Eighteen, recovering from a love that ripped through my spine
stole every goose bumped piece of flesh I thought I could call mine.
Swallowed my heart whole while it was still warm and beating,
cut my wrists with teeth so sharp and left me with constant bleeding.
Bruised my skull with questions, answers whispered soon after
broke my nose with a darkened mouth filled to the brim with laughter.
Snapped each fingertip and every bone that resides in my hands,
stared into my eyes and stole the light with every "can't."
Yanked apart my chest cavity and poked with rusty promise.
As for my faith, it's shriveled. Every cell in me is godless.
Poisoned my organs, shattered my hips,
chipped every tooth and put a **** in my lips.
Tore all my skin off from ear to ear
they pooled with blood til I could no longer hear.
Femurs both missing, knee caps displaced.
Shoulders and collarbones skinned both with haste.
Every inch of my body
broken and bruised.
Every thought in my brain
screams I have been used.
Every cell in my heart,
at the pit of your soul,
still sings for you, dear.
Our love it still knows.

How have you been?
I think I'm forgetting the touch of your skin
on mine and it's similar to the feeling of an ocean in my ears
water blocked my hearing and nothing is as near
as it should be. I might be hit by a train
because my senses are telling me it's far away.
I have time
to let you go like the monkey bar handles
don't want to fall beneath so I'll cling to the candle
lit bedroom I once had with my first lover ever
wanted incense and kissing and hands moving slower than heaven.
With you it was quick
like a pin to my chest
and you pulled away too early
so I bled and I bled.
It's healed over but I'm so tempted to pick
that little hole back and let the blood run thick.
At least then I'd know that I bled in the first place
instead of wondering if it was a stomach flutter
and not the lightning bolt
I wasn't looking for.

You are a ferris wheel operator because
you keep guessing why.
I'd like to tell you
that you've taken me higher than ever before,
made me see what I couldn't
don't know if I can anymore.
Because I swallow too many pills that are sweet on my tongue
listen to the same songs he showed me the summer before love
making it to the middle is absolutely good enough for me
if you can use me like a ladder and get higher than the lows of the sea
we are polar opposites.
Balance each other out,
we're the flat planes of Kansas and we're going down.
It's been said that a person is only an atheist until they're dying
I say everyone keeps loving until they're told they're lying.
Only the truest keep fighting to hold onto the middle
and never let their love weep like the tree of willow
said every single person deserves a second chance
until they use that one to pull a gun
and blame it on their parents.

I had a dream you were a fountain
                         filled with cancerous cells
multiplying to numbers I can't count
                                           cried to you in a cab,
but  you wouldn't accept me.
You've repressed me
             blocked me out.
I don't reside on the surface of your skin,
I am the slight tickle in your bones within
the marrow.
Do you ever wonder what piece of clothing has touched me,
if the hair you haven't cut remembers my scent
and I want to ask if you meant
you loved me straight through to my bones,
every beauty mark and mole,
all my fingers and toes
every word I spoke
with your head on my chest listening to my heart beat.
Do you strive to see bits of me in every person you meet
or do you think they're too good for me,
                           I'm too good for them?
Did you love my lows that go so far as the Mariana Trench,
straight shot right up to Mars, higher than sitting atop the globe.
Did you know
you are my "it" and I can't let
that go.

When did you feel the most beautiful you've ever felt?
When it sent a lightning bolt through your bones and hit
every pore, caused your hair to stand on end
and your heart to pump more blood,
like you couldn't fit all that living into one breath
you needed the whole. When the sheets on the floor looked like the entire ocean
stretched out before you, your body is a boat, a vessel for another person's life
not a stitch of clothing on and not a single speck of dust
in the air of the bedroom. Lights wrapped around your ankles like
you're above the sun rather than underneath it,
but there are no boils on your skin and your scars have smoothed.
There are no hands on you
but your own and the ones of every person you've been before.
Shedding skin cells with every brush of a finger on your wrist
and this is it.
You promised yourself, I love you now.
I love all of you, somehow I always have. Not a stitch
of clothing
not a hand
held to your body warmth
and you're beautiful alone
you're the ocean and the boat.
I'm trying to write until I can't anymore
and it's words that flow out and it's sentences that pour
no longer about those lost, but those living,
and the ones that I strive to keep close, to keep giving
every bit of me away and I'll gain each part back
from other breathing and split ends and cells,
I don't need others to feel well.

