i.
caren forgot about her morning.  caren forgot it was wednesday.  caren had an event and she was not there.

caren is a shadow.  caren is an absence of space.  caren is a gap that people shy away from, women in black dresses sidestepping past her memory.

caren is a woman with a streetcar.  caren is a woman with an office job.  caren is a woman with a social network.  caren goes to functions.  caren is no longer a function, but a product of her own actions.

caren forgot herself.

ii.
shattered windshields. broken glass like triangle teeth. more monsters lurk in mirrors than in the recesses of the closet.  behemoths wait by water coolers, demons sit in sweaty three-by-fours.  the devil wears a motorcycle helmet and caren hasn't learned from her mistakes.

iii.
run a red light.  it's december and she's egging on the new year.  frosted features and blinkers hide hot flashes.  she's impatient for her age, a businesswoman at her best.  

a shift in gear. a change in mood.  road rage, road rash.  a few words from a dark knight on a whinnying bike.

iv.
lane changes and unintentional nudges. motorcycle launches the devil like a dove to heaven. caren stays earthbound, blood spilled to nourish the ground.  fertilizer runs through her veins, and vampire trees in city parks drink it up. bystanders drink it up.

v.
caren is a casualty.  caren is the victim of her own habits.

caren is a corpse in a coffin. caren is an elephant in the viewing room.  

caren is to blame in eyes and minds. caren is condemned in whispers, but caren is lamented out loud, so caren is proud.

caren got **** done.

each day staggers by
in stuttered compromise.
heaven meets hell in my stormy eyes,
but my wrath is surely wrapped up
in the way i never cry,
the way i won't admit
how much i'd love to die.

i am sick of this existence.
i want to unzip my skin
and flay it from the ribs,
to let my bones step out of it.
i've stopped feeding my demons.
now they feast on my flesh.
pain is my steady hand, and not my torment.
you avert your eyes, but i love how i deserve it.

if you knew me like i do, with no secrets,
believe me,
you'd hate me as much as i did.
i'm better than i was, but i'm still just a kid.
one year older, none the wiser.
i still want to die, but i made a promise.

if i could tear myself to pieces again,
i'd do it in an instant.
if i should leave this sallow casing,
shut your eyes and cash my chips in.
if i make it hard for you, don't fail to mention it, for i'll repent for it.
i mean you no sacrilege-
i'm simply demented.

i still suffer every day. i just learned how to hurt invisibly.
i'm still enamored with my own pain, but don't want anyone to worry.
i've chosen a new medium so i can rest in peace.
i'm done with trying. i just want an ending.

i would have done it already
but my conscience keeps me.
i'm tired of holding steady. i only want to sink.
each day that passes by just brings me closer to the brink,
and i'm tired of having to think.

how low will i get
before it kills me again?
how low will i get
before i get on with it?
i'm tired of the pills and tests.
i'm past the point of being worth it.

i say i'm in purgatory- waiting to die,
cause i know this will **** me.
i'm playing deadly limbo with the bar dropped to my feet.
motivation left me, but i'm still keeping beat.
but how long can i maintain this without sinking completely?

i.
fantasy girl,
they tell me,
you've got your head in the clouds.

but it's better up there.

ii.
i'll do what you want for now
but i'll have you know,
i'm a celebrity in my own head.
and i don't need to figure
things like taxes and math.

i dance
around beautifully brazen ballerinas
and flowers missing half their petals
before they've even bloomed
and weave justice back into romance
and weave romance back into words.

i make my own living
where i am king
of thieves and beggars
and i am respected
for my fraud.

iii.
you expect me to remember
the littlest things
             (names,
                 dates,
                  rules)
when i am too preoccupied
by things that fill my head
              like the sounds of words
              like the way they make me feel

and due dates make me anxious
so i'll just erase them
why don't you understand
i have the power to change the world?
my pen is mightier than your scalpel.

  (i don't need to meet
  your plastic-surgery standards,
  your smiling faces with lying eyes)

iv.
what is surviving in your world
compared to even living in mine?

i learned about loneliness last night,
belatedly, because no one ever bothered
to explain it to me- it was
something best kept for the time it existed in
the blank space where a hand had once been
a soft shaky touch
now absent

the sorrow comes in sultry waves
with the indigo tide of me missing your breath
on the hollow in my sleepy neck,
a whisper backandforth inandout and then
a hitch, a twitch and the slow descent
from sea-froth into dreamland

we drifted, content, into the
scared scarlet hills where nightmares roam
where i made my home, knowing that
in sleep your whispers still coated my pillowcase
and i was not alone

we sank, satiated, into
the wasteland in our wasted heads
knowing that despite the terror, we could share your bed
knowing that when i woke, gasped, drenched in sweat
you would brush the hair
from my forehead
i'd remember my respite
and we would settle down once again

and as i lie, disconsolate
my ribcage heaving, desolate, i pull your jacket
to my face, breathe in your scent, your comfort
rise from the depths
and thank whatever guides our fate
that i only feel this pain
in the present

i’m fighting with gravity
to the death- until my head rests,
empty as my belly
on this false-porcelain floor-
skin waxy as laminate over
these heavy hollow bones
waiting for freedom-
liberation from this sullen casing.

i shake, manic-
blood pressure in the basement,
nauseous from diet pills and anxiety.
jittery, stare at the ceiling-
a spider, stick-limbed, teases me,
but here’s the silver lining:
no curds or whey coating
my shining insides.

i am stronger and brighter than ever
as black swims in my vision-
light-headed from malnutrition,
i wrap fingers around my wrists
to make sure i haven’t escaped my limits.
the mirror doesn’t lie, but it won’t snitch.
we’ll keep this surreptitious.

spilling my bloodred guts, my blood,
won’t make me wither,
and confessing won't save me either.
this red ribbon stays tied around my wrist.
secrets kept keep me stable
clinging to my only success,
self-confidence cellophane-wrapped
in my absence, my transparence.

the whispers don’t mean a thing.
i am frantic on a wire frame,
white noise on parade.
the ground can only hold me for so long.
i'll sprout wings from my ribcage
and float away.