I remember the nights I would stand in between you,
your drunken fists creating waves,
I was trying to protect you from yourself,
and after all I ended up saving no one
and all I was left with was a fistful of hair and gravel
I could say that you had given me nothing,
but really you showed me parts of myself
and even then I did not want to recognize
There were nights when I didn't know who you were
You wanted to start a family,
but between the sober and drunk conversations
Everything blurred together,
I didn't realize then that love should not feel like this
A lump in the gut of your stomach,
and all the quiet silence that followed
I was someone, I sacrificed myself in ways
that I had never before
Committing crimes against my own body
How could you tell me now that you have
fallen in love with someone you barely know?
I want to peel my skin back and find
out what hides underneath,
who am I as a woman that I couldn't
give you what you need?

I don't have much to say these days,
but I think it's because I have too much
waiting to be said

in the end,
i will have nothing to show for this
a sister who loves me long after i'm gone,
you had already taken down the pictures
of us, and the novel love letters,
i had written you so many,
i thought maybe you would appreciate
how much i tried to appreciate you,
but you never let me know
and while you are happy,
i am at a complete crossroads,
but at least one of us

came out of this alive

We planted flowers for you, Jane,
and the rich soil, wind on my face,
sun on my back, and earth worms
sliding in between my fingers,
all reminded me of life...

*You are still very much
alive.

You told me I was the glue that's
holding everything together,
I never asked for this title,
I never wanted to be the center,
All I can think of is standing
in the middle of all of this
chaos, all I can think of is
my mind, heart, and body
absorbing every last drop
of negativity...
The selfishness,
The names,
The substance abuse,
and the ***** **** water,
The sins that lie in secret,
begging not to be found,

Lay it all on me,
I will soak everything up,
Like a sponge,
Like a buffer,

I will make it all better,
I won't let this fall apart,
or fray at the edges,
but GOD,
I am so very

tired.

I wanted to sing you to sleep,
But along with my heart, you took my voice.

I closed my eyes and realized,
you were STILL there.

If I could never talk to you again,
I would be okay with that,
and even if you're my father,
I have no problem telling you
that you failed in doing
what you were
meant
to
do.

You always try to fix me,
this time, please don't.
-

The search feels never-ending,
If there are "amillionfishinthesea,"
then why am I still alone?

i.
We would sleep, but never touching,
your sheets were always cold,
your room dark, like a thick blanket

You told me tonight that all you
wanted to do was hold me in your arms,
I didn't know if this was the truth
or the ***** speaking your sentiments
for you

ii.
You have been out with women,
women who I'm sure were beautiful,
who were possibly more expressive,
more full of life,
able to offer you what I couldn't
but still, you said
that you were left with
comparisons
and that every time

I won.

So, you're probably going to tell me that I'm crazy.
But nothing ever made sense between the both of us,
I remember sitting on the beige carpet,
My legs splayed out behind you,
Facing you full force, but still feeling like you had
no idea who I was.
That's how it always ended.

You never looked into my eyes,
you saw me, but never who was underneath.
I would beg you to look at my hurt,
Understand it, "please try to understand."
And you would just stand there,
offer your arms to embrace me,
but it never made anything
better.

I know I'm not crazy,
I just know how to love to the complete
fullest
and maybe...
Maybe, that was something you just
couldn't handle.
But either way,
it tore me apart.

Sometimes, when I feel like I'm sinking,
I'll let myself go
all
the way
to the bottom
just to find the release,
just to feel like even though I
am pressed in on all sides,
I am still protected
and the black
was always
more comforting

then anything else,

then you

Dear sickness,
I couldn't carry her up the stairs.
Her weight was unbearable and she lay limp in my arms.
Dear chemo,
She really did lose all of her hair.
We would go out in public and people would stare.
She wore a wig but still, I knew.
Dear limbs so skinny,
I watched her walk down the hallway using her walker.
My father clutching her arm, guiding.
It broke me in two, to see the jutting bones.
There was nothing left of her.
Dear insanity,
I remember the night she called to say goodbye.
She thought she wasn't going to last another day,
After all... the nurses were out to get her,
and she didn't understand why she had to take so many pills.
Dear rotting tumor,
You had been growing for over a year in her brain.
Taking up space where there should have been healthy cells growing.
You took away so much, the little things,
the big things, the important things...
The heart and soul of things.
Dear growing pains,
I realized what it meant to age quickly,
To grow up sooner than you are ready.
I did it, and I'm still here.
My mother's still here,
although some parts of her
will never be the same.

