There are people I've seen on the train from the coast to my home
whom I've made eye contact with and loved
                                                                           the confused, weary look
and I wonder if they know which stop to get off
or if they've considered
                                       waiting til the last one and seeing where that will take them.
There was a man in a dark blue cardigan and a beige plaid scarf
sleeping the whole way through and I thought
I'm happy for you, you're content. But I could never love you
the way I loved the man
                                         who spent the ride staring at a paper in his hand
only glancing up once to catch my gaze
and smile.

Here's a half-naked picture of me
because your father is an alcoholic
and mine used to beat me until I left.
Another **** rip for my straight-A sister,
a hole through the wall for my mom,
scratches on my hips from secrets I should have kept.
Here's mascara on every pillow case I've ever owned
blood on my jeans from biting my nails
and pressing them face down to smother
the redness and keep it from my hands.
Another stab wound through my papers
because these words, they don't scream, they scratch
ever-so-slightly at the inside of my skull.
But I yank out the wrong wires and so it goes.

My mother's not an alcoholic but she's plenty of things I'd like to sing
Thanks for criticizing my skinny jeans and ****** up child hood teeth.
Here's to making my first girlfriend cry and squashing my beliefs,
a toast for being paranoid and obsessed with what you lack.
Better swallow all the car keys, mom, cause I may not come back.

And dad, thanks for slowing down the car so I could stick my head up
for knowing my mom is unstable and when I should just shut up.
Here's to holding me down and bruising my wrists and daring me to leave
because what I found and loved and lost is more than I could ever begin to believe.

So here's to my brother who got the short end of the stick
cause I was born so ******* intelligent
And here's to the buddies who left me on my own
Because we're all too lazy to pick up the ******* phone

Said I'll splatter my brains across your bedroom mirror and serial killers don't have motive,
not everyone knows enough to know what they don't,
but if this isn't the so-called "real world" I don't know what is.

So here's to death, Mr. Portuguese, zodiac signs, poor stitching and the trees (and their leaves.)
So here's to now, Mrs. Angel face, you've finally got your perfect family (and you see)
SO HERE'S TO THIS, my dear bestest friend, to laying in the tub at 2 am (til 4 am)
And here's to wrinkled toes and kissing, to grass stained jeans and living where you are (you've gotten far)

And you can try to end it all but they'll probably just hit you,
And when you go to therapy I'd like to be there with you
Because I don't think they know what they've got
No they don't know, they don't know
they don't know.

So here is you, living on the streets. I'd give it all away so we could be (why not happy.)
So here's to you, open heaven gates. Jesus knew that death awaits us all (well all fall down.)

Everyone I love is dying, everyone I love is dying (screaming) x how ever many times you feel
And I
am
dyyyyyying too.

What if a heart were made of chewing gum
and the leftover clippings from bird wings
tied together with frayed ****** seat belts
surrounding a core of fake diamond earrings.
There's a song out there written about me
and over fifty-seven poems written by me,
although not one of them encompasses the longing I have
to stare into the mirror and love myself from root to tip
like a tree that's grown on the side of a cliff.
You said extended metaphors seem to be "my thing."
I say home is a song my Vovo would sing,
"Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be."
It went on to talk about the future,
but I haven't gotten that far yet.
My discount heart
will keep pumping.

Come to think of it,
I'm not so sure
if I ever did
get the water out of my ears
that found its way in there
during a pool party
four years ago.

The sheets lay in a disarray as I attempt to make my writing real
"Like mountains," she told me, "Like the deer on those mountains gasping
for your body and his to blanket the trees during the first snow in November."
And the warmth faded over five months ago. Seven, if we're being precise.
I want my sentences to end sharply as I send you and the car over a cliff.
Put a stone on the pedal and give it a swift kick.
Stand there, wind in my hair, a smile on my lips.
Whisper while it's followed with the warmth of the breeze
singing "I'll burn it all down before everything leaves.
I'll set fire to the houses and the people and the trees."
And you. You are the flame that never burns dry,
the oxygen part of the air in the sky. You are
the water that refuses to drown me. Sung, you
are the earth under my feet.

I'd be more afraid
if I believed
you were able to be attained.