You were the Barbie jeep engineer.
You were the 5-card pinochle player.
You were the gripe to do the dishes.
You were the patient mall bench sitter.

You were Elvis Presley records and
paper backed crime novels.
You were my new antivirus software.
You were the chatter in the middle of an
NCIS episode.
You were the "It's okay, sweetie" on the
other end of the phone.

You were the voice of every bathtime storybook.
You were the baking soda on my first wasp sting.
You were the green Ford Escort parked
outside my middle school every afternoon.

You were the loudest clap at my graduation.
You were the sticky caramel corn crumbs in the
living room that held the place together.
You were the laughter

You were the toolkit when my pictures hung crooked.
You were the cornerback baker, the pecan pie maker,
dance recital seat saver and the road trip driver.
You were the puppy-dog pill-giver and the
broken heart mender.

You were the church goer and the goodness seeker.
You were the black-haired teaser and the
very best secret keeper.
You were a prideful wig wearer and
wheelchair rider.

You were a cancer fighter.

You were my first call.
You still are.

I wanted to go everywhere with you,
to dive into your past, the beautiful and the *****.
To meet every version of self you have ever been.
I wanted to see your frosting stained smile
on your 8th birthday. To know you when
innocence and hope still reigned.
I wanted to hear your midnight laughter on an
ordinary Tuesday in California. To sit on the floor in
that apartment that you couldn't afford to furnish.
I wanted to walk hand in hand
through the years of your life.

And when my curiosity had been sated
with endless waves of knowledge of you,
I had hoped you would've liked to
walk through my stories.
To meet the now-gone women
who molded my soul and gifted me with
love and a sarcastic sense of humor.
I wanted you to greedily feast upon all my days gone by.

Armed with an overwhelming acceptance of one another,
I hoped we would embark on a path we forged together.
I dreamt that when I savored pasta in Venice,
I would look up to see you sitting across the table.
I imagined that your smile was the last delight
I would feel before I slowly drifted to sleep in Amsterdam.
I thought the next time I dove under a salty wave,
It would be you at my side.

I wanted to experience every taste, every touch
and every breath with you standing next to me.
For, life was more beautiful with your hand in mine.
You were my welcome rose-colored glasses,
now laying shattered on the floor.

Without you I see the world in
all of its harsh grotesqueness.
Without your cloud of sweetness,
My past pain and horror yet unknown
have taken on new strength.

I now only wish to travel back to the time,
when I thought I had a chance with your heart.

Some people feel their pain with grace.
Some people swallow their emotion and let
It claw out of their chest with an exquisite
Spray of blood and a melodious sob.
Some people wake every morning,
Sure that they are alive because their heart
Is adorned with the scars to prove it.
Some people are a pretty kind of sad.

Other people are brutish transformers.
Other people quietly inject their toxic pain
Into their bloodstream and wait for it to run its course.
Other people work every day to sweat it out,
But never quite feel clean enough.
With clogged arteries, other people explode.
Their pain takes their power and other people
Break things, break people, break love.

In hiding you will find only danger;
There is never anything beautiful about anger.

Your smile is a shiny serrated knife,
Divine, but deadly.
With the power to mesmerize my mind
And to slowly, beautifully put an end to me.

One layer at a time, you peel back my skin.
And even as the blood begins to seep out of my pores,
I will delight in the pleasure of your attention.

The pain of the lacerations caused by your kisses,
Barely an afterthought -- to plague me only after
The door shuts behind you and the memory of your spirit
Is the only thing left to violently wake me in the middle of the night,
So that torturous thoughts of you can pour out onto my pillow.

My body heaves trying to purge itself
Of the wonder it still holds for your soul and the
Desire for your skin still pulsing through every vein.

But to rid myself of the memory of you,
would leave only a breathing corpse, for your fingertips
have grazed every fiber of my being.

My brain is a clock.
tick tock
Since the last time we spoke,
Since that time your laughter colored the air and my cheeks a pretty pink.
tick tock
Since the last time your hand found its way into mine,
Since that time your tender touch cleansed each pore of my skin.
tick tock
Since the last time your body shocked mine into euphoria,
Since that time your warm mouth proved to be the key to my pleasure.
tick tock
Since the last time I looked into your eyes and found my home,
Since that time I saw your smile and knew I would never need another.
tick tock
tick tock
tick tock
The hands in my mind have counted
Each agonizing second since you left.

Come to me, darling,
in the midst of this sleet storm.

Come with your chest open,
your heart pumping.

Forget the words I thew and
the glass that screeched across the room.

Forget the night you held my hand
and whispered her name.

Don't bring a bouquet of apologies
or a fistful of daises.

