you got uh
permanent imprint
tattooed on my knuckles
it says, “risen”
shaky, now
now i’ll
touch my fingertips
to the surface of the sun
till there’s no love left
till the ashes fall
off the end of my cigarette
pluck every part of u
from my pores
i unravel
like an orange peel
ur bedroom eyes, that tungsten light
blue hues, **** fumes,
u count my freckles like starry night
and i’m sure if u stuck a needle
in my thighs
or the backs of my knees
a little bit of ur blood
mixed with mine  
would fill the vial
ur teeth still sunken into me
crimson, now
i’m thinking bout uh tall boy
pabst, perhaps
12 ounces of bubbles
i smother my lungs
he wants us to combust
im thinkin bout poison
or someone else to fill me up
while I’m still young
and while it’s still my choice
bitter, now
we’ve grown tired
and the roots are pulled up,
rotted
old
still stacked like nothing changed when i left
like u would taste peach and think of me
juicy, now

the room is
bursting
flattened
from silver and bronze
nostalgia walls
framing a time
we celebrated

our shelves
should be empty


the house is
splitting
at the seams and corners
alcoholic lucid dreams
clinking, clanking
in the backseat
the heart monitor
keeping time
counting
down
breath left in this house
like a smoke alarm

we got rid of the swing set
swaying
back and forth
every last bit of life
growing old or blowing smoke
growing up
in a cobweb hall
the portrait of my parents
sliding
down
the
wall.

it's literally lying awake at night
wondering if the smell of my hair
lingers on your pillow
or if you would even notice

its tasting the word mistress
and having flashbacks of my mother
and understanding why
she always acted so bittersweet

it's avoiding
catching
feelings
feeling like ****
for wanting to
give you everything
when all you wanna do is
dodge parents
keep secrets
and stay out past curfew

it's never being able
to give you the love you deserve
i would give the universe to you
with water droplet stars
infinite black and blue
like the bruises we got
from sneaking into the neighborhood pool
it felt more like a baptism than a rebellion

it's being terrified
of holding your hand in public

it's being terrified of holding you period

it's going out in public
knowing people think that we're together
knowing that you hate it
when people think that we're together
knowing that it tears me down
chicago skyline style

it's knowing that her love
is irreplaceable
but just know
that i will memorize and recite
every line of good burger
if it made you smile
i'll take you to disney world
because it's so ****** up that you've never been
adopt a cat and give it to you,
because you don't need another ***** in your life
i wish i could give you
the childhood you missed out on
blinded by another world the two of you created
and i'm just the house pet
being domesticated

it's being so excited
to see some light in your eyes
they've been dark for so long

it's loving in the dark
never turn the lights on

it's being a ***** little secret
when i don't even know the truth

it's biting my tongue
never asking
what am i to you?

it's choosing words so delicately
"I'm into you"
"i'm sorry"
"i'll park down the street"

it's foot in mouth
hands on face
tongue in cheek
bending over backwards
for a lost cause
it's pretending it doesn't bother me
when you ignore my phone calls

it's feeling the need
to apologize to everything
and everyone
for leaving a single trace of myself behind
i taste the word mistress
and it burns like acid
so so sweetly

it's
i don't need you
i don't need you
i don't need you
but i want you

it's best friends right?
i hope you smell my hair
on your pillow tonight

i would like to formally thank you
for not being a Catfish
emojis often spell out love
more than words spoken

thank you
for the nudes
i don't really know what
you expected me to do with them
but it's interesting how
we never touched electric skin
but i've seen all of you

there are secrets still buried in the deepest darkest
regions of my sim-card
thank you for being the receiver
of everything i wish was different

you should have seen my face
when my mother asked me
who sent a pizza to our house
on Valentine's Day

I wish
you were just a Catfish

shoulders squared
putter lined up against
the pink gum ball at my
miniature feet
i know my father is watching
and i know he will swing me around in his arms
regardless if i get a hole in one,
and say, 'i'm proud of you, kathy b'
that loop-de-loop was a real *****

i remember the car rides home
fleetwood mac on the freeway
every time i asked you where we were going
you'd tell me, "to the moon"
hold my hand,
and with you
we went celestial

and in a couple years,
i'll advance and swing clubs against the wind
i begged you to teach me, begging
"how do you get that ball to fly so high"
i'd crane my neck against the sky
even with me on your shoulders,
our love flew so high
and i was terrified of you dropping me

i never played to impress you
i played because it was a part of you
sweetly polished, leather golf shoes
you smelled like grass,
and sunday
and thick tulsa wind
so you and i played every weekend

in aunt melissa's backyard,
i stared at my compromise
when i was thrown off the backseat of the cart
my twisted tiny fingers
dangling
pit pattering against rubber
it smelled like gasoline
and i couldn't stop thinking about
your sweet leather, newly polished shoes

we didn't play golf anymore after that
i stared death in the face, and so do you
because we hold hands in a different ways
you're on my shoulders now
because your occipital is faulty
and you can barely see

i'm hoping one day,
you'll teach me how to hurl pink gum *****
through the wind, so effortlessly
i hope one day you'll teach me
to pick out the perfect christmas tree,
and i hope you tells me you're proud of me,
kathy b
a perfect chicken soup recipe
the cure for all broken memories

to
purple skies
late school nights
to
the tunnel under the bridge filled with our names
they painted over last week
to
heartbreak
and malt liquor
to
skinned knees
and ****** teeth
to
the lies we tell our parents
and sun burnt chest
to
Kid Cudi
and Kanye West
to
summer reading the bible
and a book about mythology
to
Jesus and Hera
their perfect harmony
to
green eyes
to
truth
to
shoegaze
to
bass
to
slick roads
too ****** to skate
to
spitting verse in the backseat
to
remembering family
to
rain and how it ruins everything
to
never letting your ex ruin everything
to
Sunday sun
and mosquito nights
puffy and swollen
and always multiplying
to
the concrete embedded in our cheeks
to
every firecracker
reminding us
that we're free

on this day in 1969, Denton Cooley implemented the first artificial heart
into a human whose nature was slowly failing and falling apart
blood barely pumping under electric skin
fake skin pumping blues under rubber valves and tubes
it kept his breath for
64 hours.

I imagine his family watched the light leave his eyes
and not even love or divine intervention
could beat him back to equilibrium
wires surging through him
your body is not science project
it's a miracle
but I guess it's conditional
because some people see the light too soon
when not even artificial life
can keep you from dying

even with robotic models
clinking clanking
subconscious
pounding veins into submission
keep this miracle alive
revived
it's not cheating Mother Nature
it's not cheating your life
beating pressed against the odds
artificial body
artificial feelings
love
isn't even a feeling
it's a combination of chemicals
connected in your brain
but I wonder if that human felt his rubber heart breaking
when he saw the tears in the eyes of his family
these aren't emotions
imitation life can fake
even though not all of me is here,
I still feel like nothing ever left me
they didn't know
I would leave so soon
64 hours
I could wake up a robot
I could wake up a miracle
either way
I'll be gone in 32 more hours
when a brand new heart
infects my blood
you didn't finish the job
but you held me over
beating on my chest for me
blue blood pumping
but I guess I forgot how to do it on my own
when my own heart should have never even left me