You’re gliding on ice that’s sprouting
Flowers like the freckled mountaintops down south
But you haven’t noticed the red that’s started to cover
Spreading on the bottom of your plate
If you did this with fire maybe you’d still be alive
But this is a new kind of electricity angled towards you
Like the stroke of a brush that whistles
Something that sounds like letters
And open doors at the end of mile long pathways
You are an exit route not a fire escape
Does your mother know why you keep empty water bottles
On the desk by the back door and not the one by your bed
Swearing that you are sinking into tides that keep you afloat
I saw the run rise in your eyes once
The yellow and green awoke something in your smile
And a streetlight’s glow burned out
Coated in silver, immersed in purple petals
Yet the plastic stuck in your throat
Is lodged between adventure and fear
And you don’t want to jump

Rain can fall hard,
Like a storm sometimes.
While the drops of water
Pitter patter on our
Windows, doors, the
Sidewalk, driveway, roof.
You can see the
Individual drops
If you look close enough
As they hit a surface
And dissolve
Into a river
As the other drops
Join them.
Surprises can be
Like this.
So can
Anger.
And so can feelings
For one
Another.

i didn't want to paint i just wanted to be great at something so i unghosted my soul, told her to go pick 6 roses out of the garden of my love for the mountains & i pierced my nose w a silver needle that was so sharp i could hear your velvet voice again & it call came back to me in little waves of blue pain and sunflower energy on lined sheets of paper sort of like this one with an orange accent I had to find in Rome behind motorcycles & burnt coffee w out the bitter memory of sugar cookies, only the ones we ate on long weekends by the beach beside the ways in which the sun told us the stories of sunken ships & waves the moon wanted to create at 2:11am on the least windiest days. i didnt bring my brushes w me, but a skateboard and a glass house were enough for a disappearing act & 3 conversations w a wall and spray paint can

you tried to drown your fears in sunshine but the red thread in the corner of your oversized sweater caught on the moon's crescent instead and the rose petals that you were keeping up your sleeves fell out and onto the garden of peonies your best friend was growing on her front lawn, its not nice to constantly be running from forest green comfort but the only other option is staying where the gold is and thats something you never learned to do, yet
maps have followed you recklessly
on the roads that you've ripped through and eventually you'll find yourself climbing taller fences to be back where the purple of the last February evening wrapped your impulsive body tight, though you'll never be found how you were last left

The loneliest nights keep me up.
It's not hard to do when I've drank a cup
The substance being crazy,
With a dash of hazy,
Sometimes physically lazy,
But never mentally motionless.
I only needed your caress.
And I always do, in and out of distress.
Why won't the sparkles glide off your tongue anymore?
I try to swim to them but I'll never get to shore.
I'm lost at sea, sometimes they're oceans.
Time always travels, but never showing emotion.
I'll make it as I always have done.
Still it doesn't change the fact that you're my only
       Loved.
One.

Find outlets when you are sad or angry.
- You never did well when you wanted to talk and no one save the craters in the moon would listen.
- I’d have to walk, sneakers thumping on the main road into 3am putting your shoulders back into place.
- The stardust on your nose was almost gone and your smile out of place.
- Who stitched your words shut without threading through the electricity you exert in the carefully thought out letters when they shine volumes on all the little things that make you see solar systems in coral oceans?
- I love any excuse to hold you, reminiscent of the nights I crave the coldest ice-cream, we buy two scoops, and you let it drip down your warm hands after holding the cone too long without licking off the excess that craves you more than mountains wish for valleys even at the highest peaks
- When you’re looking towards the red of the sky and talking of answers that to me taste like blue dreams and fears that make me envision yellow stop lights blocking off speeding trains on the corner of Freedrive and Bluckoren Lane next to the corner store, rope stitches hold my heart in puzzled rows while I figure out how to piece you together
- But I can’t fix people, though 4am can only try.

