You want to be tough.
So you wear heartbreak like a medal and laugh at how you used to cry yourself to sleep.
You smoke ten cigarettes a day and out drink every guy at the parties you go to.
You don't cry or so much as flinch when let down
And you meet every promise made to you with a frown

You want to be brave.
So you kiss strangers and go walking alone at night.
You get in cars with no idea where you're going and no concern if you'll be back.
You get on a plane to a place where the only soul you know is your own and all the faces are unknown.

You want to be fearless.
So you never say no unless yes makes you second guess your self worth because to hell with their opinion of you, right?

You laugh at everything,
Even when you're crying, you're laughing at your tears because after all these years being broken,
You finally speak before you're spoken to.

You wanted to be loved and cared for and held at the hips.
You wanted romance and roses,
True love's tender kiss.
You wanted someone to caress your scars for once and not be the one putting someone else's broken pieces together.
Only for them to thank you
And be on their way.

You loved and you lost,
Then settled for liquor and lust
Those boys drove you insane
But you drop them off, grip the steering wheel,
And try find your way back home.

It feels like someone's continuously tapping a hammer on your heart and I know you've taped her together so many times and there's still so many fresh wounds covered in band aids. But you refuse to let her break. You refuse to hide her behind your ribs where it's safe and protected from all the coldness and cruelty of the world. And every night you wash her cuts clean with your salty tears and tuck her under your sleeve, careful not to touch the bruises. But you're the only one who's careful with her aren't you? You're the only one who night after night still believes in her and tells her she's still capable of love and someday you're going to give her to someone and they're not going to have guns for hands and bullets for words. They're not going to grab her and hold her against their chest and whisper that they'll be there for her no matter what, only to carelessly drop her, sometimes throw her aside, when realizing how close to falling apart she is. Don't they see how hard it is keeping her in one piece when all anyone tries to do is rip her to shreds? Don't they see that you're  trying to love and love and love in the hopes of getting some in return to fill these cracks? The worst is when you see other broken and battered hearts, and with the sole intention of helping them you only end up in worse pain than before. I can't stop crying I can't stop crying. Somethings got to wash her bleeding wounds. She might be ruined but she's still capable of love. She is. I am. I am. I am.

Don't get too close
If you smile he might think you want to **** him.
If you're nice to him he might think you want to **** him.
Don't let them touch you
A second is far too long.
Your skin is smothered in gas,
His fingers are lit matches

We can't afford to be fire anymore

Don't do anything that might make it seem like you're asking for it.
Your smile should be small
Your voice ice-cold

Don't let your guard down for a second

Stay awake. Don't fall asleep.
Wake up.
(I'm always tired)
don't let them catch you asleep.
Don't let them catch you

Keep running.
Don't let them catch you

You had me there for a second. Had me believing. Wanting. Aching. And then....breaking. You had me like no boy has before. You held more then my thrusting hips, my lustful lips, my hand wrapped in yours like you were scared I'd diss...appear.
'What more, what more is there?' - you cry

Well foolish boy, don't act so surprised.
Didn't they ever tell you in your Sunday school teachings, that the seeds you sow grow and grow, when you water them?
Maybe you missed that day since you saw no crime in taking your sweet time to plant your love deep inside my soul and you fed that garden come sunshine or cold. But come season for reaping, you were nowhere to be seen. You fled when you saw the beautiful monster that flourished.  You only wanted a garden and could not handle my forest. But enough about you leaving, let's talk about loving. Ah.
That is all we want to hear about isn't it?
The ones that made it. The fairytale endings. The moments you searched for hidden cameras 'cause reality was too, too perfect. You always said perfect like something bitter on your tongue. Like you weren't deservèd of it, your excuse being we're too young. But you said my name like it was your favourite song and each night you cursed the days for being so long,
dismal and futile when lacking my presence. You fought battles with my insecurities and made best friends with my hopes.  
You said, 'we got this, let's go'
And boy did I go. But your hands grew slippery, your lungs too weak. You could not keep up, but I'm not one for defeat.
Please know that I kept going, long after you let go. Please know that I kept growing, long after the cruel winter snow.
Please know that I love you,
but this is not a love poem.

