while there is
still all this
fight left
                in me
                in us
I won't give up.

and even when there are
no more battles to fight
and even if we've won,
even if we've lost -

I won't give up.

sometimes i wonder
if ideas like fate and
soul mates are just the
clumsy words for things
that are tangled together
for awhile until they
are eventually unraveled -
if soul mates are only
together for as long as
they're together -
until the cords are
cut, the ties are
severed. until the
bath tub drains
and all that's left
is the filth, the rot,
the longing.

the leaving was
meant to heal,
to relieve. but
again and again,
i am proved a
fool.

sometimes I think
I don't want to be
alone. but then I
realize I'd rather
be alone than
with anyone
but you.

and you'd rather
be with anyone else
than be alone,
and you'd rather
be anything
but with me.

once upon a time, i loved a boy
until he broke me

once upon a time, a boy loved me
until i broke him

once upon a time, a boy loved me
until he broke me

sometimes there are
no princes
no princesses,
just sad little girls and sad little boys
and no happy endings.

eyes wide
hearts untied
swallowed pride
laced cyanide
quiet suicide

god knows
we tried

Piece by piece, I'd let you take me apart; a mind, a body, a soul
Hidden between blood and sinew and bone
Destruction is a pretty, pretty thing when done by your hand.
Put me together, macabre puzzle of your own making
Skyscraper mural by your own design.
My love, you could have me so completely if only you knew how.

one morning
in our kitchen
over coffee
i told you
you were the love of my life
and you didn't say it back
didn't really say anything

and i don't know why it
took me so long to realize
i was never yours.

you put your hands on me
like I am a church, a body
of worship, a home to confess
all your sins. write my
body like a poem, like a
confession, like you'll
find in me the verses of
redemption.

I am not your savior, not
a holy body. I am nothing
like salvation. I am the dark
place you only visit when
you're overrun with guilt
and rot and desperation.
I won't leave you feeling
clean, you'll leave me with
stains on your skin and ache
that will never empty.

I just
     want
            to skip
                                                   *ahead.

they pried us apart with
knives and tweezers,
extracted every last nerve
and so we drift away.
what am I now?
empty vessel?
empty canvas?

I don't think vessel,
I don't think canvas.
I am an emptiness
unlikely to fill, blank
surface unlikely to
become masterpiece.

I'm something like a
balled up note, with things
like "love you" and "don't
forget the milk" written
on it, crumbled up, fallen
out of someone's pocket
long forgotten. words that
mean everything, but
all at once amount to nothing.

I'm a dried up river bed,
full of footprints and animal
corpses. I am empty, I am
devoid of life, I am...
I am nothing.

and you are gone,
fled the moment the
last tie was cut, a pillar
of relief to be free.
once, you were everything.
once, I was everything.
once.

feast or famine,
there's war in
my bones.
wipe my
blood clean,
brush away
the ashes,
burn what's left.
let the smell of
gunpowder replace
the lavender and
the honey and the
sweet salt of us.
start over again
on the charred
remains, leave
the burning bed
frame so we remember
to do better
next time.

her silhouette behind the shower curtain
her dress on the bed
she sings while she dries her hair
swears when she smears her
makeup

the shadows of her life are
all over this place
they mingle dissonantly
with mine

and yet I find her chaos
bleeding all over my order
to be the most beautiful
form of life
I've ever been
exposed to

and so this morning
instead of complaining about
the mess
I kiss her soft face
and she smiles
and everything is alright

Bleeding aches wait for days
Feeding on deliriously intertwined wounds
hungry
thigh
adoration
Bruise-claimed jaws and darkened hips don’t mind.
Exhale thorns minded inside by pretty electric blood
And nonsense moves the whiskey inside
Miraculous, macabre cancer.
Hello, our thoughts embraced,
Fed false weakness and colored reason,
The suns of souls fighting our own black shame.

the last time
I felt you slipping-
I felt you slip like
ocean through my
fingertips.
I felt the shift,
and I knew
I'd lose us somewhere
along the line.
I knew the last time
I kissed you,
standing in the rush
of cars and departures
and arrivals,
I knew as I held on
to you with fevered desperation
I knew it was the last time.
I couldn't say it then,
I couldn't say it for awhile,
but somewhere in there
I always knew.

and I'm sorry.
I'm sorry you're
not what I want.
I'm sorry
I can't be what
you need.