Don’t close your eyes when the stars come tripping after you, they’re just searching for a grey home inside the silver coated palaces you set on fire, lit up and burned down
- When you’re scared to look through screens of eggshell white because they remind you of ripped up, closed doors and veined leaves, punch through them, they won’t be controlling forever
- At night Saturn’s moons stare down on homes like the one you have inside your head to make sure you're drinking enough almond milk and brushing your strong teeth, don’t be scared of blue security and golden warmth just because it can be unfamiliar and far
- Even birds will fly from you in winged directions you don’t want to look towards, sing towards them instead and watch the honey dripping from your voice sink its teeth on distance
- You’re labeled as missing but shattered glass from cracked clocks don’t lie about mistakes, the only thing missing in you is faith

Racing cars and blinding lights
On the corner of the street
After you came home last night
The kitchen clock stopped
Working at 9:30 pm
You were covered in tomorrow
Morning’s melodies and
August’s warmth but the
Carelessness in your eyes
Glowed more like February
When we had raspberries
For breakfast two weeks
Straight and you bought
New khaki pants because
Dad wanted you to
We had boundaries linked
With the ink of a pen
And wings that belonged
To red birds but we were
Still free and now all that’s
Left is the taste of sour
Apples and honey and old
Photographs tinted with
Mustard colours on the
Edges stacked in the
Bookcases covered with
Sparkling dust and crackling
Leaves I wish you left the
Constellations threaded
In your palmed still stitched

I like to sip my iced coffee
Without the lid
It seems to look more accessible
Unlike the strings of stars
That remain in the sky; the ones
I trusted do not shine anymore
A box of Oreos sitting across
The wooden table sits nearly
Vacant and once again I’m reminded
Of you and your
Carefully drawn departure
Trailing you went all the ways
You worried that the plants
In the corner of my apartment floor
Would not get enough water
(I made a pond one day,
Scared to deprive them of your
Love like I was).
And how you only ate peanut butter
With sliced bananas
(The air smells like tangerines now).
All the soap in the world cannot
Erase the paint stains you left
On the bathroom counter next to
Your blue-orange toothbrush
Canvases are just better off
Untouched / Uncarved / Unloved
And always accessible.

It is He who turned the words that echoed through walls of built up ego into towers of strength made of faith and prayer, obedience and consciousness – the best architecture knew I needed a blueprint that wasn’t covered in mustard coloured stains and red pen marks that led to nowhere good
2. It is He who untangled the blackening shackles from ties to this sticky, messy mirage of a world entwined to these wrists and instead taught to braid ladders to the heavens on its way to freedom which looks like His love, love that is eternity and eternity that isn’t an illusion; it’s a vision
3. It is He who, through every turn, slip and fault, stayed closer than the jugular vein and fished the despair right out of this muddled pond the colour of dust and rusting metals, teaching to swim and thank for the air filled lungs taken for granted even when I'm drowning, the water became clearer and the air cleaner and He still held His hand out, better than a lifeguard, He’s a guard for life
4. And now I'm trying to find another way to Him in these blessed nights to heal this aching splintered heart and solid iron fists made from fires only the roughest wood could spark up; in His name does the stomach starve so the soul can feed, where the toughest times are handled with sincerity, everyone becomes family, and strength is found underneath His love, overtop the rest of the world

Try calling me again
And see what voicemail
Greets you this time
I change it up
Each time you ring
To prove that I’m not stable
Never your rock
Always a moving shoreline
Trying to get away from the sand
That holds it in place
Never a tree
Rather the blowing leaves on it
Rustling lack of comfort
Falling when the air turns grey
Full of carelessness
Empty of passion

Letters scribbled down on
Paper as the pen engraves its mark
Even when it leaves the paper
The colours remain
The shapes linger
You tore the clouds from
Their places in the sky
While the purples, blues
And pinks bled
Like red lipstick marks on tissue
Stamps on new bought
Postcards that stick where
They are stuck by flying through
Time, countries and air that
Smell like metal and lemons
But the colours couldn’t show
What thunder and dirt
Showed up under the
Doorstep when you
Decided to walk away
And no matter how many daisies
I watered and loved and caressed,
My veins will forever be painted with
Rotting petals
Discoloured leaves
Like old sunsets
And falling telephone wires
Those do not leave
Even when they are left
I will shine the broken glass
And wash the buried fire
To me you’re still home.