I  am standing at the grave of a boy
We lost, a couple of months ago.
There was no elaborate church service or organs echoing off cathedral walls.

We are here today to mourn the death of a soul we cannot be sure is really dead.

You went missing.

That is what I told myself all those nights I spent out with lanterns,
Searching for you.
But it seems now that you intentionally ran away and the suspect in question is just the person you've become since you left.
You only died for me.
You only left me.

Everyone else still sees your wide-eyed smile and hears your singing soul.

"Have you seen this boy?"

No. Nobody has seen you since late November but I am the only one who remembers.

For you, I've written eulogy after ******* eulogy.
I mourned your loss and grieved in your absence.
I took gulp after bitter gulp of wine, each a toast to You.

I stand at your grave, eyes red and heart still in flames.
How come you turned to ashes before me, when we started this fire together?

I lay two roses on your tombstone,
One for each month you existed for me, next to me, with me.

I commemorate every bench we ever sat on:
"In unloving memory of two souls that loved too much and tried too little"

I was the only witness to your death
The only speaker at the service
And the single carrier of your casket.
I stand in an empty grave yard
And weep with the dead.

I didn't mean
To make promises for you
To me about us
I didn't mean to notice the fire burning in your eyes and turn your heart into a rescue mission
I didn't mean to turn your love into a game that I couldn't bear to lose
And all you do is chase and refuse
Only solution you have is a drink
I'm starting to think you're not real
I'm starting to think I've forgotten how to feel
You give me the largest sum of nothing
I think it's all you have
I gave the ghost of you the little I have left.
With admiration in your eyes and holding both of my hands you said,
'I feel nothing for you'
But I didn't hear what you said I just noticed how your voice dripped with longing and your fingers melted into mine.
They always told me actions speak louder than words, so I went with what I felt.

But I woke up alone the next morning hating you. Too drunk to remember how we got home and how you left.
I woke up alone the next morning hating you
Not knowing why.

Nobody except you will know what you did that night.
Nobody but me will bear the consequence.

I was so empty and hungry for love;
that I scoffed it all down in one bite.
Then I was so full I threw everything up in your lap
& I haven't been able to stomach it ever since

Love is the only drug you can't buy;
yet the most lethal
& once you've had a taste you'll never be quite the same as before.
a burning itch you cannot scratch,

You'll either live with the discomfort
Or you'll tear your flesh apart till you don't feel a single thing.

Maybes don't cut it anymore with this heart of mine,
It is either love or leave.

But, if you feel you might want to stay -
touch me everywhere but
my heart
& don't call me if you just want to talk.

I remember my last love letter to you and how I apologized for being more ocean than girl, more suffocating than soft. I remember promising my reflection that I'd stop my heart from overflowing and I'd try to loosen my grip on you. I remember waking up the next morning and finding my heart on the front porch - beating and bleeding. Nothing too sentimental attached - just a plain old 'sorry' as if you had only bumped me by accident or forgotten to reply to a text. I remember trying to shove it back through your mailbox and your shaking head standing at the window. I remember waking up to everything smeared and hazy for two weeks straight I never knew morning from afternoon.  faded rose that used to be bright scarlet. I remember being pink for a while. It took me months to wash your stains from my walls but soon I was stark and white. Naked and empty. But at least you were gone. I remember swearing to never look at red again. Let alone touch it. But it's knocking at my door every morning and banging on the windows all night long. I try to ignore her singing but sometimes I crouch at the keyhole and hum along. Sometimes I stand clutching the key in my prettiest dress.

Last night I grew too curious. Opened the door just a crack. I saw love crimson and crying in my garden corner surrounded by empty bottles and cigarette buds.

I saw you drunk and tired

We gave up at the same time

Intoxicated, most of them
looking for empathy at the bottom of bottles and ends of cigarette filters.
Some, smiling a little wider laughing a little louder
Others more determined - blinded and stumbling, looking for someone to hold for the night

And friendships form over spilled secrets that would never leave sober lips and
for tonight,
we'll forget how forgotten we feel.