Four letters, five. You're just like my child and I'll try my hardest to feed you wisdom
if you promise
not to spit it back up.
Kisses don't make the entire world better
but if it fixes your head, I'll kiss more.
I've never gotten stanzas quite
right
because sometimes I spend too long in one place and other times I
only spend the night.
You're unstable like the twin towers and I know that's harsh,
but your illnesses are tearing you apart
like planes, do you wonder who the people were and their
families? Their notebooks filled with words, little spots of blood from picking at their nails?
That's how mine are. Sometimes coffee stains, once in a while a tear
through the page from pressing down on my pen too hard. This is what a keyboard is for-
I don't need blood on my pages, but words mean more. Or do they?
I question that daily through texts and tea on my cell phone,
notebooks dusty under my feet with a leather strand braided to make it look neat
and spiritual. You're my baby.
I'll feed you love if you promise
not to spit it back up.

I spent my past few days sleeping through daylight
waking only to taste the raindrops collected on the outside of my window,
begging the sky to feed me more and the moon to lay me back to sleep.
Sweet dreams as pristine as snow grazed my cheek
screaming softly for me to embrace the weak and the months ahead
enveloping me in cool air, praying with cloudy hands that I'd stay awake, get out of bed.
But I looked to the stars and said please, I want to wake in the night
stay alone with my pen and my dusty floor, it's only right for
sheets to stay chilled without our bodies atop them
my heart lies somewhere else with a ferris wheel operator at the traveling carnival
bearded women and great lions that aren't really tame, only for a piece of steak.
But that's where I want to be- a traveling sales man. Buy my advice and keep me
close in your heart with each passing home. I'll sell you away and sail to the moon
with my traveling circus and on my name signed
wrote "Things do get better, it's all in your mind."
Award winning books with this written on each page
my friends and my lovers said it wasn't me that they'd need,
it was themselves. I agreed. It's myself that I want and myself that I hold dear,
I've gained enough courage to say this without a sneer. It's yourself you've got for good
with others passing daily. Sometimes stay for years, but you shed them like dead skin cells
and that's okay. Because the beauty underneath is worth all the rage
from losing a lover, fighting a friend,
missing a mother from letters unsent, unopened. Tied to balloons to get to her final resting place.
I'm rambling rambling lions tigers bears,
trees have been piling upon my back for years
but they're resettled themselves to build a home.
Everything I've collected makes sure I'm not alone.
Every memory and scar, each piercing word
ties me closer to myself and no one else.
"Things do get better, it's all in your head."
I wrote this on a book, I swore it. If it were a lie, I'd be dead.

There is classical music shaking dust from the ceiling tiles above
my bed warmed like a waffle iron, sheets lay in a disarray of the Rocky mountains
each crevice as hot as the bottom of my feet while standing on the sand of a beach
small summer shells tucked away in the top of my bikini
and you left to wait at your keyboard. Leave my head please.
I tried so desperately to write a poem without you hiding in each letter,
every word telling those hurting who hurt me before that it will get better.
I'm not lying to them, although I'd say it if I were. The music above me still plays
making colors swirl and bump together, standing side by side with my mother.
She called the other day, although I think I called her. Said thank you for
birthing me and raising me and feeding me and giving me a place to sleep
all in three words I haven't said before. Not in years.
I think I meant it. I wish I were sure.

There is nothing special about you and you expect me to write you a poem. Here:
You are waking up at 11 in the morning and still feeling groggy,
luke warm water left under my bed.
You are sea monkeys, a parasite, a slight sore throat.
You are what is created everyday, waste. Won't
you kiss me again, unbutton my jeans? Tell me to write for you
words that have meaning. But you're trying so hard to connect
while my hand has been on the plug and my mouth left your neck
months ago. That was months ago? Tell me again how you got that scar,
how anime is weird and I'm beautiful. You're nothing special to me.
Here is your poem. Stay in school. Fall in love, drink some more, buy a house,
I hope your father doesn't pass away.

I'm being pulled apart in two directions,
two people touching toes,
grasping hands with cracking winter skin
lean back
and yank with all your body weight and more.
Let the moon make you sway as if you're standing on the tides past the shore
leaning back further,
skin on the tops of your hands ripping apart ****** and dry.
I feel a furrowed brow with forehead muscles pressed together so tight
intensity in each other's eyes like there were forests that burned down
from a kitchen fire, a mother crying
begging them to save her family but they had already met at the mailbox
like they planned out years ago.
And the heels of the shoes are digging like crustaceans into the tile of the hallway,
little *****' sharpened legs endowed in seaweed and salt
hiding under rocks screaming so quietly
not a single fish in the sea heard them say
"stay."

