Fingertips touching and feelings colliding
The taste of your lips, God, you look so inviting.
It's kissing and clashing- electricity
It's panic! It's fever, as skin and skin meet.
We're a collection of colors, pieces, and parts
Eyes appraising each other as a work of God's art.
It's a pulse; it's a heartbeat- the music of life
Fireworks... explosions... shooting stars in the sky.
Let's burn the books darling, for fire's our friend
Love's a beautiful disaster... beginning to end.

Being alone will be beautiful,
Although, so would have been being with you.
In life we must work to win,
But in the process, we still lose.

I'm afraid it's all about compromise,
And learning to live without.
In order for us to live happily,
We must look to another route.

We choose the best possible means,
To the best of all possible ends.
So that our hearts might not be broken,
But, rather, taught to bend.

I don't believe in pretty poems
(for) pretty verses lie
Love is more than the pretty words
The best of lovers write

I don't believe in pretty poems
They're merely works of art
Let poets spin their painless stories
I'd rather spill my heart

I don't believe in pretty poems
They're fiction- nothing more
In pretty poems, we'll never find
The love we're looking for.

(January 28, 2009)

Inspiration is a fickle flirt. He comes and goes, leaving my notebooks full of erratic bursts of passion. Sometimes I almost wish we had never met. I remember the first day; my thoughts were a collision of naivety and girlish impropriety. It was pen to paper and I lost myself in discovering the "inner" me.

Inspiration guided me blindly through heartbreaks and near self-destructions, preserving the sanity my mind so desperately clung to. But then there were other nights when I blared my music and lit some candles, but inspiration never came. I just sat in the dark, wide awake with hands of stone and a restless mind. Of course, inspiration always called the next morning, making sure I had survived the night, begging me to take him back.

Tonight I write not of Aristotle, or of Whitman, or of even my true love. Tonight I write not of wedding plans, or family tensions, or lack of creativity. Tonight I write because it is what I do. I write without purpose, or intention, or direction, or agenda. I simply write. I write not of song birds, or love stories, or philosophy, or religion. I write not of real love, or real events, or reality itself. I write not of fiction, or fantasy, or fairytales. I write not of freedom, for it is something a writer never truly tastes. Tonight I write because it is the only thing I need never explain. I write.

A sky of collision,
Filled with smoke, colored black.
Not one given chance,
To stop; to look back.

Countless persons are crying,
Panicked; in haste.
Screams can be heard,
Amongst all the waste.

Buildings and Bodies,
Tinged by the tears.
Mere fractions of seconds,
Confirmed the world's fears.

The sirens are sounding,
Time; standing still.
It seems as though God,
And Fate made a deal.

But who is to blame,
When Truth, himself, lied?
The towers are falling,
When worlds collide.

There was life before you.
There was
air
in my lungs.
...There was even love.

Can you even fathom it?
I knew love before you?
I knew the warmth of
firm
hands

and

the racing of a
happy
heart.

I was no neophyte romantic-

You just reshaped me-
restructured a
fraction
of my world.

You became my weakest foundation,
and when I fell...
so did your fidelity.

My,
we fell so hard.

But while you fall into empty arms,
I fall into hopeful futures.

I'm learning to
live again.
And someday...
I'll even re-learn to love.

There is life after you.
There is
air
in my lungs.

Why, there will even be love.

In time, every season must conclude,
And, with it, the love I have carried for you.
Oh, let us be children and live without care,
Live without love, the must subtle of snares.

I ask not for a summer, spring, winter, or fall,
I'd rather have never loved you at all.
Because sadness takes the most destructive of forms,
No April showers; just thunderstorms.

In our youth, we are destined to be apart,
Conclusions both heal and destroy the heart.
Shameless crimes we've committed now wear on my soul,
Perhaps we'll find healing once we're both alone.

Love makes people foolish; I will not be a fool,
Before the world finds me weak, they will first find me cruel.
But if I let our love die, all has not been in vain,
You will heal with the seasons, and find love again.

The sad reality is… she wouldn't have wanted herself either.

114. The scale didn't lie. She stripped and faced the reflection. Skin and bones. *Skin and bones? She was all eyes. Bloodshot eyes. All eyeballs and rib-bones. An unflattering description to match an unflattering perception.