And you and your perfect words are close enough to seep into my skin.
And I say I'm fine and well,
But can't ignore how familiar this feels

I should be happy.

But the memories crack and bleed and I have to lock the gates,
burn the key
And protect what little I have left.

We were there, but not.
You were (are) iridescent
and spoke of pretty eyes and                           faraway planets
and your disbelief in
gods and bibles.

And I; afraidandrecklessandnaturally selfdestructive,
Allowed room for hope and lovely words and your smile.

You've crowded the place and its terrifying.

Hey you,
I know you're so scared
And I know you're a little lost.
I know you want to love,
But can't afford all the costs.
A heart is a house on fire
And you don't want to get burned
But with happiness comes a little hurt,
Is a lesson still to be learned.

I now know you're not quite like me
That's something I could not take
Sometimes I wish I was not so reckless
It would save so much heart ache.

But maybe if you learn to let
Your heart lead and your soul be brave,
I can learn to have some patience
And this mess can somehow be saved.

Your words stumble out of your mouth, awkward and careful. Your smile is nervous and your eyes glow with a mixture of uncertainty and hope and you just can't manage to look me in the eyes. When you told me I was beautiful it was the first time someone said that to me and I took it to be true and not with a shaking head and arms waving in disagreement. Because, for the first time I actually believed I was beautiful before you said so. But it was remarkable nonetheless to hear it come from your lips and when I saw your smile mirroring mine I knew you were made for me to keep and not just to hold for the night. You laugh uncontrollably at your own lame jokes and it felt a little less like a random party and a lot more like just you and me. And people told me after you left that we were in our own world together and that made me both smile and flinch at the same time because I've never been good at keeping concentration but sitting next to you it's like we're the only living beings for miles and everything else is quiet noise. The first time you kissed me it was messy and misplaced and it tasted like cream soda and *****. We were laughing a bit too loudly under the full moon in my best friends garden and it was in that moment that I believed that any tangles of the heart can always be untangled by unapologetic laughter and some drunken honesty. I also realized that I wasn't waiting for you to come and save me but you were waiting for me to save myself before you so gracefully came into the picture. The second time you kissed me, it was slow and meaningful. We had the previous nights memories replaying in our minds and we kissed like we would never run out of time. I sincerely hope we never do. You see, I think I want you in all the ways a person can want someone they've known for two days. And that's incredible, because you're easy to love and I love easily. But I know I don't need you or anyone else anymore to complete my soul. I think that's what they call an epiphany; a great realization where everything that was murky and blurred suddenly becomes crystal clear. And it was in that half an hour ride in the back of a cab where I was holding your hand and we both couldn't stop smiling that I knew I was ready for this, simply because I had learned to love myself and you didn't have a choice but to follow in my footsteps.

flowers wilt and bedsheets get stripped clean with bleach bitter like my words my eyelashes held together with tears you laugh not at me but as if you’re amused at the idea of anyone ever loving you I can see your eyes lack understanding and you should be glad that you don’t know the look of heartbreak and I don’t hate you no matter how much I know I should I think I might never speak to you again though but don’t forget the day you first saw me and you told your friends all about the way we didn’t stop smiling on the dance floor the end of an era the beginning of a mess who would’ve known you would look at me 12 months later and see someone you claim to love but fail to ever show it don’t forget the night you came to my dorm room too afraid to say a word and now cause you know me you say too much let’s stop pretending that you didn’t spend hours lying next to me in a tent made out of the night sky holding hands and talking **** and I know what everyone sees in us - something pointless and never-ending but don’t think I’ve forgotten what you said and don’t think when you smile at me like everything’s fine that I ever believe it and we should sit down sometime and talk about nothing I guess that’s my way of saying I hate what you did, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love you.