There was a lemon tree that never bore lemons
still growing in the backyard of my grandparents' home.
Years passed climbing every tree around it
but never did my sister or I dare to yank on its branches.
"It's weak. Rotting from the inside out,"
but still standing.
The cherry blossom tree towers over it
sneakers often scuffed from the bark and knots.
Climb higher, so I did. I was the smallest.
Gaze down at the lemon tree from the highest branch I'd dare rest my weight on.
I have faith in you.
"Grow," but it didn't.
I spent all my years climbing every tree around it,
and the lemon tree stayed weak.
Stayed growing.
I stay faithful.

My list for this year:
No boxes or sparkles,
no red ribbons tied.
I won't ask for much-
1. Stay by my side.

It was the tears in my eyes that kept my vision blurred
so I laid my face down on a pillow and let it go, breathed
in through my nose, through the clean cotton, leaving black stains.
Did not replace my eyeliner, replaced my energy
with laughter
open windows
chubby fingers kissed constantly
laughter. I can take myself seriously
to the edge, but he can bring me back
down to earth. He can bring me back
to bubble gum lollipops and corny jokes.
Let me cry to you again, look up and laugh.
I'm sitting on the entire globe,
soaking up the oceans with my sleeves
forest trees stabbing holes in me
all the mountains raising me high enough
to look up,
thinking my god it's beautiful
that I didn't need to believe in god
to be happy again.
I just needed to believe I could be happy.

I'm going to the city on Friday
while I wish still that I could be holding your hand.
I realized a while ago that most of my poems
are directly addressed to you.
Take that as an honor, take a bow.
Take my hand and shout
you didn't want me every second of every day,
just when the weather was warm in the morning.
I want to tell you I'm done
falling against my dresser drawers
getting scratches on my back from anything
(except future lovers.)
I want to let you know I'm through
with scrolling down my contacts, clicking you
and giving up hope before it even rings once.
I want to inform you that I'm tired
of sleeping alone mentally with his arm around me physically
and the confusion that fills for when my heart quivers a bit when he-
let me stop there. I want to make sure you know,
I'm lying. That when
he looks into my eyes I feel nothing
but guilt.
That could very well be because I can't see clearly
through the tears blurring my vision,
when I try too hard to let go it leaves me scrambling
to my feet to catch my breath but it seems to have never lost me.
I'd still like to garden with you, wander New York City
you looking handsome and me looking pretty.
I'd still love you to be in my bed ev-er-y night
your breath on my neck
my eyes towards the ceiling tiles,
and they'll smile
because they already know your name.

Welcome home, we're proud of you
soft hands caressed my hair.
You're ghostly white and beautiful,
we'll care for you, my dear.
Lay you down on blankets
and sheets as pure as doves.
Kiss you on the temple
promise you our love.
You've returned to whence you came
please do not leave again.
From dust to life to ashes
your body you will shed.
Your soul has been marked black
we'll wash it clean with prayer.
In your heart you've always known
you didn't belong there.
So jump, my child, into our arms
we'll keep you safe forever.
Come back to the sky, it's simple now
you just have to pull the trigger.
Press down a littler harder on that blade,
swallow a few more.
Welcome home, we're proud of you.
With angels you will soar.

Their heads are filled with stories.
Hope for life after death.
The questions asked to many times,
what'd happen if I lept?
Would I still get into heaven if I took my own life,
would my father from above see my struggle and my strife,
would I be forgiven for giving up so soon
to be pulled back into angels arms
white clouds and perfect harp-played tunes.
If I quit this now, the fighting,
I'd be on the other side.
And we fill the heads of children
tell them that the pain subsides
when the kiss of deaths upon you,
the dead move into the sky.
And everything's eternal
when the last breath escapes
as a sigh.