Starved for love.

The truth was… She knew she was doing this to herself. What she didn't know was how to stop. 18 hours. She had 18 hours of control. And then, there were the dreams.

"I'm not hungry, really."

She was learning that the term "broken hearted" was, unfortunately, not always metaphorical.

summer was bittersweet
as she tasted independence
and limped on broken limbs

she learned the landscape of other bodies
drank the wine of foreign tongues
crippling beautiful souls, a mere ******* herself

she bared skin, grew out her hair
as she kissed a boy she had wished she could love
she tossed and turned to nightmares of dreams now come true

she discovered the duality of loneliness
and the complexity of affection
while soaking up the sun on florida beaches

now she's left with the remembrance of september sweethearts
and nights filled with uncontrollable tears
she asks herself if she regrets a single moment...

of a bittersweet summer vacation...

she could say she was sorry, but she knows an apology isn't what anyone is looking for.

bittersweet, she can't say this isn't what she wanted after all

One word on your lips
"farewell"
echoing up from the ashes,
r a t t l i n g in my ears,
a thousand horses across cobblestones.

No forever;
No futures.
This is the E N D
And then the world will be over.

I'll bathe in the streetlights,
stumble into your graveyard,
bottle in hand,
with your promise of eternal youth f a d i n g from my sight.

You listen but are incapable of (truly) hearing.
You say you're sorry but, even to yourself, can't explain what the words mean.
The truth is...
We're just empty shells of people.
We walk through halls: judged, misunderstood.
We accept the inevitable: that life is unfair and no one owes anyone a single kindness.
The truth is...
Kindness is a blessing. It's a patch, but it can't mend a broken heart.
Kindness can't rewind our lives.
Kindness helps us through each day, but Your kindness is no substitute for Their love.
The truth is...
You say, "It will all be ok." And, we know this.
We keep to the maximum dosage, the guns are kept unloaded, razors are left to their proper use.
The truth is...
We WILL be ok, because there is nothing else we know to be.

(May 2010)

I want to see you in the stars
- a constellation in my arms
so close, but still so far
Oh, how beautiful you are
I want to see you in the stars

I want to hold you 'till I die
I want to kiss you 'till I cry
make love throughout the night
throw off the sheets, turn on the lights
I want to hold you 'till I die.

2008

In clover fields 'neath a midday sun
Oh, let me be the summer and you be the sun.
Or if I am the sky, then you're a balloon
We could both float away, take a trip to the moon.
We can wear jeweled crowns and build an empire
Or grab a guitar and sing by the fire.
We'll laugh like thunder and love like rain
Catch fireflies like we're five again.

I'll kiss your knees if you fall while we run
Oh, let me be the summer and you be the sun.
We'll make a pact that we'll never part
The impossible dream of a child's heart.
We can tell tall tales and paint the trees
Or steal a ship, sail away to the sea.
We'll shine the stars with the edge of our sleeves
And stay up all night, never falling asleep.

We'll both grow up and fall in love
Oh, let me be the summer and you be the sun.
We'll teach our kids to imagine and dream
By telling them stories of you and me.
How we wore jeweled crowns and built an empire
You played the guitar as I sang by the fire.
We laughed like thunder and loved like rain
Caught fireflies to feel young again.
How we told tall tales and painted the trees
And stole a ship, sailed away to the sea.
Oh, we shined the stars with the edge of our sleeves
And they'll stay up all night, never falling asleep.

(July 14, 2008)

I am volume.

The stereo turned up
-top notch-
harsh to the ear.

I bother not with breezes
nor whispers.

I want to hear you S C R E A M
-to stumble along-
hand in hand
-two skeletons in the wind.

I was a trophy for a night.

But
you
will
be
my
trophy
for
life.

... As I tread upon the hearts of both
                                                          heroes
                                                                    and
                                                                        harlots ...

Storing up titles.
Forgetting faces.
"No, you meant nothing."
-Just a notch in my belt.

I will be brilliant.
An inspiration
to the broken-hearted;
For I was u n t o u c h a b l e.

Unable to lose that which I had not to give:

A Heart.

- For I had given my heart to you.

****** you and your seamless charms.
I blindfolded myself to your flaws.
I fell in love and you let me.

You should have screamed.
Called me a hundred thousand obscenities.
Saved me the trouble.
Saved me the time.