Where does girl with broken heart go?
Girl with sunken eyes and heavy chest
Girl with pressed on smile and recycled lips
Girl with sharp words dripping with forgiveness.
Where did boy with sunshine smile go?
Boy with electric hands and voice like rain
Boy with truthful eyes and honest lies
Boy with unsure insistence and blanket arms
Where do we go from here?
Because from what you say (or don't say)
Our options are not very clear.
Was our reunion after all these months,
Simply just to plan our farewell?
Maybe this is the beginning of the end.
Maybe we've reached the conclusion of our tale
Maybe we've been pretending there's still more to our story
The remainder of the book is wearing thin and neither wants to turn the page.
It is too final.
Too much like a tragedy, instead of the fairytale we'd hoped for.
Maybe I've spent weeks mistaking your silence for fear, when really you have nothing to say.
You know, it is very much the same for me.
I think that I have so much to tell you but whenever I open my mouth to speak,
My hearts already breaking
Whenever I want to pose a question
Your heads already shaking.
And I guess what I'm trying to say is that only my hands and my heart still love you, but my head doesn't know what to make of the stranger next to me.
And I feel like a fool because I swore I would always look for you in a dark room but you don't want to be found.
Even if you did, it would be both of us searching in-between forbidden kisses
Because you don't know where you are either, do you?
And I spent months thinking that I would have you any way I could get.
That anything would be enough 'cause you're the only one for me
But lately my hearts been playing tricks on me and my mind cannot come up with more excuses.
Because it hurt so much less when you didn't love me at all.
Now you love me in halves and quarters
And I just don't know how to break myself up like you do.
With me, it has always been all or nothing.
And don't you see that the scraps of affection you keep tossing my way feels
Like a whole lot of
Nothing.
Especially since I've already seen what you can give me in the past.
And then I start to wonder if I'm living in sweet memories and refusing to see how bitter reality has become.
You see, this is who we are now.
My problem is not that I can't live without you.
If you had to tell me you want nothing to do with me, I would blow you a kiss and be on my way.
My problem is that you plant hope in my heart whenever it suits you, and I'm too weak to refuse.
Especially when it feels so familiar and tastes like chocolate instead of heartbreak on our warm and wanting tongues.
And I don't know whether I am jumping to conclusions or hitting the nail right on the head.
Because I don't think and you don't talk and we've both been terrible, terrible cowards.
What happened to girl with poems pouring out of her soul and hands that reached out unafraid of rejection?
What happened to boy who reassured his intentions with every second sentence?
Where did they go and why did they leave and do they plan on coming back or can I please stop sitting at my window waiting for something to happen that deep down you know never will and deep down I'll always, always hope for?

It was feeling everything and absolutely nothing simultaneously. It was the dam wall of my heart cracking slowly and then collapsing all at once. Hope came gushing out of everywhere and left my soul speechless and empty.  It felt like I couldn't quite place my feet firmly on the ground and I was floating away up and up out of my own body. I don't know how but I can see my crumpled face the moment he let me down once again. A mixture of hurt, confusion and an irreplaceable look of wonder that I can never quite get to leave my eyes when I look at him. It felt like a blindfold made out of duct tape was ripped off my face and for the first time I was looking at him and I didn't like what I was seeing. It hurt to look at him. I was meeting eyes with a stranger. A stranger that I knew and loved so well not too long ago. It was the feeling you get as soon as the roller coaster ride comes to an end. You're breathless and nauseous, heart beating outside your chest. Relieved it is finally over. It felt like the time I realized I didn't believe in God and cried myself to sleep for a week. All the water in my body was replaced by fire that night and now smoke permanently lingers in my veins. Realizing he was never coming back felt like someone was burning the home I grew up in to the ground and all I could do was watch. That someone was me.