I let my hands slip
from your shoulder blades
only a few seconds after your
arms had dropped to your sides.
Feel better, have a good night
but you can't cry to me anymore
you said it with your bloodshot eyes
the forcefulness of your voice proclaiming
that you've loved her for longer than anyone else.
I stood there, biting my lip thinking
does it really matter how long
you've loved someone for
or is it all based on how
hard you fight, the
passion in your
words and the
taste of your lover
printed all over your skin.
Two years of dim comfort cannot
combat two months of struggle, constant
kicking down of walls and kisses with smoke
in between. Letters miles long with the word "never"
attached to "stop" connected with "loving you."
Mattresses with sheets and easy sleep won't
compare to uncertainty of where to rest
my head, being more concerned with
the state of yours and your self
worth. Two months of loving
passionately does not even
need to fight against
two years of rest.
It always wins.

Chances are
you will not be anyone else's first kiss ever again,
if ever at all.
Anyone else's first love.
Being eighteen
you must have seen
promises scrawled on a picnic table
"4ever & always"
Chances are that ended at about two o'clock on a Sunday afternoon,
when the perfect boy for you
decided to move
five hours away for school,
and you couldn't take the missing him.
Forever ended.
I was twelve in my neighbor's basement
playing hide-and-go-seek.
I kissed first because I'm tired
of waiting, always have been
the one to leave my eyes open
just a bit.
You'll be perfectly okay when someone who has loved
someone before you
loves you now.

Indecision holds my passion;
I love hard from loving rarely.
**** out the marrow of your bones
while the flesh of my wrist
has barely been kissed
by anyone else.
Wanting to devour you
starved for something true,
like icicles so cold the heat pulses through
turning the tops of my hands uneven and red
I love like roadkill
sticky and dead.
Black rubber tired marks over the head
of an animal begging to leave or be left.
If the timings not right, those leaving are left
and the ones who hold on are swept away on tides
on the rain water missed
by gutter grates, reaching out
empty and dried.
Depending on a single element results in no fire
no breath or no way to walk,
no source of life.
If the timing's not right
those leaving are left
and not for a second did I anticipate death.

It's really very lovely
how my heart aches for you so terribly
there are fisures in my rib bones.
How I crave to know the pieces frozen underneath
in hibernation as you use up your energy
hidden to heave your chest
up and down.
I've bitten you til your skin was purple,
said I felt like I was part of the universe
and you were a part of me. Human nature
is just that,
nature.
With all the chemical reactions and nerves firing
inside my brain, I don't mind if there isn't something greater.
This is more than good enough,
it's everything I could muster from my deflated lungs
to say to you, we are a part of the world and you
are a part of me. Should I wrap it up with ribbon,
char the edges with a match? Write it down in blue pen
sign my name in cursive. Say, you are a part of me
I am a part of you. We share this energy,
but it's past tense. I need to start anew.
I bit you til your skin was purple, yellow, green
colors swirled around the center
giving a meaning
to life.

Scissors used to make paper snowflakes
sharp metal used to cut the strings,
let you fall out of my head but stay
pumping blood through my veins.
My fingertips are blue
from holding onto you,
I think it's time to thaw them out.
There's not another word that I can shout
at the tip top of my voice at the highest point.
Nothing else is loud, screeching breaks in my ears
After all my weakness, this is not my greatest fear.
Cutting the ties, breathing you away
locking up our memories inside a plastic cage.
Breathe my own scent in, stay in rhythm with my steps.
Ninety-nine percent of my cells will be kept
for myself. One percent for you.
You'll always have a section where my feelings  are warm and true.
Cut the strings, I'm letting you fall
down my scalp, my mouth, my throat
to my stomach, thighs and knees
letting you
escape me.

I want you to know I didn't mind the cold
of the tiles, sliding under the bathroom stall door,
holding your hair back and you laughed
when I did. Thank you, for listening
and talking even more. For raising your voice
but not slamming doors. Thank you for being
exactly who you are. We're lost, that's okay,
let's go downtown to a bar. No, thank you,
for being there when I threw up, too.
Regurgitate my feelings for every person new
and thank you for not dying, for crying to your mom.
I wish I had the courage to stop singing the psalms
at church earlier than this. I should have believed in myself,
the way you believe in me. I want you to know I see
the bits of you that you dislike, I'll love them all the same.
And thank you, too, for making sure I don't hold all the blame,
for taking some of the weight
off my shoulders. For being there
when I do things to build myself back up.
Thank you, thank you, thank you,
It will never be said enough.

The top of my head is warmer than my hands,
gloves and boots are getting quite damp
from the snow. I've never known
how much people thought of me
reading it in words forces my eyes open
to see bare feet wading into a pool
deep into the autumn, months past high school
graduation. Hot metal seats never had me smile,
Christmas trees past Christmas and broken ceiling tiles
are what I've lived for the past few years,
my laugh genuine bringing up tears
penguin underwear
everything I thought I'd never share
and my head is always hot and heavy
with my boots firmly on the ground.
There's sunshine in the coldest days
if you open your ears to the sounds.