I had to let you go,
and it was the hardest
and most freeing thing
I've ever done.

I learned the true meaning of disappointment
The day I stopped calling you “daddy.”
It was the same day I realized you were not
Responsible for hanging the moon, and you
Certainly hadn’t done it for me. I realized
That the bottles in the paper bags would
Always come before me. I learned that you loved me
But that love lived in a box in the attic,
Dusty and forgotten. I learned that I’d never know
What it was like to live on my father’s shoulders,
If only for a moment. I’d never know what it was
Like to want to escape the overprotective father
Or what it’d be like to apologize to a boy for
The way my father sized him up. I’d never be chastised
For the length of my skirt or how much makeup I was wearing.
I learned that sometimes the ones that are supposed
To protect you from the pain of the world
Are the ones that hurt you the most.
I never learned what it was like to have a father.
Or at least, one that didn’t destroy you.

I rose from dark water,
untethered from the collapsing
kingdom hidden deep down
at the bottom of the ocean.
my fingers like brittle branches
from grasping onto you for
so long, but my lungs fill
with this fresh air and the
toxicity of your prison
seems to drip from me like
ink. my insides are putting
themselves back together and
I hold the hand that finally
rescued me, and he will wait
until I am clean again.

fragile boy
too weak to
shoulder any
blame:

I am not the resting place
for your guilt,
for your regret,
for your shame.

and how dare you
leave me to clean up
your mess.

Dear writers (and artists and songwriters and poets, etc),

Tell me,

When the thing that drives your heartbeat no longer belongs to you

What do you do with the things you made?

Because surely, most of your work is based on this particular muse

Because I see things laced with love and adoration

And I wonder

I wonder

When that adoration no longer exists in you

How could you possibly look at the words you wrote with tenderness

Or the masterpiece you painted in their image

Or the song you painstakingly pieced together note by note in honor of the way they kiss goodnight

And not want to destroy it?

Long ago, you planted lilies
in my ribcage, roses in my jaw
coaxed them to life, you fed them fire.
The roses grew thorns…
the lilies grew crooked

They got hungry in your absence,
******* at the metal inside. Quietly,
they began to die, turned black like bruise.  
Rotting and wilted, they slip to the floor,
still smelling like you.

when you finally let go of me,
let me go with grace.
remember that I loved you.
remember how much.
remember the exact
cadence of my voice
each and every time I said it,
the feel of my palm
against your cheek.
the taste of my lips
on yours. don't forget
how I held you,
and how I held you up.
remember my courage,
remember my strength.

understand this:
letting you go was so
unbelievably hard -
so distressingly painful
that I almost couldn't.

but remember all those nights
you weren't there.
remember the words of those
girls you chose over me,
again and again.
remember the taste of
every lie you ever told me.
keep in mind the company
you kept, and how rarely
you went to me first.
think of my loneliest nights
where all I wanted so
desperately was you -
and how you always wanted
for something else.

and when you sit in anger,
thinking that I gave us up on a
whim. please, hold in your hands
the weight of me and the weight
of my hopes.
because my god, I wanted it to be
you. but everything you ever did
unraveled that boulder of me
until all that was
left was the barest grain of sand.