Moving on is not trying to deny the pain it brings to your chest when you hear their name mentioned, but acknowledging that it's there and nothing can be done about it. Moving on is touching all the places they used to touch and accepting that you'll never forget the memories you made together, but knowing that you can't go back. It is finally not wanting to go back. Moving on doesn't happen overnight and moving on isn't a switch that turns your love for them off. It's learning that it's a light that will always be lit, even though you don't need it anymore, even though it's in the corner of the room - dim and gathering dust. It is looking back and saying 'I miss you, I will always miss you. But I don't need you anymore.' It's realizing that you never did need them. And it's being able to think about your future without crumbling to pieces when facing the fact that they're not going to be a part of it anymore. Moving on is a deep cut across your chest that has healed but bears a nasty scar. It is the difference between actually feeling the pain and the memory of the pain. Sometimes you can't tell which one is worse. And sometimes you think you're right where you started because you hear a certain song or you drive past the restaurant where you went on your first date and everything inside you just wants to go back to when everything was okay. Moving on is bittersweet. You can't bear to let go, those tender moments where you finally believed your heart had a home after all, it has become a part of you. But no matter how much you want to, you can't forget the nights you spent piecing the shattered bits of your heart together, through misty eyes and with shaky hands. So moving on is accepting that the bad parts overrule the oh so exquisite ones. And the love you felt for them will never be enough to overcome the pain that came after. It is choosing yourself, even though you want to choose them. That's it. Moving on is choosing yourself and believing that you deserve so much more than what they could ever give you.

If you had to climb inside my head tonight
You would find quite a mess
Of guilty confessions I haven't had the courage to admit.
Stay a while longer,
You'll catch the scent of regret and last night's alcohol
hanging heavily in the air.
You'll spot depression, somewhere in a dark corner, exiled and asleep (for now)
You'll find a fair amount of hopes and dreams, still waiting to come true
You'll probably find my deepest fears and gravest nightmares too
You'll find all the words I want to tell you
But don't have the courage to admit
There'll be memories boxed up real tight
And a loveless fireplace, waiting to be lit.

he moves in fast forward and
talks in rewind and I like the way
he always seems to be on his way somewhere better then the place he left you
he knows exactly what he's doing although when he speaks it might as well be another language

he will always be wild,
you can see it in his eyes if you catch contact before he buries his head in his lap,
and sometimes your chest -
in these moments he's as tame as a newborn puppy,
fragile as the glass cups
he throws to the ground,
laughing.

he will do the same with your heart

wild things can be loved,
but they can never stay.

As much as it might feel like it sometimes, your life is not a romantic film and I know you get really caught up in your imagination and sometimes you really believe that he's just like a character in a John Green novel and this is your story of how you fall in love. But movies end and every book has a final page. But we keep going and we keep living and the thing about stories is that they only tell about the the in-betweens of you and I. The moments in rose filters with The 1975 playing in the background. You and I, we have a music-video love that cannot exist in the quietness of 7am or the mundaneness of lunch on a Tuesday. When I think of you, I only see lights and dancing and I only hear music and laughter. I don't know much about your mind or your family or how you sleep in your bed at night. But I know exactly when you're lying cause you can't help smiling and I know how you dance when you're tipsy and how you fall when you're a little too drunk. I know you try to never be sad and you've become so good at it you've even tricked yourself into believing you're emotionless. We are identical shards of the same broken heart. We exist in our story together, and live completely separate other lives. We keep following the White Rabbit down the hole and leaving the world behind. Leaving our worlds behind. They tell me you're running fast and they warn me that chasing only leads to falling and breaking. But I've been playing cat and mouse with my heart for months on end and I'm in just as a hurry as you are.

Oh how we criticized their hearts
And inspected their love
Looking for poison,
Always finding it
Always keeping it
Never realizing how close we held it to our hearts, letting them infiltrate and infect every corner.