Let's take a recording of your heart beat
incorporate the cardiac sounds
into a song,
send them on their way with nothing missing
something left behind.
Quiver and shake for nineteen days
stop short.
The world asked for a recording of your heart beat
to feel something alive and true.
Pass the green beans, tie your shoe
but it will never be that a head is laid on someone's chest
stillness in the room and a simple beat
something rhythmic to tap your feet
to. Quiet in the house, let's remember
there are people in need,
and people right here
who need us.
There are enough empty houses to give every homeless person four,
enough empty words to take them all back.
We're concerned with the cancerous children,
worried about the stray dogs and cry over
those without enough to eat. Food for the soul
is more rare than carrots these days. Take my hand and listen,
I'm right here and always have been.
Stop trying to find the missing girl three states over
and begin to search for yourself.

You were in the reflection of the car window at a stoplight,
sitting on the "rent-a-center" couches.
You are the highs in my voice as I'm screaming at the top of my lungs
the scuff on the front of my shoe.
You are dried salt at the corner of my eyes begging to be mined
used to save meat and people from themselves.
You are a blackened screen of a cell phone, you are lonely without light.
You are an empty bottle of pills, you are the scars left from a fight.
You are everything with meaning, yet you only live at night.
In the morning when I wake up you are not there.
You're a whisper from the open window, pushing in cold air.
You're a single word at dinner that I can barely hear.
You're the warmth held in the blanket from my toes up to my throat,
you're a crumpled up old letter, the word "love" scrawled in a note.
You're the biting cold upon my fingers that I cannot seem to shake.
You are everything to me at night,
gone in the morning when I wake.

She's sick of synthetic happiness,
smoke that makes her smile.
She'll kiss you in the moment,
thinking wow it's been a while
since she has felt alive,
or anything really.
She still didn't feel it with lips against hers,
***** and coffee (that's a thing, she learned.)
French toast at 3 am, let's drive around
scream at the tops of our lungs
"Did you make it to the milky way to see the lights are faded?"
the colors are faded,
I'll watch her blood fade as it mixes with hot water
swirls around the drain.
She's done telling me that the red won't change a thing
because our breath won't change a thing,
and the drinks won't change our heads
and the lips won't fix my missing you
I don't want to be here,
but where.
Run around the car three times at a red light,
try out listening to that new band.
Go to a club, wear something tight.
Drink more, stumble, laugh,
kiss someone you don't have feelings for.
Thank someone for saying you're pretty,
smoke another cigar. Inhale through your nose,
smile big in pictures,
smile big at people who smile big at you.
Slow dance drunk in the common room,
crack your back, love, call him up,
throw things. This isn't a poem.
It's a list.
Of what
has not
once
made me feel okay again.
Here is a list of
what makes me feel
at all:
you.

Maybe tomorrow
or the next day
     the next?
Possibly I'll find a loophole
to avoid getting this fixed.
And next week I'll crumble
from neglecting my head,
next year there is a chance
that I'll be bled out and dead.
Hell, an hour from now
a plane might fall
dive into my building.
I wouldn't mind if a disaster
accidentally killed me.
Tomorrow or the next day
or the next day or the next.
I'll never get it done, I know,
I'll never be my best.

You are not the ocean because I do not know that well,
you are not a meadow nor a stroll around the park.
None of these things mean much to me, although
they're beautiful in and of themselves.
You are the scent of incense that used to attack my nose,
eventually I craved it, now the smoke in my room grows.
You are laying on my back in the middle of the road
a kickball flying over me, no worries in the world.
You are a caterpillar making it's way across the street,
climbing onto my open palm so that we may personally meet.
Suction cup feet, pipe in it's mouth a formal way of greeting me.
You tickle my taste buds like peta chips,
you're like sleeping through Christmas morning
(something I could never miss
on purpose,
but if I'm tired enough, I might accidentally oversleep.)
You are grass with ants on each blade
but I lay in you anyway
roll around
breathe
it in
laugh, think,
when did this begin?
When I stopped appreciating little things.
The freezing water of a pool in the shade,
baked beans and a fire place.
New York City vendors
selling handicrafts.
My town written down
tucked away with other maps.
You are
an apple all sliced up without the skin,
you are the worm inside it, too.
Where did this begin?
You are a tree,
now trace my roots,
later trace my skin.
But only when I've figured out
what's missing from within.

