I was born in Princeton University.

2. That's the closest I was to getting in.

3. As a kid I enjoying stuffing round pegs into square holes.

4. I knew it wouldn't work.

5. That comforted me.

6. I grew into jeans I didn't own.

7. So I could stop wearing other jeans I didn't own.

8. Come to think about it I use a lot of things I don't own.

9. I have two parents.

10. My mother used to be anorexic.

11. Now she wishes she was.

12. My father makes a lot of money.

13. Yet he is unsure of whether or not he is successful.

14. He does not want me to make money.

15. He believes he's done enough.

16. I am tired.

17. That's probably because I don't sleep a lot.

18. I am tired of being tired.

19. I doubt the redundancy matters to my brain.

20. I used to want to be an astronaut.

21. I only said that when I looked at the moon.

22. Now I want to work in Tv.

23. Maybe that's because I always watch.

24. I look for inspiration under every rock.

25. All I find is dirt.

1/25/2017

the sky melted, sweating glass
for three days straight-
once, we marveled at the inexorable and eventual

at
the drop that makes the bough
bow.

i remember the ache
of the sunlight on my
crooked nape

one May day . We sit in a January cafe
"It is springtime," she announces
except these days, it's no emotional pantomime, not a hopeless mantra

"and why?" I beg a question
"oh, because something's starting"
she mixes milk into her honey

it is too sweet for me
the umbrella opens in the shop
"put that away, it's a bad omen" oh, as if I care

imagine me so treacly?
she talks about pregnancy and politics
about marriage

and something in me,
i realize
wants to be, is disgusted by my far future maternity

at the supermarket
there's a jingle
hey, mom, what's for dinner?

"Uh, hey, I feel like Plath... marriage is oppression and all that"
"Well, join the club. Oh, domesticity-"
"O'Hara said : There is only one man I like to kiss,"

I misquote, intentionally.
"Heterosexuality!
you are inexorably approaching!"

perhaps we can't wait
to be thirty and bored
with three kids

watching them play at the Minetta
wondering where the hell our time went
and there they'll sit

polish- to her irish, italian- to my puerto rican
new jersey mutts
i laugh

thinking of drunk days down on
53rd and Lex
we're not ready to live like it's 1953

*oh, johnny promised me
and i wear his
ring

1/14/2017

one in the morning, champagne drunk
KNL INW and I
steered uneasily down the sidewalks
of an uppereast side street,

the January wind whipping us
into a frenzy
smoking rolled cigarettes
a homeless man stops us:

asks for food
she gives him a cigarette
lights it for him
looking back, this was not good

a drunk bougie boy out of many
says "it's alright sweetheart!" as he passes us on the sidewalk. we complain of exhaustion

it is quiet.
i will move here next year
i pause.
I think, stop

and we laugh
and wonder if it's really happening
and i think my poetry is uninspired
and frankly, ugly

my state does not settle in
i almost step on a puddle
i say where am i? the answer:
realization enough to strike me sober

"said my muse to me,
'look in thy heart and write.'"
-Philip Sidney

1
"i have a song to show you," i said in the late morning
but did not play it until eleven that night.
your eyes seemed blue when i met you
i realized they are green or maybe temperamental.
as the train swept past the neighborhoods and the forests
in between them
and the white delicate soot of the snow lifted in the air
for a second, or two or three
one couldn't see anything from the window
on one side, this
on the other, you
one ethereal
the other, just frozen rain

2
in the museum,
the serious straight lines of malevich stared me down
i walked towards the other side of the room
when i turned around, the back of your head
ash blonde and head tilted
i looked at the art, then the floor, then the white walls
you looking at your favorite painting
you implied it was an honor and
i touched your shoulder
and called you the prettiest thing here.
you smiled. it was just the truth.
i said i would see my favorite painting
but i don't know where it is
you told me, with a laugh,
you did not mind traveling
i later found out
Portrait of Maude Abrantes*
is in Haifa.

3
"where do we go?" you asked.
"good question. i don't know,"
figure out for yourself what i meant.
The subways were all closed
and only the 7 was running
who gives a **** about the 7? i'd always said
guess the joke was on me.
walking to the station, whichever one we could find
i looked up at you with snow dusted hair
and frostbitten hands
feeling something i hadn't felt in years
"let's hop on a train and get off wherever"
it took 15 minutes
but the D train rolled in
and up to 59th we went,
then the E down to west 14th.
We laughed at the incompetency of bureaucracy
and hopped from the train onto the platform,
watching the gap as we did.