I'm looking for myself
in all of the wrong places.
He tells me that all I need to do
is to breathe, and release
and I'm trying,

but I become choked up,
in all that I could be.

more
more
more
this is the only word
i can seem to tell you,
it falls out of my mouth
and bounces across the floor
lays at your feet,
bare and stagnant,
you stare at me like you have
no idea who i am

i need more love*,
and you are going to do
nothing at all
about it

I stood in the middle of your chaos,
guitar melodies and melted candle wax,
cigarette butts from another drunken night
and that **** futon that always made
me awaken, toss and turn
but I never reached for you
and you never reached for me
I knew right away,
this should tell me something
about the way we both love
Not enough,
or too much
and neither is ever
right

i told you i could write something for you,
and you didn't believe me,
so when i showed you my fancy script,
the dotted i's and crossed t's,
you looked at me like i was crazy
to have named a poem after you,
and well,
maybe,
i am

You think it won't happen, but it does
The sinking feeling, the gutless entry and
You are left to fend for promises that you never
Intended to keep in the first place
I am coldhearted and alone and deserve nothing more
Then to rot here, or there, somewhere
Where your eyes won't follow my every move
And when I will finally fall to my knees
And cry and beg, and bleed and bleed until sore
I will still not understand the price for my sins
As he taunts and teases, pulls and prods
At my long ago innocence, I will falter
To be the girl He intended me to be
Too late and too little devotion to matters of the
Heart, the soul, the in between space
And I am wasted and shedding the wrong skin
Parts that should have been kept floating off into space

I dreamt about you last night, and it hurts
When I look back and ask myself,
Why I ever took your graciousness for granted
Placed it on the ground and stomped hard
Over and over and
I ruined you
I know I did, and now I live with
The reality of that
But I don’t know if that was me,
I think that was me...
And I lost her, when I lost you
I will never get you back in the grasp of my hands
I have memories, and they are all that suffice
I can say that I was happy,
I was so happy and I could see marriage
Being a possibility
Rather than something I ran from
But I realize I have always been flighty and flirty
And the disadvantage is all mine
Because you will find someone who
Gives you something,
All of her, all parts
While I will still be stuck here,
Trying to figure out ways
To gain something back that is long gone

Is my mother really dying?
Spiritually, I know
Lord, it's hard not to feel broken in two
Legs bent backward, arms twisted behind my back
Chest heaving,
Heart throbbing
Pain, pain, go away
Come again some other day

it's only a toothbrush,
placed in the same exact place as yours
on the bathroom sink,
if she were to walk in to do something as innocent
as check her hair in the bathroom mirror,
she would see it, she would question,
does that make me something to you?
does that push this relationship forward,
to morning breakfasts and cigarettes over coffee,
late nights out and bad attempts at pool playing,
smirks and kisses, and love...
love, is something i cannot ask of you
so tell me, when i place my hand within yours
when my body encircles your skin in the heat of the night
*do you feel like i feel, see like i see?

I.
My heart was in my stomach,
I couldn't look at you without feeling
something, like the something I felt
shortly before you broke things
off with me, but you came back,
You came back around in time

II.
You invited me in like we had never
left off in the shortcomings of November,
You still looked the same,
The house the same,
Your bed sheets felt the same
But your lips, a different story

III.
I don't know what I expected,
looking for change in places it could
never be found
I was searching then, and I'm still
searching now, but you already figured
that out

IV.
We flowed and synched so well,
Like when we sat side by side
one another at the small bar,
People stared at us as I laughed
and laughed...they don't know what
they're missing out on,
Not knowing you, or us

V.
I know that leaves us here,
Wrapped up in the unknown,
but second chances come few and
far between,
So I will take mine with gratitude
and an open heart,
Nothing more and nothing less

just look at her,
she wears the love she receives
it's overflowing, and she has no idea
where it should go
the overspill of others generosity
onto her, the air around her
charged and
here i sit,
here i sit,
should i dare say
that i find myself comparing?
the love you wear,
and the love i hold
are not two in the same
you walk around this town
like you have nowhere to go,
if i told you i could tell,
would you turn your head
in denial?
and if you lost it,
would you do anything...
anything at all,
to get it back into
your undeserving hands?