Sad waters swish and sway in the wind when the pressure is superior
But they’re still when there’s immobility left to move them
I guess what I’m trying to say is that as people,
We’re only moved as a result of the push that others spell for us
Rarely do our own aspirations swim up to shore and
Though they gasp for air,
No one believes they can save themselves.
But we are not water; we are only made of it.
We rely on winds, but do not realize that we are winds.
The power to destroy someone doesn’t only derive from fire
The power to save someone will not usually come from soft sands
None of us need to be caressed for.
We are oceans, but much more flourishing.
Animated. Thriving. Prosperous.
You make the rules.
How can you not, when you have lightning inside your heart?
Every time it beats it sets a strike so hard everyone can feel the upshot.
You shouldn’t be suppressing something so electric.

You can't touch graffiti, especially when it's mine
Freedom of speech, freedom of thoughts, fine.
But when it comes to art you turn the other cheek
Not trying to look gangster, thats not the way I see
It's just a way of expression, letting things out
But when you come along to see it, you yell and you shout
Leave the artist be if you can't appreciate their works
Don't visit galleries but if you take art down, it hurts
Paint, glue, paper and a steady hand is all it takes
But stencilling ideas on walls takes courage; its not fake
Always wanting everyone to follow rules, but who's rules are those?
******* creativity out of kids in school, but without petals its not a rose
Open your minds, see that you're not the most right
You have a status in society, so the rest of us don't see the light?
There's nothing more than a human wants than to be understood
And not just if they're broken, depressed or from the hood
Everyone needs a way out from their heads
This form of art keeps their sanity well-fed.

Candles keep on burning and smoking
Birds keep flying and singing
And the silver of the black of yesterday’s night
Comes out only on pinned on the times
I seem to miss carnival rides of ecstasy
And stuffed bears with little orange bows
And ring tosses that lack aim and ring and tosses;
Just throws
While the rooftop I now sit on
In the final times of empty streets
That smell like stale popcorn
And paint from fresh vandalism
Will not take me back
Refuse to take me back
To school-less days
And fresh air that hinted purple dreams
Open oceans echoing full laughter
Wild hair, barbeques
Raw stories
Energy / Love / Energy
Even the floral print on my leggings
Is turning white
In fear of loose memories not sewed on yet
And a silver-less night of tomorrow
Maybe red will be the next best thing

I really did sit there pulling out brick after brick
When I was told that there are stories in every masterpiece
I'm on the 67th story and yet I see the same words engraved in every piece:
One doesn’t break someone down to build themselves up
One doesn’t light fires just to smell the smoke
And one doesn’t close themselves off so someone else can search for them.

can I swallow your pills / you can swallow my pain / watch thunderstorms travel hills / watch me vandalize old trains / swim with city lights and / smoke night pollen / give up all your fights / don’t hear the daytime callin

in my nightmares you sport black shirts with the collars rolled up and red sleeves for misunderstood stories. i have silver chains and a purple heart because of swallowed rocks and sold out moons that melt when the galaxies start exploding. at 2:47am we went out for coffee at that cheap gas station store and left the cliffs to the colours of an April sunrise. "the bird's eye still doesn't see everything" you said, and its stamped on my cheekbones. every time red blooms through the sky i see roadmaps to Windsor where those playground swings still reach for more of our memories but eventually they get burned down too

I was never told how I was to grow
I was never told which heart to sew
Grow up strong; grow up weak.
Grow up happy; grow up weeping.
Strong heart, hard face
Run faster, you're in a race.
What if every word that flew out of your mouth
Was written on your skin.
I'll tell you, they're engraved in me.
On every wall within
These words are not boomerangs,
You can't ever have them back.
But these words are boomerangs,
They will be thrown at your back.

Towers popping out of holes and gaps and
Missing parts of time like
They were built from lemon juice and
All the right clock pieces
Really they’re salty regrets from the
Seconds we carefully lost
In silver keys and gold buttons
Engulfing most of the trees we
Attempted to plant
If you give artificial
You do not receive authentic
So even the most opaque ebony nights
Won’t knock on your window
When all you caused were transparent
Plastic tasting [blue purple clouds]