4
there,
on west 14th
the Chelsea streets were wordless,
sleeping in on a saturday night
we walked past snowed in cars and i laughed at the
ridiculousness of it all
this is how badly i'd wanted to go to the city with you!
but i didn't mind
i walked a bit ahead
turned around
the beaux arts townhouses
on either side of us
strategically planned trees
and a pair of lost gloves
it was so quiet i couldn't hear my thoughts
just my heart's rhythm
in the station that night
you had told me you wished i had a place in brooklyn to go back to
"yeah, if we could even find a train that went there," i laughed.

on the train with grant
its cold
its white
sterility                              ok

ok   you cant hear anything when it snows
        and it isnt as cold

i cant see nyc but i looked for it

                   ok
i wanna quit and cry full time

i dont know x79,345  
                                i dont like when people  
                                   watch me write
it looks like its cold but
it (?) why                                     that was a test. i dont care
isnt cold                         ok

it is cloudless ok they laughed kind of
ok
im dumb it snowed we have two hours

i have to finish my story about rich people

ok oooooook

i. you broke both my legs and i'm still trying to walk. you ripped concertos from the back of my throat and said,
"look how beautiful you are."

ii. you don't have a nice smile. you smile like it's hurting you, like it's tearing you apart from the inside and you choke out words like stakes digging into my back, saying,
"then again, you did seem heaven sent."

iii. you sing church hymns with your whole self, your body pulsating with the force of it. you look at me when you sing, narrow your eyes as you kiss me, singing amazing grace like it actually meant something to you.

iv. you're biblical. you kiss my fingers and hiss holy words into the spaces between them, recite verses when we go to sleep at night, whispering,
"i don't have much faith left for messiahs, but i'm pretty sure you could be one."

v. i hate you and i don't know why. actually, that's wrong. i hate you because you never really died, did you, you're still here, imprinted across every surface in my house did you know that having an eidetic memory means i will never be able to forget you?

vi. you shattered my jaw and took the remains with you, painting a mural in different shades of red, saying,
"sweetheart, this is how you look best."

vii. you told me once that vampires are just vengeful angels and i don't know if i still believe that. i don't know if i ever believed that. i don't know what you believe when you tell me,
"look at the mess you've made."

viii. i wonder how long i've been faithless, or faithful. whatever you want to call it, sweetheart, when you say,
"you could have been all this, love, and more."

I FORGOT TO WASH MY HAIR FOR TWO WEEKS IM ******* SLIMY ALL OVER DO YOU STILL WANT TO KISS ME
this isnt a ******* pride parade **** me with your eyes open
**** me and say "god,the smell of you"
the stench
******* spiders crawling out of my mouth i smell like a gutter turned into a bomb shelter
im an epidemic
ITS ******* ART THATS WHY I RIPPED OUT YOUR THROAT ITS ALL A METAPHOR DONT YOU SEE IT NOW
let go of me. let go of me--slime central
home of the world famous gutter babe
******* ******* shut up ******* **** me
bury your pride and the ******* ****** weapon in one line its not that complicated
but i want to be messed up, or i used to want it
or i will want it
i can feel everyone vibrating with the force of it all and somewhere you're laughing at me
chains around your ankles
this is what it takes to **** a martyr
this is what it takes to swallow him whole
go out guns blazing
WELCOME TO YOUR DARKEST HOUR
**** the switch, or turn the lights off, or whatever
put a blindfold on when you stab yourself
put a blindfold on me when you pull my intestines out with your bare hands
desecrate me
im not a tomb but im a funeral pyre
bodies are my specialty
sorry, i misspoke
what i meant to say was, "i want to **** myself"
but i won't, not when the meats so fresh, lick blood off of my kneecap
YOU WERE ALWAYS GOING TO BE THE SACRIFICE
sentiment is for liars and thieves
(im both but you dont know that yet, it hasn't happened yet--shut up, I'm telling the story.this is my fall from grace,not yours)
bite your tongue bite your teeth too in fact
just bite yourself ******
its better this way, or whatever you want to hear
what am i supposed to say to a graverobber? do you want me to thank you,is that what this is about?
*******, *******, what the **** are you still doing here, anyway?
i hope you rot
i hope we both rot
(AND HERES THE PART WHERE YOU SAY "I ALWAYS LOVED YOU" AND HERES THE PART WHERE I CUT OFF YOUR HEAD)