a blank page,
waiting to be filled,
waiting to be violated and blemished,
waiting to carry every single last burden
it stays waiting, because i can't
seem to reach my expectations
it will never be enough
and i will always come up short
with that puzzled look on my face,
like i didn't know this would happen
like i had no idea at all

I remember those basements stairs,
the smell of cigarette smoke,
and the clicking of beer cans
Girls with long blonde hair and
glow sticks as head bands,
and ripped tights...
Adam stood next to me,
and while I felt connected,
I know I was so far...gone
So, when he vowed
to take care of me
To get me out safely,
I agreed, of course I would agree
I told him we didn't belong here,
but then again maybe I did,
and he didn't
He gave up drinking shortly after,
I continued on into
my own
dark
abyss
I wish I would have listened
the first time around
.

every screaming siren i think of you,
the pictures are turning rusty at the edges,
worn with the coming of the years,
but they make your face appear softer
they make your eyes glassy with understanding
you only have one heart but it's
times like these that i am afraid all it is
filled with is cigarette smoke and hatred
towards his eyes
but you have found the love within
your children and the one thing that is
keeping you chained down to the center
of the earth is not your sanity,
it is only the hope in which you carry within
your fist, the tension within your walking feet,
that someday they will return all that has
been taken away from you,
all that has left you heavy and weighted down
with the sighing of waking up to
another empty day
priceless and smudged at the corners,
*who would have known that you held the
capacity to love them like they
wanted you to

I miss you,
Can't you tell?*

The way my fingers intertwine
on themselves, looking for a hand to hold,
yours were always so small,
despite your rough exterior,
I took every flaw into consideration,
tasted it, held it,      felt it
in my being, and when I told you
that I love imperfections,
I meant yours
and only yours
It was always this simple,
and always this complicated
And we are still breathing here
with our eyes blinded by
our past, the moments when
we became caught up in our
own crafted demise,
when we weren't strong enough
to just say, "No."

I carry you around with me,
like an old picture kept in a locket
chained around my neck,
holding me down,
and the heaviness rests
beside my heart, as it slowly
seeps into
me
I've tried to wear you well,
you would never know,
but others look at me like they
know my hidden secret,
In the way that I walk,
in the way my smile curves
downward, and
I realize
if I don't let you go,
it will be the end of me,
I always wondered how I
could lay beside you at night
and not say a word,
listen to you breathe,
and talk in your dreams,
even then you battled your
demons in secret,
in the times you thought
I wasn't listening,

but I was.

because you always had the right answers.

that's why i came rushing to you,
in a flailing of arms and hands,
rushed words, but still you understood,
like we had our own kind of secret language
hidden from the world

you would attempt to play god,
wrap me up in prayers and calm meditations,
speaking from something other-worldly
but still, it always worked
i couldn't blame you for that
i still can't look you in the eyes and
tell you how badly you broke my heart
i was young, and you were older but you
should have known better, or maybe

this is the way things need to be
you can't let me go because i know i
was the only flesh that you have felt
underneath your palms, and i know all
too well that you took that kiss to mean
something far more important,
you tried to save me,
because i had already saved you

but i will never have all of the answers
like you, christopher.

no
no
no
the fact that he would look into my eyes
and deny me of these feelings
it makes me want to become unborn
to sink back into my mother's womb
and never re-appear
no
no
no
not another drink
not another wasted word
her eyes wash over, she goes unseen
i watch the night soak her within the light
but her heart is dark
this is darkness
this is death, caught within her throat
caught within her running veins
no
no
no
this can't be it
this can't be me
running off the tracks
he asks me again and again with innocent eyes
why doesn't this make sense?
my answers are silent
no
no
no*
one seems to know

i.
he's ranting and
raving again
i wonder if it will ever just

stop

ii.
i count the seconds until the
door slams, until the pain seeps into
his drunk smirk of a smile and
god, i wish
i wish that i could remove
what makes him
hurt

iii.
in turn, she screams and pleads
with him to come down from his
high
to look sobriety in the face,
and declare himself a winner
once and for all

iv.
he will never push past his
stubborn ways, his childhood
still raw and i know his wounds,
because i am a part of him

