you're real
spill out your secrets like poured concrete
i know everything about you
and i'm never letting go.

I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the house top.

But I will be under your wing in four days.

Punch
******
Stab

Pouty
Moody
Sad

Pudgy
Munchies
Stop.......

i <9 you
because nine is bigger than three.

i was made to break
the mold.

we present ourselves as perfect manuscripts
nobody sees the crumpled rough drafts and messy handwriting
scattered around the bedroom carpet at home.

nobody has seen the way i've
scratched out parts of myself
that didn't fit into the high school mold
then the parts that didn't fit into my suitcase when i moved away from home

nobody has seen the revisions i've made
do i sound too formal, am i too quiet, do i need to be a little bit funnier in order to be considered acceptable art?

i've thrown entire scenes of my life into the trash
because i don't want anybody to see them and i am ashamed

i sit for hours staring at blank pages wondering how anyone could ever find me interesting enough to spend time with

do you ever feel that way, too?

i write because i can make it as smooth or as
c h   o   p
                p y    as i want.  unlike life.

what does your hand reach for
away from the power source?
why do you reach away from that which will heal and help you?
fame in the west
false sense of security and peace in the north
greed fuels the reach for the east
down south you will find heartbreak and misery
don't overextend yourself
give yourself a backache from reaching for a happiness that will never come
instead, turn inward for a moment
reach for the light that is within you
give the richest parts of yourself away
and there you will find true happiness.

bae:  breaking and entering.

hamburgers for dinner.
happy earth day.

are you jealous of the jellyfish?

it is said they have no hearts at all
neither loving nor hating
floating in a utopia
"nowhere," as it is called

the tentacles have no one to love
hurting everything it touches
they have no eyes
love is blind, they say
but what use are
eyes if there is no heart

what use are these arms if no one will reach back?

sometimes
i wish that God would drop His golden yo-yo from the sky
and turn me yellow. <3

"is cutting a sin?"
you ask me.
only fourteen years old.
and you show me your wrists.
one line for the divorce
another for your mother's death
a 3rd to feel the sadness in a tangible form.
but there's a fourth line, it's the strongest
it's the lifeline
and I threw it to you the moment you told me.

strangers hold up scoring cards as I pass by
6
4
8
3
i pretend not to notice them, but I do

I try to pretend like I enjoy talking about myself
when people ask me stupid questions about my life:
"where do you work?"
"how are the wedding plans coming?"
"are you going to school?"

all of which hold very little importance
so I shy away from them
perhaps it is because I do not feel worthy of such attention
cannot grasp that some people genuinely wish to know

I don't show love or interest like that
sometimes I am afraid that I am not capable of loving at all

but that-
is a silly notion
scrawled up on Lucifer's drawing table
he wishes for me to be miserable, as he is
why do I succumb to the lies

I feel incomplete sometimes (always)
and I wonder if Pacman feels like an incomplete ball of sunshine, too

"Sunshine," he calls me.

and I shrink from my lover,
because I don't know what to do with my darkness.

accept everything
let go of the past and reach
for what could happen.

We're like birds who've lost
our voices.  Trying to tweet,
but no sound comes out.

Scroll through the newsfeed
that feeds anything but your
starving human soul.

i'll pluck poetry
from the flowerbeds to read.
you are not alone.

you are the sunrise of my smile. :)

i've scrambled
trying to find the whites of my eyes
(have i cracked yet?)
it all boils down to the thoughts i've poached from others
(i exist to create, not to consume)
i tried looking at the world sunny-side up, but the devil in me broke the yoke that i used to share with Jesus.

the suns dance around
in their orbits
picking and choosing what will revolve around them
all in their tribal costumes
nothing matches
no unified purpose
no one remembers the first dawn
curled lips and fiery gazes
their chaos absorbs through the skin of so many
but i am wearing sunblock

that there are merchants of darkness and merchants of light
you run into them every day
sometimes
the merchants of darkness scream louder
and we voluntarily reach out our hands to absorb the darkness
because we are afraid
but merchants of darkness have no power
they cannot hurt us unless we are willing to hurt ourselves
unless we reach out our hands and deliberately take what they offer

merchants of light are quieter and softer
but the more light we absorb
the better we will be able to face those who give off darkness and say
"that is your darkness, not mine.
take it to God, not me.
i only absorb light."

how would you let the ice cream melt
if you didn't want it anymore

would you take a blowdryer to its droopy shape
whisper you're sorry but just can't stay

would you compliment the ice cream
watch it blush
let the heat rise to its face
then whisper you're sorry but you're going away

why would you let the ice cream melt
if you crave its texture and taste

when something isnt good for you,
perhaps it is better to let it bleed through
so that you can carry on

would you abandon the ice cream
there on the kitchen table
congealed and sticky and unwanted
letting the drips from the carton signify all of the tears
the ice cream would shed in your absence

you told me you were so excited to see me that you threw up kittens.
and i vowed to love you one day longer.

