconditionally. I felt like we had been disconnected for a little while but I’ll really never stop loving him he’s the Jake to my Amy I’m definitely Amy and he’s definitely Jake and i hope one way we end up with each other sometimes I wonder what will happen after we graduate but I love him and try not to think about it but either way I love him and that’s all.

That’s really all. He’s home safe and I couldn’t be happier. What if he kissed me

What would that be like

I imagined it a lot tonight

I don’t remember much from tonight but I remember looking at him and just loving him. He’s everything to me. I love him more than I’ve ever loved anyone else. I’m going to sleep watching Brooklyn 99 and the fact that he loves this show is so amazing. He’s perfect. I’m trying to stop typing but I can’t.

I bought his water tonight. Didn’t notice until later that he couldn’t drink because he was driving. He had a swig if ***** but didn’t feel anything. I told him I knew he would and he didn’t believe me but I knew he would. Maybe I really do know him.

I wonder if I’ll be hungover probably

Reminder to self look back at messages to Endia kaylinn as Jacob just to make sure you weren’t stupid

I love Endia I’m glad she knows that now and I’m glad she told me she loves me too and I told her that I was always surprised that she didn’t and that she defended it it makes me feel so good to know that she really does value me like that

I’m laying/lying down goodnight I love Jacob and Endia and kaylinn and Kylie and bell and Val and Kyle and Hannah and Evan and Maryellen and Mackenzie and Denee and Jenna and myself <3

My lips are still numb

my god you were such a beautiful stranger
i've still got the confetti in my hair
between the smoke and the shot in the barrel of a loaded gun
don't you remember us being there?
god i remember us being there.

we’ve been apart most moments so far
my throat scratches like a broken record
when i say i miss you
and when we pause in the hallway
almost leaving but wanting to stay
i remember why.

perhaps i beckon love
and failure
in proportion.

i know dresses don't fit me like a tube sock
and the skin around my fingernails is raw
but i'm tired of walking away from a love story
and feeling as if i'll never
walk home to one.