i'm tired,
i'm tired and i'm fed up,
i'm tired and i'm fed up and
i'm sorry,
i could have been more
for you, for us
i could have told you what you
wanted to hear,
that you were the sun and the moon
and every single star in the sky
that held a wish
but i'm tired,
i'm tired of the nights
where i laid beside you
and felt your hands inside of my
hair, and inside of my heart
reaching,
it hurt me
i tried to pull you up,
i tried to pull you out
your burdens were heavy,
and yet, my shoulders bore the weight
for you

and now,
there's nothing left
for me to give

"you're confused,
isn't that why you're here?"
he speaks in quiet tongues,
always so gentle,
but sincerity lacking
i don't want to talk about the
things that brought us here
the things that have broken us
down... in the quiet,
and in the dark,
it was always the same


i'm here because
i want to be held*

it's as simple as that
i have no other explanation
for the way things are,
or should be,
or could have been

maybe i should have been better,
you always said it was a competition,
and i was never in first place,
no matter how many times you came back
to kiss me, and you always kissed me well
well, this is all i have left
all i have left to show for this self-doubt
a morning hangover, and your side
is empty

i'm always cold,
with(out) you here

you told me you had lost your muse,
the first night we had met,
i glanced over and blushed into
the overhead lights,
i wasn't about to volunteer
my own self
but i secretly knew

i could be her

it's a wonder we are still surviving,
writing and re-living:
past memories and guilt,
pent-up lust and miserable deceit

sometimes i think,
you were the lucky one

dad, i stumble over the words
just as i did as a child,
and you took me in your arms
and rocked me to sleep
numerous nights,
i've cried,
and you've left,
and you keep leaving
me

a child needs her daddy,
a young girl needs her daddy,
a grown woman needs her daddy,
you were never...
present

why,
i could have begged ten times over
for you to put down that can of beer
that whole case completely demolished
i tried to empty the cans into the sink
one by one,
i never got far,
and there was still some left over...

why,
couldn't you have loved me
more, better,
just love me

here i am, 23,
and still longing for your
presence in my life,
instead i try to fill with addiction
and voids,
boys who try too hard for
all the wrong reasons,
and dad,
tell me
why i am so dependent
on the ways of this world
that haven't ever mattered?

were you ever present in my life,
or were you always drunk,
slurring your words and stumbling over
the memories,
like you always have,
as i count the beer cans,
find the beer cans
crush the beer cans,
the **** same beer
that you have been drinking since
i can remember

you used to tell me so many stories,
you used to make them up,
entertain me with your sense of humor
hold me a little closer
dad,
where are you?
where have you been?
your little girl
still
misses
you

i can feel myself inside of you.

i.

my pulse is beating the blood
from your heart that never
took the chance to spill once you
ripped apart-
all our letters,
the pictures,
the words
they're running a marathon
against a wild train wreck which
reeks of the times we spent
wrapped up in...'this'
nothing means nothing
it means
i  can't  deny  our  fate
our hands entangled in each other's hair
the pavement hot,
having everything to bear
having our g o o d b y e s
hanging in mid-air

ii.

there were choices made and i
enveloped inside of myself
giving everything away,
so you wouldn't be able to say
that i left being complete
my insides are churning new
love letters for you
but you threw-
you threw up the ties that
held us in each other's own light;
you gave up the fight,
you gave up the fight

she's gorgeous
that's all i seem to know

and when your eyes start to glaze over
i can't, i need
to look away
you complain to me, whisper in slow syllables,
"this is how it's supposed to be"
my stomach in knots and my hands twisted
i can't, i need
to become her
(suddenly i regret the way my smile curves,
i regret the shape of my body against hers)
and to look at her pursed lips
makes me sick
to think
back onto your thoughts

...rewinding
and i don't care how long it takes
for me to

leave
forget,
leave
forget,

a sick cycle,
a circle that spins,
and i become the center
twirling again,
and again,
over her and what wasn't said

the truth came
tumbling in on a cold
winter wind
i was asleep,
the world became chaos
my grandmother told me to
face my eyes in
the mirror
i found after much
distress,
i couldn't

My palms open up, always.
As your fingers dance across,
and down, down in some kind of
fragmented ballet
sweeping up all I have left
to give to a boy
like you
I know how you are
You're the one
my mother warned me about
You're the
"I should of known better,
Should of learned,
Should of grown"
Everyone else is always right
But me,
I keep spinning the same circles,
until I'm completely dizzy with the thought
of such infactuation,
Always giving too much,
and receiving little to
nothing back
Your world could have been served
to you on a silver platter,
I would have came to you with
so much

love.

