you’ve had your whole future mapped out
since you were 16, sitting in homeroom
and hand-picking your life.
me, i’ve got no plans to speak of,
still trying to figure myself out;
everything major still undecided and undeclared
because pandora’s box is
always really pretty until you open it,
and the future’s really alluring until you’re in it
and you’re wondering if it really fits.
and i know it’s stupid trying to
plan for a car crash,
to plan on ******* up  
but i’ve been trying to take precautions
in case i don’t grow into who you were counting on.
i keep your promises tucked in my pocket,
you make vows just to talk about it.
and i don’t know much about fate
because once my horoscope actually told me
that i’ll be alone and unloved forever,
born under an unlucky star,
so i’m not placing my trust in the stars
even if sometimes i get the sneaking suspicion
they might just be right.
i’m trying to dictate my own future without having a tongue,
i’m trying to find a future i’ll be content living in.
people are always waiting for time to run out,
and i’ve always been waiting for the fall out.
because i know all good things have to end
all bands have to break up, all stars have to explode,
all slow dances have to still, and eventually
all loves have to run out in one way or another.
and i’ve got front row seats to
the inevitable explosion
because you’re a heart attack and i’m totally doomed
we’re just bombs going off too soon
we’re just strangers dancing in a crowded room
we’re just ****** up and wishing on the moon
we’re just racking up casual causalities
we’re just reading our fortunes
in the coffee grinds and tea leaves,
half-joking and half-a-little-too-honest
when you peered at yours and said,
“it says we’re gonna grow old and grey together,
and move out of the city and have a bunch
of loud mouthed kids with your eyes.”
i don’t know about the future
and i suppose you’d like to tell me about it,
after all you’ve had your whole future mapped out
since you were 16, sitting in homeroom
and hand-picking your life.
but it’s an affliction, all those ******* predictions.
don’t tell me where you want to be in five years in from now;
tell where you’re actually going to be tomorrow.
because i was dying for this week to be over
and then i was dying for this year to be over.
and i can see it clearly,
my whole life lived in transit
on the way to something else.
i was dying to finish high school
and then i was dying to finish college
and then i was just dying,
and i forgot to live in the present in my rush
to get to the future.

we were in the bed
of your truck,
the two of us so close
but not close enough,
just two mismatched hearts
trying to get along.
i was trying to memorize the stars,
so i’d be able to redraw the constellations
we looked at that night  
for when i get lonely,
for when you’re not longer here.
and it was like
you could hear all my
over-thinking-this thoughts
buzzing around in my too-full head,
it was like you could see me
bleeding poetry out of
a borrowed heart;
it was like you could tell
that i was already preoccupied
with months from now,
too worried about
what comes next to even
be here right now
because you turned to me,
and you said,
“i’m right here. you’re right here.
so just… be here.”
because i’m the kind of person
who’s always waiting for the fall out,
i’m the kind of person
who’s got all
the escape routes mapped out
before we’ve even started driving.
because i’m the kind of person
who just kind of expects things to have
an expiration date,  
expects things to crash and burn
instead of fly,
expects things to fall apart.
because you of all people know how
easy it is for those of us with the
dreamer’s disease
to get caught up in all the lights.
and when you smile at me
with your not quite crooked teeth,
sometimes it can be so bright
it’s blinding.
there are a thousand unwritten poems
hiding in my shaking hands,
there are whole universes
hiding underneath my skin,
and i swear,
i would give you
the ******* grand tour
if you only asked me to.
you of all people know i don’t
believe in much.
and maybe i could believe in the way
the stars looked that night
with a little persuasion,
but i already know
i believe in the way your eyes
looked that night.
darling, no bible needs to
convince me of that.

if i stopped eating
people would compliment me
on how thin i am
and when they saw the bruises
they pressed their mouths
shut tight
and just joked about
how clumsy i could be
with their easily uneasy smiles.
i don’t know if they
just didn’t see
or if they just weren’t
looking.
introducing him
to my friends was like
living in a ****** part of town,
having someone over
and hearing the racket of gunfire
outside of your window
and then having them say to you,
“oh, listen,
you can hear the fireworks
from here!”
and being too embarrassed
to correct them.
so maybe i’m not sure
if i believe in fireworks;
bombs are too often
mistaken for them.
but i can distinguish the difference
now, i can, and i will not
teach my daughters that when
he pushes you down in the dirt
and pulls on your pigtails
it’s because he likes you.
because when i covered up
those bruises on my body
in too-light concealer
like i’d never learned how to cover up
love-bites and tired eyes,
there was a voice in the back of
my mind that was telling me
that he only pushed me
down because he loved me.
i do not want a voice
inside my daughter’s heads
that sounds like me,
telling them that they deserve
their split lips.
i will tell my daughters to wear
boxing gloves over their manicures,
i will tell my daughters that
“love” is not an excuse,
i will tell my daughters that no one
is allowed to give you
a black eye and expect you
not to punch back harder,
i will tell my daughters
that you are not weak for getting hurt
because the weak ones
are those who let their anger
and insecurities
manifest themselves
in fists and words.
i will tell my daughters
the difference between bombs and fireworks,
i will tell them that they may sound
the same sometimes,
but fireworks don't ****
innocence.

I understand the cutter.
Loving you is
My self-harm.