Don't tuck your marionette strings in
your back pocket.

Leave all your master tools at home,
and come home into my arms.

Lay with me and show me the ****
interior of your veins.

Break apart my rib cage and steal
a gulp of air from my lungs.

Borrow a scalpel and let's peel away
the layers of each other's skin.

****** the bed in the process, but
bask in the honesty of muscles and tendons.

Reveal to me secrets hiding in your intestines,
and I'll introduce you to the skeletons in my mind.

Risky? Yes. But maybe we'd be a pretty kind of sad,
like a broken butterfly wing stuck to the pavement.

Fall. Fall with reckless abandon.
Fall into her and enjoy the
Bliss before you hit the ground.

Dance with her body,
Make love to her soul.

Entice her to stay with your kisses,
But don't trap her with your words.

Love her.
Love her until the love is gone.
Then be grateful it existed at all.

Hope is cruel liberation from a secure foundation in reality.
I hope.
On the inhale, desire fills my lungs with fairy dust.
On its release, longing shocks me like an intoxicating form of torture.
I hope.
The first time you called me an "*******" we shared a glance
that sent a lightning bolt down my spine.
I hope.
When you plopped down beside me, your tattoo peeked at me from beneath your sleeve.
It read like an invitation addressed only to me.
I had never seen anything more beautiful.
I hope.
When our minds danced, I realized what I had been missing.
The taste of your raspberry lips lingers on mine.
I hope.
Maybe love cannot conquer all, but you have conquered me.
I surrender to my hope.
I hope for "us."

If the angel of the girl I once was didn't
fly so far away from where I am, I would
stick Forever Stamps on a million notes,
hold them together with a broken pinky
swear and send them to her like a bundle
of weary promises. I would instruct her
to clutch them against her fluttering chest
for a moment or two, then scatter them like
breadcrumbs leading home.

I would send her the night you showed up
drunk and giggled your way into my bedroom,
where you collapsed on the chair in the corner
that was covered in the silhouettes of song-birds.

I would send her how it felt when you hugged me
onto you lap, my thighs squishing on the top
of yours. Our laughter melded with the Joni Mitchell
lullaby humming on the small side table.

I would send her how we looked, your nose brushing
mine and the silly smiles that made kissing impossible.
We couldn't have looked pretty, with your wide waist and
my blemished skin but I'm sure we looked lovely--in-love.

I would send her the taste of your tongue after you
whispered in my ear with hot, sweet breath, "I'm happy,
more than I have ever been before." I believed those
tickles of your thoughts, because I was too.

But most importantly, I would make sure to send her
a final note that included the creak of my bed as you
sat up and the sound of your soft footsteps padding
towards the for as you left my lying there.

A bug-like being crawled up your spine,
Its many feet clicking on your bones.
The movement was scarcely perceptible under your barely bulging skin.

The closer he got to your brain, the faster he clicked.
His anticipation was tangible, translated into your erratic acts.
He saw your thoughts, he smelt your love.

He hungered for your sanity,
With huge, dilated, droopy eyes and a salivating mouth.
It held a long sloppy tongue, that left its sizzling slime along his path.

Upon reaching your brain stem he used his sharp incisors
To take a mouthful of your rational. It fed him.
He rejoiced, throwing his head back in malicious laughter.

With new energy, he slithered around your skull
And barged into your frontal cortex.
Your judgement forever altered, now under his command.

His delight was overwhelming. In his pleasure,
He covered your cells in his hot, heavy breath.
It was poison, acting against all remaining sensibility.

As he devoured your corpus callosum, he spawned another head.
This one small and sleek, covered in slime,
With black beady eyes.

The new head drilled to the core of you and reeked havoc
On your amygdala and hippocampus.
You are gone. You no longer remember how to feel.

He is almighty.
The movement of your limbs is no longer your own.
Your words are first conceived in his belly.

He cares about nothing but consumption and destruction.
He is starved for pain, he needs to breathe in the
Cries of those who love you the most.

You can no longer notice the beauty in
Your daughter's smile, rather you smell the tears
Resting in her eyes still so full of adoration.

Love is a messy business; even in the best situations:
Two people, two hearts, two souls crash together.
In mock protection they fight against each other,
Against the pleasure, against the possibility.
Claws thrash, tearing at tendons until
The blood spatter is no more
Than a pretty trail of desolation.

Everywhere I turn, I slam into memories of you.
They pop up like brick walls, creating a maze out of my life.
I can't find the way out, I can't escape.

Each morning, the toothbrush you left in my bathroom,
adds a new **** to my chest. The scar tissue tells the
tale of the many hours we wasted in laughter and in bed.