I gave you my voice.
I packed away my pens; my pencils.
I dreamed of forever.
Put behind me old muses.

This is what you have made me.

I've unpacked my plans.
Shredded them.
Burned them.
Along with everything I ever loved about myself.

And yet, you pretend.
Three words still tripping off the tip of your tongue.

You broke everything I ever saw to be beautiful.
You sold every treasure I ever had for us to share.

******* you.
You broke every promise you ever made.
You told me you'd love me forever as you walked away.

(June 27, 2010)

She wanted to be exposed. Hot sun. Wet grass. Rough hands. Explore.

…Although, she never found it within herself to believe in freedom. She was the prisoner and the jailer, in one…

Exposed to the elements. Tangled hair. Scraped knees. Naked skin. Vulnerable.

Exposed to herself. Human. Broken. Ugly.

She wished humanity could be beautiful again.
She feared she could never believe in happiness; feel hope, again.

Utility, efficiency, necessity … her mantra.

She longed to remember how to dream once more.

She yearned for open skies and lean legs. When morality mattered.

… She wanted to be exposed. Heartbeat. Heartbreak. She wanted to have a heart, again.

The world is a beautiful work of art,
With priceless paintings of Ocean and Sky,
And fragments of souls just drifting by,
All enjoying this brilliant expanse of life.

Which thrives in the hollows of the Human heart,
And drips from the Heavens to land on our tongues,
We exist in the flesh with the air in our lungs,
As displays, prepped, and ready to be hung.

(July 29th, 2008)

I want to write a book about fragments- unfinished sentences, dependent clauses. Incorrect punctuation. I- would like to mess with the mind, manipulate, self-destruct, and create a masterpiece made up of nothing but myself. Tell the story behind the faded pictures in the tarnished picture frames- find faults and rectify them- fumble and write essays about the failures and freedoms I know nothing about. I want to forget how to make sense- stumble and stutter along- verbally intoxicated- tottering but stable. Young but able. I want to write the world into/out of existence. Instigate. Revolve. And end.

I want to live.

I want a poet for a lover.
One who's talented with lies.
Who will wear his heart out on his sleeve.
And words as his disguise.

I want a poet for a lover.
Whose poems pray we'll never part.
One who will paint my world with love.
Then, poetically, break my heart.

(January 2009)

I feel like fanning flames and falling apart. Like, playing hours and hours of the saddest songs. Because life is an unfinished lyric, and nothing makes sense anymore.
It's drawing conclusions from empty wells and pretending to see that this love story holds any hope for you and me. When all that's left are empty holes and unfilled depths, because you can't fill me in and I can't fix this mess.
And looking back is like sitting on our hands and feeling we've struck gold. When all we're really doing is staring at the dead end of a gravel road.

She looks in the mirror and she doesn't see something beautiful. She doesn't see anything remarkable in her face, nothing commanding in her stance, nothing compelling in her eyes. She sees no blank canvas, no work of art, just the first draft of an under-developed idea, a "trial run"; she's the type of canvas that you throw away. Warrantless narcissism, the worst kind. She justifies her "self-studies" with lies; after all, mustn't one must first learn to understand one's own self before understanding the world? It's the sort of thing you tell yourself in your head, but you would never repeat out loud.

However:

Sometimes, this girl, she feels beautiful, like the sounds of symphonies. Her reflection in the mirror, unchanged. For it is not her figure; no, it is not her face that paints her pretty; it is the knowledge that a masterpiece could marvel at a mistake, the knowledge that someone so beautiful could love someone who had not yet grown into their own skin.

laugh with me
at these childish mistakes
innocence is bliss
...or so they say.

for we are young
but not quite as free
as this, our love,
demands us to be

for you must live
and to live, must leave
and a companion to you
I cannot be

but I cannot ask
for you to stay
"I'll wait for you"
is too easy to say

but soon we'll look back
on these memories
for love stories like this
make life worth living.

I trained myself to trip over my words.
To stutter and stumble along.
So that your lips might catch mine as I fell.

Fell into open arms and empty futures.
While the world knew my words could move mountains...
I practiced incoherency... and called it love.

(September 11, 2008)