Back on the loop past my old flame's house again
I sleep in and I show up late because I can't get you off my mind
Between failing friendships and endless gap years I feel like there isn't much of my heart left
But I'm still here
And I cry but I don't talk about it anymore. The people I love are a text message and 45 short miles away
But I'm too scared to cross the distance
Emotional or physical I'm too ******* scared to even ask for prayer
Singing out hymns to an estranged father imortalized in memories from last year and in the gruesome images depicted in stained glass windows,

Hallowed be this place in me.
Hallowed be the space in between my ribs.

 and my brother is a gospel singer to a basement full of people who are just as scared as I am
And He rides the crowd like Jesus walked on water
He lifts his hands caught in the same spirit that torments the angels and demons alike
And maybe god hears him screaming through the walls like I do
Maybe god cries too
But if he does he does a good job hiding it
And my parents are on the continent that I turned my back on a year ago.
I traded family dinners for a decomposing raft and tried my luck at the sea
Only crossing the water to drink wine and share the communion of post apocalyptic dreaming or political warfare we are so horrified and mesmerized by
The fellowship of the modern day saints,

Hallowed be this place in me.
Hallowed be the hole in my head.

Icehead baby don't you come to close to me
I'm friged baby I'm too far gone to see
And I've been dreaming about summer while I've been reading up on life in Antarctica
Cold tundras and odd communities I could work in maintanince for the price of living
Meanwhile I'm surviving my own tundra the endless night never gives way to sun for seasons on end
And my friends grow wings and fly into the sun
 a thousand variations of Icarus they're going to be dead and gone on while I'm still landlocked in concept
Or in orbit far in space
Wherever I am, I am distant
Living on the memories from years past
So I'm driving the endless loop past an old flame's house again
Connecting the dots between my ideas of dependency space and time
And I'm fine
In love with the seclusion of the towering trees
The security of a prolonged gap year
The warmth of the ice in my head
And as the roots of the divine cover my mouth and bloom in my lungs
I sigh and give into my year of hibernation.

Hallowed be this place in me
Hallowed be the expanse of this space.

I told him I was fine,
But then he looked at me and said:
"If you're going to do that,
Then I want you to take my arm,
and cut as many times
you would yourself",
I stared in disbelief.
Told him I couldn't,
Couldn't cause him such harm.
Not ever.
Then I suddenly froze
Struggled to breathe, struggled to speak.
Lost feeling all the way through my toes.
In that moment, I saw it,
Deep in his eyes.
I finally understood.
And I stopped telling lies.

It's easy as a poet to turn yourself into the flawed broken ideal you so readily romanticize at any given moment
You adapt generational buzzwords like
"Pale" or "thin" or "depressed" or "bipolar"
To make up for the places you feel dull or average
You long for someone to write about you like you write about your lovers or friends
So you set yourself up like a john green character
Beautiful
Distant
And empty
You spout tumblr religion and intellectual quotes
You become as paper thin as the characters from those novels our generation can't seem to get enough of
Predictable
Sad
Romanticized to the point of extinction
You survive on maybe three good quotes and self inflicted lack of sleep
In pursuit of becoming the lie you loved youve become the truth you hate
Millennial icon
The cycle continues with you.

It's not that the snow isn't beautiful
It's just that my mind is somewhere else.

Cold air and frosted branches only drive me deeper back into my own skin
As world sleeps I do too
Trying to cope with snow banks and the screeching halt of society
Frozen interstates and losses of power
Dependency on the structures of man
Fragility

So
it's not that the snow isn't beautiful
It's jus that my mind is somewhere else.

Strung out on the memory of summer
The way it felt to lie bare in the damp grass
Naked and open as they come
Spellbound by the nearness of everything I am trying to remember the heaviness of the humidity of that one night with those good kids
Trying to capture the feeling of the reeling of the gentle breath on my skin
Winter may last an eternity but heat changes everything
Light changes everything
And we are thankless in return
Sentiment
A pretty word for apathy

So
It's not that the snow isn't beautiful
It's just that I'm trying to find the words to tell you why I never tried to reach out
Why I left so early and why I showed up so late
I am trying to articulate exactly what I needed when you were right there next to me and I couldnt muster up the courage to say a single word
It's alright
I'm okay
It was beautiful
The heat
The light
the front seat of your car
The fullness of youth.
The grandeur of your version of life
It was beautiful but you and I both know that it wasnt substantial enough to survive
And they called me the romantic

So
The snow is beautiful
But so was last summer

And
It's difficult but
I want you to know that I don't take it for granted that
The light we chased is strong enough to divert me from the present beauty
I don't take you for granted
Even with all that's happened

So
The snow is beautiful
My mind is somewhere else
And you are still all that you were the day it all fell to pieces
Beautiful and ignorant
Naïve and well meaning
Frosted like the trees outside my window.