Each afternoon, the book you left on my shelf,
hits me like a nasty right hook, as I collapse on the couch.
The same place where you once kissed me so tenderly,
I swore could feel the happiness dripping from my pores.

Each evening, the liquor you left in my kitchen
slides down my throat like fire. It engulfs my
esophagus in flames, when my mind refuses
to forget the night you brought it over,
and danced with me in front of the stove.

I can't escape,
I miss you too much.

I was pulled from the comfort
of sleep and warmth by my
father's voice from the floor
below. "Double-time girl,
we're going to be late!"
I hurried down the stairs
of our home to slip into
winter boots and zip up
my puffy winter coat.

In the garage, my dad was
already in his gray van.
I opened the passenger door,
climbed up over the rusted
rims and plopped into the
seat next to him. The cold
raced to reach my body. I
buried my bare hands in my
sleeves and prayed my wet hair
wouldn't freeze into icicles. I
could feel the stitches of the
leather pressing through my jeans.
Even they were cold.

My father's figure sat hunched in
the seat next to me. He gripped
the steering wheel with black
gloves. Staring forward,
he considered big things:
chemical structs and his
wife's lingering debt.

A familiar melody began to
waft out of the radio. Oops.
That meant that I had made
us  late to school...again.
At 7:35 each morning
Garrison Keillor's voice
spoke on something my
parent's called the Writer's
Almanac. I listened with
fascination to his voice,
which seemed to promise
each listener an afternoon
backstroke through the
milky way and the strength
to land, with grace, on Earth's
hard ground.

Out my window,
I watched the early-morning
breadwinners rushing to buy
their fuel: gasoline
and coffee. I wondered
if I could ever be good
enough, worth enough to be
mentioned by Keillor.
What could I do? What
would make me special?
Should I write poetry?

The episode came to a
well-known, comfortable
close: "Be well, do good
work, and keep in touch."
I hoped to do just that.

My dad's sudden voice
brought me back to his
shaky van. "****."
He too had been
wondering.

She sat alone on a pretty park bench, breathing
in the ugly air. She had encased her body in layers of
wool and worry, but it didn’t keep the cold out.
She felt. She felt the hard wooden boards beneath
her thighs and the metal pressing into her vertebrae.
Her fingertips secretly snuck out of her unraveling
gloves; they were still chapped from endless empty
nights, still grasping for a warmth they knew long ago.

An odor emanated from a pile of courage
in the corner. The lump moved to her throat
and conjured a swarm of guilt like spears that left
scars on her lonely lips and bruises on her unforgiven
hips. She watched as the men splurged together on the
serendipity found in a half-eaten, tofurkey concoction.

Killing the ruins of peace in her desert
chest, she was pulled to the shore. Tasting
the salt on her cheeks and the salt in the air,
gravity guided her to her knees. The water
soaked through her jeans, chilling her knees
and conquered the remnants of her soft spine.
Two bony hands then emerged from the dark
and encircled her homeless heart.

Death is a funny thing.
I pictured him large, intimidating,
With a barbed wire tattoo encircling a large bicep.
I expected to find him lurking in the dark,
With the face of a monster.

Instead he showed up in the daylight, unassuming,
Wearing a bow-tie and a shiny smile.
I only later noticed that under his trench coat,
He hid his secret weapon of cell mutation.

He politely knocked on your door and insisted
To come in and sit down for tea.
Sensing your apprehension, he engaged in silly negotiation
To disguise his true determination.

In the end, he gently took your hand
And slowly pulled you away from me.
He got off on the agony that manifested itself
Within my heart and on my face.
His pleasure increased with each inch he dragged you,
Only reaching ecstasy with the final yank,
When I was sure that my children would never know
Your kindness as I had.

Daydreams rescue me from the harshness of the mundane.
I see us on a mountaintop, I feel your hand in mine.
I experience the safety of your embrace and the electricity of your kiss.
I bask in the warmth of your smile and
Let my heart fly away with hope.
I imagine our home, a small cottage overflowing with contentment.
I imagine our bedroom, a soft bed sits between its walls,
Still disheveled from last night's pleasure.
I see your figure in the shower, as I brew coffee in the early morning.
I feel the desire in the goodbye kiss that makes me late for work.
I envision the power of our love.

However, imagination is also brutal torture,
That sometimes runs rampant through my mind.
I feel my heart break in two, as I see you with someone else.
I watch you loving on her in the way I wish you only did to me.
I see her walk away from you, but the pining in your chest remains.
I am convinced that as I lay here dreaming of nothing but you,
You are consumed with thoughts of her.
I imagine your cries of pain are caused by her absence
and I know that I will never be able to fill the cracks she so
mercilessly hammered into your heart.