the next day you whispered that you would gladly take on the armies of Mordor with your fists for me.
and i vowed to love you one day longer.

you propose to me at least once a day.
and i vow to love you one day longer.

i whisper that you are my "forever boy" and we talk about silly things like Nutella and Al Gore and nonsense
and you vow to love me forever.

you scoff as he rubs wings into my shoulders
and life into my mouth
i am free with him
he has cupped me in his hands like a butterfly
let me go so many times
but i come back
(because i was always his in the first place)

i wonder why you want to be tied around his wrist like a balloon
don't you have feelings, too
perhaps children cry when they let go of the string
up
up
into the sky
(too selfish to understand that you would be happy if you could just fly)

we are products of our pasts
creators of our futures
and maybe that's why they say that history repeats itself.

i am stuck in a bottle of windex,
that disguised itself as kool aid
my body smashed between plastic
you pull me out but i crave the fumes
i want to go back
i want to be with you
i want to go back
i want to be with you
i want to be with-
a love we made from scratch
i don't know what i want
i am sandwiched between the past and the future
there is no way out because
i cannot escape the present for the life of me.

there is a magic
in watching you
pack up your things
knowing that next time
you'll unpack them with me.

you were lightning
and i was always behind.

Being with you is like the game we would play in 8th grade science class
(everyone would hold hands in a circle to see how long they could stand the electricity flowing through their veins)

But we are magnets that bent over backwards to be pressed against each other

If you are the lightning
reaching
burning through silence
brilliant electricity
(our hearts thunder in the distance,
1 second behind)

I am the key on the kite

Our class
Benjamin Franklin
You
Discovered

the law of attraction
the law of never letting go.

hello, poetry.
the most bipolar part about me.

there are days when you burst into my room uninvited, 
i wonder if my rhymes are that rude, too.

hello, poetry.

there are moments when you lay an understanding hand on my shoulder,
i wonder if my words have ever been the comfort food for a melanchoy mind.

hello, poetry.

sometimes you go streaking across the traffic of my brain
and i laugh when i think that these stanzas are slaves to my nakedness as well

you 
hide under my bed
leave flowers on the doorstep
break my windows
steal all of my clothes
make it impossible to sleep
breathe on my neck
mend my mind, while
irritating the places that are already wounded

but i can't live without you.

hello, poetry.

i am waking up
pushing my way through the plastic covering all of the ideas i was never supposed to touch
so many ideas

i am choosing to walk down halls with varied perspective mirrors
i stop at the ones that make me look fat
and don't believe the ones that reflect a flattering figure
i walk on

i observe
i internalize
i try to understand

why do i think the way that i do?
i was born
into a straightjacket
on the rungs of a one-way ladder

never saw that others might be scaling or ascending the same wall
with rope
sheer strength
the stairs

who am i to judge which way is better?
"the injuring of another can be in no case just."

(as long as it's not hurting anyone)

it's
           closer
                        than
                                   it's
                                         ever
                                                  been
         ­                                  but
                                  still
                       not
            soon
enough.<3

03-03-15; 12:18 am
sent from: Kate Lyn
may you dream of a world
in which money is used as toilet paper
and being a millionaire means
breathing in
and breathing out
a million times a day. <3"

i could scribble "hey, cutie" on your napkin in red lipstick while you're in the bathroom

and watch you fold it fancy-like and tuck it into your suitcoat
for safekeeping

i could offer to foot the bill at village inn with my new visa card that came in the mail two days ago

and feel you slip ten dollars into my hands asking if you can pay for half

i could squeal and laugh when you flick your tongue into my mouth while we're kissing

and hear your soft chuckle and the sultry whisper "you're so cute,"

i could wrap myself around you and whisper how much i adore and need you
licking the back of your neck and feeling your muscles flex
beneath my touch

and know that in just moments you will run your tongue across me, too
and i will be swimming in your glory

i could throw a fishing line into our pool of ideas
draw one up
examine it, gut it, roast it over a fire
and share a warm meal of minced minds with you

to find that you are playing with my hair and nuzzling your nose into my back as i talk and laugh with you
over this meal meant for two

i could scrape the snow from your windshield every morning
and draw hearts endlessly in the frost that formed across your soul when your mother died

your lips would crawl across me,
whispering "Kate Lyn" the whole time

"I thank my God
upon every remembrance of you."