I am what you’re alive for, and I’ll let you start over,
And over again, before the last chance you have is done.
My name is life; though it’s not always fun.
I live in your veins and breathe in your heart,
My name is passion, and I am very smart.
You were born to use me,
To live by me,
And to inhale and exhale me.
My name is love.
You can’t run away from passion, life, or love
But this might inspire you to bring out what’s underneath to above,
To let your inner Van Gogh out or maybe, just your soul.
Pleasing anything and everything but you,
They made it your ultimate life goal.
You may still think that’s exactly what you want.
Engineers, lawyers, doctors with crazy fonts.
But you come to think that maybe that’s not for everyone…
And for that, they all make fun.
But maybe, you’re good for something that doesn’t need you
To memorize formulas, letters, numbers, symbols alike, it’s true!
Maybe you, need to be memorizing shapes, lines, colours, and words that rhyme.
Despite the way no one else has your kind of flow, it isn’t a crime.
Don’t worry about judges or surgeons, with their fancy titles and big pay,
They have their own light, their own great ways.
If you’re better with a paintbrush, then stroke away, or splash, or stipple.
Anything to show them that art is not that simple.
Its takes courage to speak out what the world craves to be said,
If one doesn’t write books or poems, there’s nothing that will be left to be read,
And children rely on stories, it’s what keeps them innocent.
It also keeps the rest of us wide awake and vigilant.
So the world bursts at the seams,
With people aching to fulfill their vibrant dreams,
Of being the ones who can finally fly; oh so very high.
The world is bursting at the seams,
With people craving to feel the colours in ungrouped teams,
That pop and crackle and spark when touched.
Turn into stardust and glitter but in the hands, are tightly clutched.
But there might be a need of people,
Who love dandelions more than roses,
Who stand strong, even as every door closes.
Who play with ice rather than fire,
Who from their risk takings, would never retire.
And who rather they feel the softness of the sand
When the wind blows it around on the beach in their hands,
Than the blankets that they sleep on.
Who look to clean the chessboard of their enemy’s pawns.
But what we see is mainly what we hope to find,
And if we look at life with love we can find it to be amiable and kind,
One can achieve their goals if they let go of the headaches for a second.
Impossibilities should never be counted, thought of, or reckoned.
So breathe; you don’t have much left of your fast travelling time line.
Recite; you don’t have much air left but your voice is just so fine.
Write and your fingertips will never stop screaming,
Just like if you run, you will never stop beaming,
Never hitting the pavement with the steps of wraith.
And if you can feel... then you will always keep close faith.
You have not badly slipped, or played the wrong note.
Because even in the midst of beautiful gardens,
Weeds were never remote.
And then you walk through the streets of love.
Hand in hand with a culture fitting you like a glove,
As the smoke draws you in a feeling not unfit;
Feelings your heart clenches; at least you can hold it.
Some have lost this rare, valued treasure,
In the waters of functions and formulas, always measured.
So never swim with them if you are one to tight line,
At the end of your life you can say, “This life is mine.”
Always one to dream, never one to follow
Never let them tell you the mind is hollow
Always experiment, don’t be the child of a shadow.
And they put art at the lowest hierarchies,
Displacing the solution to locks on creativity.
Saying art is nothing but they don’t know where we’d be
Had shapes not evolved and paintbrushes never
Met paint and gave birth to an image you can see.
That you mixed and threw together, you’re clever,
No canvas should ever be empty,
Odd reasons say still… there are plenty.
And only an artist can solve that problem.
Breathing life into objects, one can make into an emblem.
So now what you do without math, science, or neither?
Yeah… I wouldn’t give up either.

-look at the sky more often, it puts your day into perspective so that all the burn marks you thought were going to be blue holes in your skin feel like galaxies instead; the sky's taken up your problems so that you have none and you're still crying about a 56 on your science test, one that won't matter in the long run.
-drink water, flush out all the worries and fears and bad vibes with each swallow, you're not eating rocks for dinner anymore. you're flowing with so many ideas and thoughts and talents inside, make sure you don't drown them.
-fold your collars back down, you can keep your guard up using the bones in your neck but you're strong enough to withstand a little wind here and there. maybe you don't need the practice anymore but the sun while shine on you anyway like the moon still keeps watch and eventually you'll have nothing to be wary of fighting about

Keep your tears in
They collect on the pavement
With the rain
Like alphabet soup
They form
Letters with the potential
To make sense and form
Words but are too
Lost and mixed up
Whereas my tea sits in silence
And doesn’t have to
Speak to know that
You don’t want to talk