"I've always had this feeling that I'm going to die young. I don't know why, I've just never been able to picture myself being older. I just have a gut feeling, that I don't have much time to be alive"

I said these words to you and you told me to shut up and stop talking. At first I thought you were being rather harsh, I was only speaking hypothetically of course, no seriousness at all. But you genuinely sounded terrified and you told me that you wouldn't know what the **** to do if I died. You told me to never speak like that again because even thinking about me being gone forever ***** you up a little bit. But, love, what makes this any different? Now only a few months later you tell me you have to let me go. That we have to stop what we're doing and that we'll never move forward from this. That you have too many doubts and I don't deserve someone who can't tell me they'll love me no matter what. So now, it'll be just as if I'm dead to you, that's what it feels like anyway. I haven't seen your face in over a week and you don't plan on seeing me anytime soon. Even the deceased get one last goodbye as you lay flowers on their tombstone. I didn't get anything but an emotionless message claiming you're sorry. So you're telling me, that you wouldn't be able to deal with me dying. You would lay flowers on a grave containing rotting remains of a soulless body but you can't stick around to love the real thing? I feel dead because you haven't acknowledged my existence in so long. Your touch and the weight of your body was always an assurance that I was alive, regardless of how numb I felt inside. You brought my eroded and love deprived heart to life and planted flowers that filled my rib cage so sweet I had no choice but to feel utter and complete joy. And of course I had my doubts because we're young and ignorant and a little naive. But I never doubted you or the connection we shared. I never doubted the fact that I cared for you with every broken piece of my heart and I would continue to care until you no longer needed me. I just didn't expect it to be so soon and I was so sure of the sunshine you brought to my soul, I only assumed you felt the same and nothing less. And I'll never understand how the people you love will tell you sweet nothings and make false promises about the future, with no intention of keeping them. I'll never understand how you could look me in the eyes and tell me you'd see me soon, and not have any intention of looking into my eyes again.

This is fake so so fake. All these drugs man they're messing with my mind. It's kinda like I'm ok but I keep feeling like I'm on another planet. Really spaced out? Messing with my head my head are you okay (no) ok well I'm just saying you need to pull yourself together I don't really care about myself right now. I know I'm breaking my body and my brain thinks it's getting better but it's the euphoria. It tricks you. Everything is always ok okay for like an hour. Then it all gets terrible again. Fake. Without antidepressants for four days I thought I was going to burst into tears every 5 minutes. Also the pills' happiness is not real. So fake again. You trick your sad little brain into thinking you're happy. But deep down you can almost feel the darkness inside you getting crushed with this concocted 'medicine.'

So you are content and you're 'happy' but deep in your heart you know your sadness still lives inside you. Pushed into a cell, bolted, until it grows too big and breaks the walls down. So go get your dosage upped and sit in class with your head in your hands and know that there's nothing wrong with you girl. There's nothing wrong with writing poems late at night and crying over people you've lost. You are a forest fire among dimly lit matches. Just because your brain is sick and no one can physically see the bruises doesn't make it invalid. But it is there, always. It cannot be destroyed, only tainted. I know you love harder than everyone else some people aren't used to that kind of love, they can't handle it. I know you still believe and trust every single person you meet. That is your best and worst quality. They're scared of the way you care too much and don't think for a second that the fault lies in you.

You deserve to hear those words and believe them with every piece of your torn apart heart. You need to hear these words and nothing less. You don't deserve maybes and someone who doesn't know what they want. It needs to become a rule to believe these words and not something to laugh off.

You deserve to hear someone say, 'I'm not going to hurt you.'

And you have to be able to trust them. You deserve a chance to believe them. And what those who left gave you was not love. Because love is giving as well as receiving and you have to open your eyes when looking back on the past and see how empty they made you from taking and taking and taking all your love and leaving you with so little. But take your bent and battered heart that's far from broken and allow yourself to fall in love again. Because after all the tears and pains in your chest that felt like trying to swallow broken glass, you deserve to be happy. Don't rely on someone new to fix you - fix yourself. You deserve to know and be so sure of the fact that you don't need someone's hand to hold in order to be happy. You deserve to find love again and never have to look back and wonder what you did wrong. They were wrong and they never loved you. You are lucky, you have not lost anything. They didn't love you. You loved them with everything you had and that is their loss. You have so much more to find and its waiting for you just around the corner. But you can't look back, stop looking back. You deserve to open new doors, shut the old ones and swallow the keys. They'll always live deep inside you, but they won't matter anymore. They don't deserve to matter to you anymore.