Dry heave quietly in the back room it feels like I've been coughing up blood for years
Warm house cold friends the noise is distant
Nothing lines up like it should and I can't find the pen in my own hand but I'm writing
But I'm surviving
I am learning how to live in the midst of my own hell
Fragmented relationships spit venom over cups of coffee collapse and repeat
Self defense class on Saturday and I didn't sleep for two days
Paranoid about anyone who could be out to hurt me including myself
And I do
Put myself down in my own head alone
Quiet chiding that I didn't have to let go of the love I used to know
I am a delicate soldier sitting out on the roof till the morning
Trying to get a feel for the light
Trying to get back somewhere in time when my own skin wasn't the battlefield
And my stronghold was my mind
This isn't easy but it's fine
I'm not yours and I'm not mine
Even if it doesn't make sense
(Which it never does)
I'm a walking paradox
Confliction even in the cracks of my skin
The optimistic realist.
The tired kid in the back of the room shaking with fear and wonder at the weight of the world.
What a beautiful thing to live
What a beautiful thing to be
Even when it comes in waves in the bathroom I am learning to hold it right and save
Every ******* bit of life around me
Take the bitter with the sweet and everything in between
I'm just in between the end and beginning
And I'm doing just fine.

Isn't it funny how I feel less than feminine
When I'm stalking your tweets in the early am
Inadequacy runs rampant in the chasm of my tender mind
I brush you off again, then tell them all I'm fine

It's been a sorry six years of on and off dependency
I'm trying to understand why relationships get the best of me
I sleep in my clothes and hide the rings around my eyes
Meet you for coffee wait for another part of me to die

I know I run my mouth but
I'm trying to escape the inside of my head
I may not be the hero but
At least I say what needs to be said

It's gospel isn't it? Your quiet complacency
Out sick in the bathroom but still you seem to laugh at me
Your imperial intent and millennial mind
Only seem to distance you from being anywhere close to 'fine'

You sold out your soul to a bipolar lover you
Swore off your friends and told yourself you'd never need another
You broke my heart there in your damp summer clothes
You said it wasn't personal but i know that I know that I know that

I'm not supposed to suppose anymore
That you might feel better if you just shut that door
You can give him your world but you can't keep me in yours  
So I won't come around if you knock on my door anymore

The summer you met were the coldest months I've known
Ice in your eyes winters breath filled your home
The mess that we made still hangs round my head
Thorny black crown of the words I never said

But now here we sit in a 4x4 bathroom stall
Tell me it's fine that morning will fix it all
Tears in your eyes your hands in your lap
But it won't get better if you keep running back

But I'm not supposed to suppose anymore
So you'll keep on going back to his door
You can give him your world but you can't keep me in yours
So I won't answer when you come to my door

Quiet light in your old T-shirt
It isn't often that mornings make me this tender,
But here I am.
Constant contradiction of charisma and brine
Hooked on summer nights,
Humidity softens and sweat grounds us in the moment
Dark leaves and drunken hymns- I need the memories to remind myself that there were simple days.
Days when all that mattered was who had the lighter and who would start the first song off
I am braver now
(But that isn't saying much)
I still cower at the gentlest touch
Messes of men beneath my skin oil spills and construction sites all the walls I build to keep myself in
They weren't meant to keep you out,
Just to ensure that I didn't give it all before I was ready
But I don't think I am
Or will ever be for anyone
And are you thinking of me now? Wide eyed child running through the tangled woods
Tender open and naked
Innocence embodied in the humble request that I stay the night
We don't talk about that part of me anymore
We don't talk about those days anymore
We talk about tours and albums and lyrics and time
And it's good
Until it isn't fine
So here I lie in my grandmother's bed wondering where the hell it all went
Innocence
The simplicity of summer
The honesty of my skin
And if it all falls away
I'll figure out how to let quiet light back in.

Midnight blue stars descend on me tonight.
Clear intentions and dusty attitude I'm in love with the lines of my skin
Hesitant and bold,
I only wanted to own you.
I only wanted to be the ice in your drink.
New years afterthought of the rush of our voices together
The need to be more than just the girl next door
I wanted you, Bruising Smile, to keep in my bedroom for the nights when the stars don't fall
For the nights when my head is too heavy to hold
So I wanted you, Troubled Tongue, to hold in the center of my knowing
To know that I would be all you had to hold
To hold. And to be held.
And like the song says "I've written pages upon pages trying to rid you from my bones,"
And here's the proof: hundreds of pieces of poetry or pages from my journal all pointing back to you
And you haven't left me yet
But, the blush stays while my family bottles new wine on winter's eve
And don't you know you were all I wanted to believe could resonate within my tired form?
Scent like your mother's: safe and warm in your car.
I needed you to be the one but the longing went to far
The girl with the Tangled Teeth just wanted to believe you were hers.
Just wanted to believe you were mine.
It isn't easy wanting after a memory.

I loved you and I lost.