I said
goodbye
and you said
goodnight
thinking we
meant the
same thing.

he said,
"please stay."
and so she did.

for a little while.

an emptiness
nothing fills -
invested so deeply
but oh,
those roots never grow.

this is how she writes
slanted and sideways
too full of liquor and love
and longing. she smears
it into the walls of her
heart, paints the insides
of her skull - and yet,
everything remains
blackened. the warmth
never laces the cold,
never undoes the laces
of her desperate skin.
her bones crack, fingers
splitting like broken
tree limbs, the floor
looks something like
a ****** scene - decimated
forests and bloodless
bodies of all the boys
whoever used lies to love.
she is an empty house,
abandoned, old and aching.
tiptoes up the stairs of
her broken spine, wondering
how her front-door soul
could have wandered
into such a lost and lonely
place. her bones crack,
the walls shudder. this is
life, this life is an island
and her hands are sinking
ships - hard enough to
wound, soft enough to
never fill. just like her
insides. just like her outsides.

I wish my
name had
never fallen
from your
tongue.

let me fall down the well
into chaos, into rebirth, into
wonderland. let me drown,
let me disappear, disintegrate.
I hope you watch me go,
watch my body sink into
grave you dug for me,
baptized in the water you
poisoned. something about
the way you designed my
destruction will always
sign the masterpiece in my hand,
though, and you'll carry the
grief and I'll carry the blame.

our hearts tick like
wind up toys,
parading up and
down the sidewalks
manipulated by
little fingers,
little laughs.

our lives on stage,
a dollhouse,
on display.

we said goodbye
in riddles, and
I always swore
I'd be the one to leave
that I'd never
watch you go

but my heart is a
wind up toy,
ticking and naive
and my mouth
wears a doll's smile
and god
I loved you.

and when you left,
I stood on the doorstep
watching you round
the corner.
the wind up toys
reached the end
of their turn, our
ceramic hands
clapping til they
crumbled.

I waited for you to
look back, to look
at me once more.

you never did.

love is easy
when it's
slow and lazy -
like honey, warm
and sweet.

but it bites
at times like
a scared dog,
tail between its
legs.

this is how we
ran out of honey;
got rid of the dog.

you'll find me in that space
where the sun hasn't quite set
while the moon hasn't quite rose,
where dark and light are
somewhat at war with each other,
and their battle spreads across the sky
in violent hues of red and violet
and gold, when only a few stars
are brave enough to to share their
light. you'll find me in that tender
place between sea and sky, you'll
find me in the curve of his palm
where I rest like an empty house
waiting for love to come home.

I forgot how to breathe.
learned how to fall,
never learned how to land.
the tangle of arms and
legs and the murals of
bruises. all the well meaning
friends asking if I'm okay,
watch me skin my knees,
don't understand how much
harder I've skinned my soul.
my lungs haven't tasted
fresh air for so long, and my
poor heart hasn't gone a day
without crashing violently
into my rib cage over and over.
I whisper apologies to myself
in the mirror every single night
and swallow the tainted air
and fall asleep to the poison
I feed myself while my masochistic
mind dreams up a world where
you still love me and I still know
how to breathe.

i have built a home in myself
after all these years
and what peace it is to know
that no one will burn down
what i call hime
ever again.


(and what a quiet pain it is
to still crave the home in you.)

I am need
thirsty want
caverns of
desperation
finite light
and infinite
dark and
thousands
of moments
of undefined
shape I am
something
else I am
a heart made
for taking
exhausted
from giving
or being given
because what
am I but a
buffet line of
substance
for hungry
mouths that
are not mine
to feed

there is nothing poetic about pain;
there is no beauty in the ache of emptiness,
there is no loveliness in the moments before explosion.
there is no honor in loneliness.
there is only the desperation for it to end,
the craving for the last time you felt at peace
and the regret that you did not appreciate it at the time.
there is whole body anger and the repeated
demand of why. why this. why me. why now.
there is only headaches and endless tears
and that ungodliness of no one understanding -
the torrent of it will get better, and you'll get through it,
and nothing lasts for ever.
there is only the infinity of this particular destruction

and I cannot bear it.