"Too much love,"
as you would say.
I had never heard of such a thing,
until I met you.

“You’re overweight,” he says, tapping his finger against his chart of heights and measurements, thighs too big and fingers too plump. I already know. I nod, and continue nodding, listening to the word echo and then fall onto the ground, bouncing and bounding, restrictions that have surrounded my whole life, my whole curvy figure. If I could be like the girls with the flesh wrapped tight and the bones loose and caving in on one another, I would grab the chance before it had a chance to flutter away from my desperately aching hands. When I look in the mirror, I try to remind myself that flaws are flaws and yet they were made to be beautiful, but I see what I see and what I see makes me want to *****, makes me want to close my eyes, makes me want to pull and tug and rip until there is nothing left but a pile of rotting decay. I am stuck, I am back on the playground in sixth grade where the boys would taunt and laugh, point and gasp, as I tried to pretend I looked like everyone else, every other small, petite little girl who didn’t have to worry about these types of things. My clothes don’t fit, I’ve gone through seven pairs of jeans in the last month alone, I look back at the pictures when I thought I was fat, but I wasn’t, I was fine then, why did I think that? I lay in bed beside the man I’m supposed to be with, fully clothed and pushing his hands away from my hips, away from my lips, don’t touch me then if you can’t handle all that I have to give. I’m not her, and she never wished to be me.

i.
when she asked how we met,
we glanced sideways at one another,
smirking to ourselves,
only we know the secret,
and wouldn't she love to know?
"we met at the circus,
no, but really..."

ii.
when in fact, we met by chance,
by accident, but doesn't fate always
have the last word?
we sat side-by-side, touching
and spoke gentle stories to
one another
all night
and in the crowded dive bar,
music blaring, and
drunk people chattering,
i heard every word perfectly

iii.
she seemed surprised that we had
just met,
a blind date,
and yet, i was blinder even still
she excused herself right away,
an intruder on our inside joke
and any judgement was dismissed
we had created something
far more important
far more than intended

iv.
i keep expectations low on all things
if you build a wall, how do
you ever expect to climb over
without falling?
he kept reminding me of my smile,
and so i smiled some more,
until the blush was creeping all over my cheeks,
my face glowing with acceptance
from
this
stranger

i.
the old couch
you, half naked me
resting in between that
one place of stillness of false pretense of
love wrapped within bounds of
human flesh and
thin confusion
we have no idea
how any of this is done

ii.
instead of being welcomed
i was transformed
glancing down at my white cotton dress
pulled so high, so high up
your shirt thrown carelessly
onto the worn carpet
eyes burning
as fingers pull pull pull
on the strings of my innocence

iii.
sighing heavily into your collarbone
i choked
while you covered my body
every inch with your heat
you didn't know
how much i wanted to love
you, this moment
in return, you took it all
every sweep every glance every sharp angle
became your very own
demise

iv.
i drove back home
windows through scent tangled hair
wisps of remnants
i no longer wanted to remember
images ingrained onto my mind
as stars fell from that
black hole of a sky

at the strength of my own hands,
i held you in the holiest of lights
sunshine, and rays, and god...
you were so beautiful to me
did you know that?
you question me like you have no idea
how i ever felt about the things we shared
our whispers in the dark,
and our entangled fingertips
i was holding onto you for dear life
how did you slip away like
this
i wonder, like so many times before
numerous and plentiful
weighing me down like so many unspoken burdens
you want to know i feel,
yet you're not ready to take it like a man
you're not ready to own up to how
this has made me
hard
and
these second chances are like no other
i'm grasping and gasping
for you

to come around
to come back around
to me and my empty and aching hands
they are open, palms accepting
and yet

yet you feel invincible
to these thoughts, these emotions
that you keep
to yourself, because trust is hard to find
wrapped within the lies of a beautiful girl
i was her, wasn't i?
now what's left for me to show?

you hold the world at the edges of your fingertips,
strong and steady and sure, but yet
i don't remember...you
you were never like this
so please,
please tell me, how do i make this okay
within myself, within these months that are flying by,
you're drifting

and in what direction
you never prepared me for this,
i left and you left and now

there's nothing left
at all