Heart beat- rhythmic,
Sleeping- poor.
Not even for a second did I think
we'd be less
than more.
Crack me wide open,
scream to my lungs,
bite at my muscles,
cut out my tongue.
Burn all the ropes down
keeping me up.
Not once in my own thoughts
have I been enough.
I've slept in far too many beds,
too many hands have touched me.
I've tasted far too many boys,
made love just once under the sea.
You're beautiful but I am not,
I am three-fourths used up.
I know I've lost a lot.

Dancing without music
means more to me than ***.
Avoided it completely
when there appeared a next.
Although the universe would never
have the ability to make
another you
or I
if it tried billions and billions of times.
I will save dancing for you,
                  black coffee, too,
                  everything that I once knew
          keep the songs we listened to
together sacred.
But let the other inside my body.
Never my mind,
never my mind.
If it were opened he would find
****** ****** suicide
always low and never high,
smoke has choked my lungs, they're dry.
Every breath becomes a sigh.
Every word I speak- a lie.
Nothing lives above the sky,
there is no white-bearded guy,
light is in-creas-ing-ly shy.
These thoughts belong to me, they're mine.
You were too, and then we quit.
Gave up, went deaf and mute and this
is you, at the tops of buildings now.
Your gun aimed at my head and, wow,
I wouldn't blame a single cell
inside your body
for pulling the trigger.

Did you laugh?
I want to know, when you read what I wrote.
Did your teeth show?
Did your nose blow
out more air than usual?
Did you smile real big and think
of how much I think of
you?
How badly I want you to be proud,
even if it wasn't about me in your words,
I'd believe you if you told me so.
Did you laugh, did your teeth show?
Did your body dream of falling
without your head in the same thought?
Be happy for no reason.
                       every reason.
I like the summer but I like the spring,
          orange leaves and aspirin
                                         showers
holding your hand. Fried chicken,
balloons, a football field
and you.

Cracks in glasses
             on a screen
             on a gravestone
Drops of sweat
                          on me.
And you
               are the salt in the water of the ocean,
               can change the tides of the sea
                                                             ­      in a single wrist motion
I could never
                      comprehend why I was pushed away
                      stop from being pulled back in by the waves
                      avoid being smoothed down like sea glass
                                                           ­                   empty clam shells
What I know
                      I cannot tell you
                        will not admit
You are
              the fire
              the knot in the pit
of my stomach.

Don't make me explain it because
I won't, I can't, I won't.
There is cooled down lava jumping from my throat,
leaping to your face,
climbing up your nose.
Feeding on your insides,
hotter, hotter now, it glows.
From fingertips to fire
from whimpering to words here
I've written down my sorrows
in much less than a year,
never mind three months or four or six
I'm done with being second pick.
I'm tired of sleeping next to him,
I'm shot and burnt, been stabbed with pins.
Been opened up by knives and cutting
words they're just as sharp. I'll play
classical music, hear the symphony, the harp.
I've loved you once, twice, three times too
and I'll love you more to'morrow.
If what ever happens in my head
you, yourself, have not caused me sorrow.

Stuck to my computer screen like
dry ice
complaining about plane rides
bus seats warmed
by the people there before.
I mean to wonder why they went where they went to
but I don't mind much anymore.
Ask questions constantly and plan our escape
but it will never happen
your mindsets always flake
off and away we go just for the night
through poorly written paragraphs and
promises of flight.
Surrounded by "love love love"
it's all words though, that's not enough
to keep me going, stay on my feet,
gain the energy to take a running leap
Let me leave here and never return.
Every
everything I knew turned out to be unsure.

Is that what you're into,
saving girls from themselves?
So you could watch the bubbled flesh
show up less and less
often?
Well I have a roar now,
my whimper has ceased.
No need for working to try and save me.
I've been through worse bleeding
through other peoples' wounds,
my lover's wounds,
like an addiction.
Yours is to use a girl at her weakest
teach her to be strong, all the while
tearing her up due to friction
in your words.
I've learned some thing new:
You are not the sky. Not the earth, nor the sea,
you are not a canyon or anything grand to me.
You are not a drawing on a napkin made at lunch,
you are not a beetle, not the feeling in my gut.
You will not be the one she or I are searching for.
You're a user, an abuser, and you can never be much more.
I am not sorry, cannot be
if you want truth, please ask me.
I'd leave the bear on your doorstep
if I had gasoline
and with fingers crossed I'd wish so hard
it'd burn your heart down.