I sat under the stars
And begged for you last night.
But you were still gone
When I woke up this morning.
How am I supposed to know
If I should stay,
When to let go?

Skin electric
Words of mindless mangle
Trace the curve of your hips
Trickle along the stretch of thigh
Pools around your toes
Where the world used to lie
One moment of weakness made permanent
Scored in by blade and ink
Scarred friction

paint my bones red
dress me up like the
wolves, let me reclaim
my wild.

let the lavender in
my blood turn chaos
into quiet storm.

let me be whole
again, the full moon
on a clear night.

I am so, so afraid
I've already given all
the love I had to give.
burned out, ash,
wax on the table,
nothing left to give
the hearts that have
the misfortune
to love mine after
the years of bleed and
leech. I am spent,
isolated ache,
want and crave and
empty space. I promise
I tried, I'm trying,
I'm trying.

the way the
story twists -
all the harm
came from your
hands, and yet
in the end
I am the one
to carry the
blame.

sometimes you can't just walk it off.
sometimes you have to rebreak the bones
before they'll heal right. sometimes
you have to sew the cuts closed
and sometimes you pick the scabs over
and over again before the itching stops.
sometimes they become faint scar,
injury really only you can see. sometimes
the scars are so thick and dark that
they become the most noticeable part
of your body.

sometimes we heal.
sometimes we don't.
sometimes we say goodbye
over and over to the ghost
in the mirror, watching the
scars deepen with every
desperate breath.

buried these bones
under miles of regret
pounds of regret

your skin my skin
my mouth your mouth
asking me

don't
let this be
this

this goodbye
thick and heavy
less goodbye

more goodnight
for now (for always)
but you won't

close the door
you'd rather
you watch me go

and i know you
wait for me to
turn back

but i didn't
even kiss you
before i left

the pieces of me,
the pieces i have left
don't really fit together.
collected over the years
from hundreds of puzzles,
i am left with an image
maybe designed by a
toddler or maybe a psychopath -
the kaleidoscope view of
somebody who couldn't
keep track of all the pieces
all the pictures
all the puzzles.
but i guess they tried,
because here i am
in all of my mismatched glory -
all at once a gift and an apology.

maybe
maybe i am choking
maybe the love you feed me
is poison, is ash,
maybe the hands you lay
on me are hands to harm
not to hold

maybe
maybe i am so used to
love that hurts that you
are swallowing me, stealing
all of my leftover parts
and maybe
i am such a fool
to let you.

i wish i could just
float away with the
current

to something
to nothing

it hardly matters
these days

I am so tired
of only ever feeling half
alive.

flesh and fire
blood and stitches
I've said I feel
nothing
but time changes
everything
it's so hard
to get closer
it's so hard
to find home
and there's a
blank space
where you're
supposed to be
but it's a
temporary fix
slow high can't
let it go
and I'm sorry
I'm so awake
wide awake
but this is hell
hallways of
mirrors and smoke
laced with nerve
endings drank
the black honey
here we go
here we go

i am the blood-soaked
blankets beneath your bed,
and I am the rusted knives
you keep hidden in that
box in your garage. i am
all your ***** thoughts
and ugly wants. i am that
itch creeping up your spine
and the cold tingle in your
fingertips. i am the compulsion
keeping you awake at night
and the obsession in your
every move. i am your
darkest secrets and your deepest
desires. i am the ghost that
haunts your waking moments
and i am the skeletons hidden
in your garden.

wish i would've just said
i miss you
instead

every quaking breath,
every flash of memory,
every little puzzle piece
I could never make fit -

absence, too, is a gift.

I am not perfect,
nor do I wish to be.
I want to fall in love
with every single flaw
and I want to fight
relentlessly to shape
this tiny moment of
existence I've been
given into something
meaningful and emerge
from this bottomless pit
an unstoppable force,
fearless and beautiful.