(i do)

you text me to say you're coming over
and
my heart does jumping jacks
it does pull ups on the bones lining my ribcage
my veins become skipping ropes
my heart
races and
races
until

my lungs inflate like giant love sacs
and my heart collapses
resting in your presence
as soon as your fist hits the door.

i escape to the bottom of swimming pools
the harder it gets to breathe
the harder i kick
until my head hits the bottom

my ears pop
i am overwhelmed

i take naps on the freeway
the louder the horns scream
the deeper i sleep
it is relaxing 
to hear a chaos that compliments the white noise in my brain

my hangout is at the bottom of the stock market
but when the numbers come crashing down 
and everyone lowers their eyes on me
i disappear again

i walk barefoot on the asphalt, it's not my fault
that i want to know that searing pain can be caused by something outside of myself (my mind is not the only thing that's broken)

my finger hovers over the "delete" button
i feel better knowing everything could disappear

i don't have time
to accomplish anything

so i will scroll through facebook
scratch at my face
write a poem
and wish in my heart that you wouldn't worry so much
(i wish i wouldn't,  either)

the doctor scratched notes with his pencil describing our heartbeats
our veins spread through our bodies in little lines
our bodies were a blank manuscript of life
pages of measurements
Mother's ******
Mother's stomach

still in the process of being written,
our DNA and chromosomes silently orchestrated themselves as we awaited our own arrival
suspended in profound silence as we rested,
counting down to the moment when we
would
break
the sound barrier



(ii.) silence
the doctor will scratch notes with his pencil describing our last heartbeats
wrinkles will be spread across our bodies in little lines
our skin a dead manuscript of beauty that once was and music that will never be heard again

so many
pages
with no blank spaces
detailing
what time
how
where

we will make no sound
our ultimate beat of breath (final word) is naught but a distant memory
suspended in the minds of our loved ones
as our internal metronome is laid to rest

A soldier is stripped of everything but his will to live

I nuzzle my head into your chest like a child
You ask if I'm okay
"Yes. I just wanted to hear your heartbeat."

A human being is stranded in the middle of the sea, forced to watch a comrade stop fighting to live.

You run your fingers through my hair,
Cradle my hand in yours
We are still lovers, still breathing

He makes it to the shore of the enemy
Is immediately demoted to POW

I wonder if you know that I'm a prisoner of love; it is quite the wonderful setup. We kiss with the lips first, and you ease into tongue because you are patient; you are okay with waiting

Beatings
Torturous conditions
And then--
He is liked and wanted
Is allowed to leave camp to tell his parents he's still alive
And in that building he sees "a woman for the first time
In two years" you whisper
Something I hadn't thought of
And I wonder if men need women more than I recognize

He was a drug addict, they would tell me
He was "malo," they would say
Until a policeman lost his patience
beat him
so bad that he was in the hospital for months
And never walked again
"He had it coming" was the way they'd end the story

But as I visited with him
I discovered more

He read through the entire Bible while he was getting treatment
His spirit changed
And when he was well enough to leave the hospital bed he was taken home just to be laid down again, yet I suppose that
Sometimes he had a wheelchair

He had a job
wheeled himself across miles of dirt road to get there
people would come in, greeting and asking him, "che, como andas?" which is Argentino for "dude, how are you doing?" but a closer translation would be, "dude, how are you walking (or going)?" he would always smile from his chair and say jokingly, "i don't go, i sit."

He was married and had a little boy, Alejandrito (which means little Alexander)

And i would watch him and his family
in their little tin house patched with plywood
His wife loved him; she met him after his accident
and she was never cross about doing everything for him
they had nothing
yet enjoyed everything their poverty had to offer

my favorite phrase he ever said was:
"if your problems have solutions, why worry? and if your problems don't have solutions, why worry?"

the letter said
"yours forever and ever and ever,
Alex"

your eyes said
"you are the lens through which I see everything"

that is significant
to know that I have gathered
(like raspberries in a basket)
that many portions of

your heart

said I can unzip the veins
and slip quietly into its chamber
whenever it rains
(a snug little sleeping bag for my loneliness)

a soul is a living, breathing thing,
always growing back

(when the rains are over,
there will be more raspberries
you will offer them to me)

come May,

"you'll have all that I can possibly give,
forever."

i
am just waiting for five o'clock to get here.
and you
are over there hoping five o'clock never comes.
we
live in parallel universes for a moment.

my bones
ache from the weight of your soul.
and your bones
can't survive without a crutch called me.
we
live in parallel universes for a moment.

my eyes
open the rising of the sun.
and your eyes
widen with the waning of the moon.
we
live in parallel universes for a moment.

i
no longer love you.
and you
finally fell in love with me.
we live in parallel universes for a moment.

show me a man
greater than Alex Child
and i will show you a man that does not exist <3

103 days
until we start a private nudist colony

saying goodbye is the hardest part
(but i will see you tomorrow)

it is human nature to scratch
even though we know it doesn't help anything

what gauge do you use to measure your poetry

i like it best when my mind it reflects

yet
so few of the poems true to me
are the ones that others find "like"-worthy

when i read the lines of others
etched into the wrinkles on their face

it speaks to me

because i have the same worries etched into my brow

when others read my words
perhaps
that which resonates with them is what draws them the most

thus
the best poetry is a reflection on others?

(it demands letting go of yourself)

my head's underwater
but i'm breathing fire

You are water
A necessary element swimming through my veins