Maybe when it crumbles
there will be something better underneath.
For some reason unbeknownst to me
every time I think of the future
a lion is there inside my skull
roaring all orange and tangled up
stronger than anything I've known before.
It is hidden under the building,
the cities painted with reds and blues
faded into whites.
Blood, honor, purity.
We all wonder who
built this city with a lion
underneath.

You've been waiting in my backyard for a train since last September
and I haven't gotten anything to feed you but some crackers.
Methadone makes your father stumble, but what if he didn't take it?
I've never tripped on acid or shrooms. I fell down my basement
stairs, hit one by one. Onto the concrete and I only cried because it startled me.
There is an entire forest back there with horses and movie seats
both can take you somewhere. If the train never shows, I'll go too.
Hold my hands, they're bare, and raw are my feelings for you.
Raw is the piercing in my nose, the ground outside has frozen
I'll take nearly any challenge if it means an opportunity to know him
better than I know myself. That isn't really difficult since the way I look
into my full-length mirror only shows the surface. Never every nook
or crevice of my body, you viewed all of me cold in a shack.
I know what's there because I've never faced away, never been given the chance to turn back.

Heavy breathing
lighters bought too often from a walk right down the street
and for once I don't care what this boy thinks of me.
Our bodies mesh so nicely and my mind only puts out
whatever's said in whispers I cannot bear to think about.
Squeaking bed
and sleeping has now become the norm
rather than staying up til past six in the morn-ing to hear the other's voice.
Don't care if it's my lovers voice
knowing I hadn't made the choice to
stop
let me be on top.
I've never had a lover before that one,
not once had I stayed up until the dawn
waiting for the alarm to sound
to hear a voice that could make my heart pound.
Now it's a rhythmic beat
beat
beat
and I don't feel any true warmth underneath my sheets.

My body
ached for you. I ache for you. My shoulders pop
my knee caps too.
My spine is stuck in one position,
I need your fingertips on me.
My toes are constantly in movement,
feet unstable as the sea.
My skin is full of goosebumps,
teeth are clicking just like keys,
and finally my lips quiver
because they know where they should be.
I swear I hurt the most
with you right by my side,
my words striving to open up
the inside of your mind.
My body stretches every morn
and reaches towards the sky.
I'd rather reach for you, my dear.
Brittle bones, shaking heart, voice
dies.

You make my mouth dry,
palms all sweaty and cold
my brain works quickly and I feel
quite old
when I was up in the morning
with just edges of a dream
I don't understand
can you
stitch up the seams
my blood is clear like a ghost
whispy and thin
I don't want to forget but then again
what happens if I do and you cannot
adderall, alcohol, caffeine and ***.
smoke in my room, sweat on the sheets
you are everything I was meaning to meet.

Ten milligrams of adderall, bought from the girl across the hall.
Speaking in a British accent because I'm lovely at lying,
and even better at believing it myself.
I'm from London, Liverpool,
I'm from the deepness of the cut on your leg
from those flowers that looked harmless but they
scratched
at his truck, destroyed my luck while I was high
and you were too.
The tent is my place to be with you
with my thoughts being misconstrued.
I spoke with your name coming out of my mouth
staring at the ceiling and I didn't stop
giving up.
Stepping off a curb at the wrong velocity
can hurt your ears the way we
hurt me.

I had a dream about the ocean and you
were under my bed in a lounge chair,
tongue out, care free
you said you wanted to be kissing me.
And so we did. You laughed,
not thinking about the past
your father stumbling around your kitchen
or peanut butter sandwiches. We can
do anything really, but what we will do is
stay away.
From me. I mean, stay away from you.
You're like a whirlwind and you think
you'll bring me down, too.
But if my feet are planted
firmly on the ground,
or if I'm under the earth,
a whirlwind is better than the settling of dirt.
Lift me up and slam me down
I want me feet high
high off the ground.

All your art?
Your father threw it away,
sculptures of music that my
hands had helped
create.
It has molded in the yard,
cloth I had tied around my head
as I danced and we drank
malt soda. You've always
always always always
always been beautiful.
It doesn't take me to show
you that. You know.
The need of man's hand on the small of my back,
the shallow of my spine and the shallow of
myself is not art.
Your father threw your music in the yard,
your writing stays right on my desk.
Your words cannot be rotting in the woods,
they'll be safe here with me.

