Whatever I have said or sung,
  Some bitter notes my harp would give,
  Yea, tho' there often seem'd to live
A contradiction on the tongue,

Yet Hope had never lost her youth;
  She did but look through dimmer eyes;
  Or Love but play'd with gracious lies,
Because he felt so fix'd in truth:

And if the song were full of care,
  He breathed the spirit of the song;
  And if the words were sweet and strong
He set his royal signet there;

Abiding with me till I sail
  To seek thee on the mystic deeps,
  And this electric force, that keeps
A thousand pulses dancing, fail.

As a bathtub lined with white porcelain,
When the hot water gives out or goes tepid,
So is the slow cooling of our chivalrous passion,
O my much praised but-not-altogether-satisfactory lady.

I wish I could find
Another
Word
One plucked from a
Chicken or
Snagged to a line
But all I have is
Drift
You
Laughing
Like a drunken
Gondolier
This momentous
Rise of horns
And the little
Spittles of foam
That froth at
Our legs
The sea
Creates you
A scarf
And you turn
To look at me
Your eyes
Drifting
Through the notes
Around me
Sweet
Music
Who are you
If not mine
To keep

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."

god,
ive never seen a girl that empty.
pathetic,
hollow skin in unwashed jeans.a blown egg,
empty casket
cracking sidewalk.im lonely but i can play the part,
bravado biting the sky like lightning but
you can hear your own breath echoing in me when
you sit too close.
im a mine shaft, im stale air and stone. i dug myself empty when i tried to believe
i need no one but myself.i don't need anyone else.blisters on my heels,
thoughts on self-defeat, self-pity,
self-immolation compared to arson.
when you pulled out all my teeth you told me it was so i could kiss you fuller,
deeper; you said *now you dont have to be afraid.
now you cant hurt me.
it rained last night but i thought this was a drought year, should i feel something?
i slept through the thunder.GOD, i hate thinking about this,
i hate these harness ribs hate air pockets in my chest i cant take this pressure.
when youre leaning down to kiss his lighter i'm sending you 50 texts that all say the same thing,
accoutrements of disorientation,
swollen fingers. i dont think i'm doing this right.i think i'm a different person
every time i get dressed in the morning,
every time i sleep.all the words ive misheard  stack up like unfinished manuscripts,
like letters from neglected friends.
this was wrong when it started and now it's just confused.
hoarding matches, hoarding lighters like that'll save me from the rain.
think about the bones beneath your flesh.think about the sturdy rock within your soft thighs.
think about your liver.think about your bloodyourskinyourmeat.
think about the last time you spoke with feeling.
think about the last time you dreamt. remember when you said you wanted all of me? said you felt afraid,
you said sometimes you feel like
i could eat you alive,
reaching over my event horizon,
leaning towards antimatter lips.
why did you call yourself a storm you're only hurting yourself?
why did you call me an earthquake when i'm the only one
im ripping apart.
you keep sticking your tongue down the throats of people who just want to bite it off.

you snapped my wrist and said "look at all these ******* bones"
you can't teach improvisational anatomy lessons without a textbook,so write on me instead
i mean,you already shattered every bone in my body so you might as well give it a go,right
wouldnt want to waste a perfectly good canvas
look at me
im ready any time you like,sweetheart
(and i know you only have one pencil but maybe it'll last
just dont get your hopes up,okay)

me, after i traced dirt up my arms and underneath my skin. i can still find you in my veins, turning blood into a maelstrom, this isn't what rain is supposed to feel like, i can taste wire fences on the tip of my tongue but i still can't get the smell of you out of my mouth

me, choking on dead air, static playing on an endless loop in my jaw, deaddeaddead i'm dead i can feel breath rattling in my lungs and i'm dead this must be what corpses feel like

me, imagining what corpses feel like

me, imagining what corpses feel like

me, imagining what corpses feel like

me, me, me, me, me, looped around three hundred times, me, not entirely there, me not there at all, me, me, me, dead dead dead, static, static, static, static, static, static,

me, rubbing rope burns into my thighs in the middle of a panic attack

me, imagining lighting myself on fire in the middle of the night

me, lighting myself on fire in the middle of the night

me, thinking about dying

me, feeling dead but not dying

me, clenching my hands so hard i can feel my entire body vibrating with it i'm a god i'm immortal hit me ******* hit me i swear to god i won't ******* bleed

me, static, dead, dead, dead, dead, ******* static on repeat, a record broken in three different places, static fuzzy on my slippery tongue

me, smashed to pieces, unholy lovely thing

me, blood blistering between my teeth

you, being lit on fire in the middle of the night

you, dead

ME, SCREAMING ON THE FLOOR THINKING ABOUT RIPPING PEOPLES THROATS OUT I WANT TO ****
I WANT TO **** MYSELF
ME, SCREAMING ON THE FLOOR THINKING ABOUT BLOOD AND GUTS DRIPPING FROM MY MOUTH AND MY HANDS I WANT TO ******* EAT SOMEONE
**** RINSE REPEAT, OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT
ME, SCREAMING ON THE FLOOR TEARING OUT MY HAIR
ME, SCREAMING ON THE FLOOR THINKING ABOUT THE MATHEMATICAL STATISTICS OF SURVIVING A FALL OUT OF MY BEDROOM WINDOW
ME, SCREAMING ON THE FLOOR
ME, SCREAMING