Bruises on my ribs from a rock beneath the floor of a tent,
bruises on my neck from your teeth and you have a beautiful
jaw line. My fingertips dip, you say. That isn't normal. And
colors in your eyes are impossible to replicate in my mind.
I'll study your face, the skin on the back of your hands and the
curve
of your bones. That word makes me nauseous. Curve
away from me, grow like a bonsai tree
I say please then whisper apologies
too often
I know exactly what I want but refuse to chase it
because I am temporary, I'll wound you and leave
a beautiful scar. You have a beautiful jaw
line.

You have the body of Jesus
strung up on the cross for everyone to see,
but it's only me you've sacrificed for.
Pale and thin, rib bones begin
right above the indent in your stomach.
I've cut you down from your cross,
no longer an example of imperfection.
I'll kiss the wounds left on your side by soldiers,
I'll kiss the wounds left on your hands by myself.
Lay you onto stone, your skin stays smooth
the cold no longer will effect you.
Remove all the light, wash off the dried blood
clean the dirt from your knees, that tears have turned to mud
put you to rest, bare and mute.
I'm sweating like I've walked for miles
in your boots.
I'd walk more
if it meant relieving the pressure of the cross you once bore.

Use a scalpel, all sorts of scans
my voice does not do justice to my plan
I will love everyday
and the reds won't fade
not yet.
While five minutes seems like eight hours
my brain uses up my body's power
I'd rather sleep
and keep you close to me
The things I say move towards destruction
and without your voice my head can't function
properly. I miss your feet, hands
tongue teeth elbows
I feel snow in my eyelashes as the wind blows
knock me down,
"sift through my ashes"
stay sober. Stay clean.
I can't rid myself of your energy.

Wake up, it's 3:07
and I don't think I'm at all what I used to be.
I think in times and have music playing inside me
while I kiss,
trace skin with my fingertips.
Whistling while you snore disrupts the chorus,
stop. I want to wake you up
and say I'm sad now, let's talk.
Dig deep to my core, but the dirt is damp
and it's easy. I haven't even given you a shovel.
I'll unearth myself on my own,
give your thoughts a place to call home
bury it back up again and
send you back to sleep.

I thought I'd miss your mouth the most,
worn down teeth all uniform
from grinding them in your sleep,
chapped lips, refusal to use chap stick.
I thought I'd miss your laugh the most,
uncomfortable and weary
unless you were with me,
and I thought I'd miss your body
hip bones making bruises on my inner thighs,
pull me closer closer when you hold me and my hands
never stopped.
This morning I miss the way you smell,
and I can't describe it.
Scent is most closely tied with memories.
I want to smell you on my shirt the next morning
before I even roll over onto my side and kiss those chapped lips,
see those worn teeth smile
feel your arms around me pulling me closer.
I want to wear your shirt to bed,
but it means nothing now that the scent has left.

My feet are swollen when I wake up,
place souls on the ground and the blood rush is enough
to keep me going.
Before I choose to quit walking in the weather all together
I'll walk backwards.
Bare hands against deep purple mittens,
like the story book in my room.
If anyone ever visits my house again
I must love them or I will not let them in.
How can I love them, if I do not let them in
and read childrens' books to them?

My night was spent freezing the fat on my body
and listening to a boy, younger than I,
speak about shooting his mother and sister.
Twenty-five minutes, scrolling through pictures
as I listen to a voice devoid of feeling
thinking about how I do not feel.
When I hear a gunshot, I flinch.
When I hear your name, I flinch.
And I repeat repeat repeat
I love your name in my mouth,
the taste of your tongue in my mouth,
the smell of you when I push my lips
scrunched up to my nose.
The scents on my body have changed,
and I flinch when I hear your name.

I remember when you told me my body would rot,
and I agreed. I remember when you told me I am
nothing. I agreed, and said it back. You are nothing
to anyone else but me. I will not leave. You first,
please. And you agreed. God my feet were bare
and you loved me, last. Early to bed, five A.M.
I didn't sleep. I remember when I told you
we have lived before. And will live again.
And you replied, we are nothing. And I said no,
you are nothing to anyone else, you are nothing now
to me. I want to help you bleed, but you scab over
too quickly. I will not agree. I am more to me
than I am to you.