I can’t remember what room I was in
15 years old
involuntary 24 hour hold
in the elmwood village

now I look over my yard
past the liquor store
to the the abandoned glass faces
of your darkened rooms

wonder what I would tell her
wonder what she would see, looking out

I don’t remember the view
don’t remember the way these white lines
must’ve looked fresh
red, raw, and new

but I imagine
her looking out at me

while I smoke a cigarette
while onyx tosses a stick
while walking hodge in twilight hours
while I write these words

what is it I would tell her
what could ten years offer her
to console
to comfort

all I see are black abandoned faces
in groups of three
empty rooms

ghosts of girls long dead
or recovered.

I used to say your name like a prayer
over and over in my head
sitting curbside next to a sewer drain
dropping cigarette butts into the abyss as an offering.

it’s a type of madness that I revisit
from time to time.

different names, different prayers.
cigarette butts and sewer drains.

today I went and bought a 6 pack
we had a blizzard rolling in so I
drove off and decided,
"my first legal buy", and some noodles.

and I looked at just about every 6 pack
the packaging, the price, the abv.
you were such a beer snob
and yet I loved you for it.

maybe I would've found any excuse to love you.
maybe that's what love really is.

I don't remember much of that month,
anymore.
but on your wall I can see
all of the things I bought and drank
when I felt loved and so much better off.

and for whatever reason,
the black sheep lager, I remember.
I wasn't with you, but I was proud of you
for it,
for picking it out.

maybe I would've found any excuse to like it.
maybe that's what love really is.

but anyways,
I kept thinking, which is never good,
that the beer was awesome
that black sheep was the height of summer
that black sheep brought me close to you.

each and every time I saw it on your wall
I thought
this isn't over
it happened
it's real.

well it was,
and it wasn't.

maybe that's what love really is.

but the beer
the black sheep
it doesn't taste at all
like I remembered it did.

like all your favorite beers, it is bitter.
like all unrequited, half-forgotten loves,
it is bitter.

having every other time
earned my automatic forgiveness;
I cannot find a way to make you feel
the anger that burns me up from within
like a boiling fountain deep inside my guts
that spills scalding tears I cannot stop.

and I will not wait
for you to need me;
just so I can let you down
to see if you will hurt
the way I have.

no, I will not wait.
I will never wait for you again.

past three a.m. you don't exist
except for this time when you
thought you could walk in and
exist here.

listen, these amphetamines
make me far too honest.

you can't be here
while I'm jawing out
because
I'd love to talk to you.

the summer days when
my bracelets graced your coffee table
were by far the best
that I ever had.

I have already told you;
there are sleepless mornings
when I can taste
every poison lacing my cigarette

and I wouldn't mind except
for the way that they sift past
a throat already rubbed sore
from all of the screams kept silent inside.

at the point of every morning
where I'm too tired to think of anything else
you swim into the part of my heart
that doesn't want you to be there anymore.

I have cried during too many sunrises,
to justify ever crying for you again,
so I must regretfully quit this business,
and try my luck somewhere else.

when I think, or thought, of us together
I think of june the way I thought of june in july
it was and always will be something that
brought me a happiness I didn't deserve.

I can almost understand the way how
we will slowly drift apart forever and always
'like empires and old loves'
but rome wasn't rebuilt in a day.

you've betrayed me for the first and last time
I guess I had never thought that
there'd be somebody innocent
enough to tell me all the things that would
hurt me as if they were nothing; unfiltered.
but there is, and he has.

you were my first friend in a new place
and I have trusted you more that I should.

it was never you that I came to bother
when I was lost or lonely
or too drunk to make it home.
it was never you that I came to bother
when I was despondent or depressed
or too in love to take care of myself.

I heard you scoffed.
I heard you made a fuss.
at the very idea of the one thing that
made me happy at least for a little bit
at least for awhile.

and there is no revenge I can take
on someone who wouldn't care
if they never saw me again.
so I suppose I'll just have to wait until
this life turns around enough until
the point where I truly forget you.

but you were my first friend in a new place.
I have always been unquestionably thankful
for you, and for all that you have
accidentally done to help me.
I never thought that you'd
think of me this way.

I will ***** at you in a few days,
and then that will be
goodbye.

I can't rip out the part of me
that remembers a time
when things were better
between us.

and so I think,
that for a little while longer at least,
I will have mornings like this.

when I am dead
you will read all my poems
and hate me
only a little bit less
than I hated myself.

there are late nights
and early mornings
when I can taste the toxic chemicals
that lace my cigarettes
and this is one of them.

and if you ever come across these words
I hope you can forget
the voice that could never speak them aloud.

[sleep never comes anymore,
  and I am afraid that I'm losing my mind.]

no more june songs
it's november now and
I celebrated daylight savings
with two days in bed
thinking of you
and reading poems
I would've been better off
never writing.

no more june songs
it's november now
it gets dark at five
and one of these nights
I'll delete every poem
that you inspired.

no more june songs
it's november now and
they'll never be able to prove
that I loved you.

I swam in the mediterranean
and you mattered more.

I want to hold all the parts of you,
that I never knew existed.
and keep them close to my heart.

I want to see New York City
the way you grew up in it,
the part of you that still lives there.

I want you to take me to Brooklyn,
and I want to see you smile at me,
the way you used to smile.

I wish I had a typewriter
or a gramaphone.
we could let the records spin.
you & me.
I'd forgot punk or indie
as far as you knew
and nothing would have a label.

I don't wanna graduate.
I let it all slip right past me
just enough to say I'm trying
you've heard it all before & more & worse.
I'm asking, please don't save me
tell me I don't need to be saved.

it was June wasn't it.
and we can't go back.
the rides before the flight
I knew I knew I knew
across the ocean I'd lose you.

there's something cross continental
about my courage
to try and tell you just how I feel.

this is swallowing Xanax and flower power
this is so lethargic it shouldn't even count
for anything other than the absolute truth.

it was June wasn't it?
I settle for winehouse and empty bottles
I wonder if I've tried enough

what words would get me there
what the **** can I say
to make you understand?

give me a shot of *** and a shot at your heart, and I'll only miss one of them.

for ***** sake

the lovesick little ******
wears a bandaid on her trigger finger
and bites her split lip
while aiming.

she is trying to go higher
past the tree line
and figure out just where to aim.
she points, & shoots.

there are songs
that belong to jack
like tiny vessels

and they will always be his
because
you've never left a mark on my neck.

but could you?
will you?
I'll make you.
before this is all over.

I'll make you stain my neck.

before this is all over
before this weekend is done
I'll make you stain my neck.

the songs that belong
to people you've never met
are theirs.

but my neck is clean
"my lungs are fresh and yours to keep."
stain me baby;
I think you maybe want to.

gimme that elmwood walk where we don't acknowledge each other;
my lips feel on fire and I
count the steps
for every sidewalk square;
1,2
3,4.

I handed you an angry orchard
to where you sat in the backseat
welcome to our great car driving tradition
we were all sad to see her go
even me.

I don't mind if
she curls up to you in the backseat.

she's sitting on a bus back to New York
missing you.
and you're sitting in the backseat
with us, while we drive you home.
two of your best girls here.

I didn't mind that
she curled up to you in the backseat.

no, I didn't mind at all.

today I watched the movie
and Nina was here;
I think that
if you love her
I could understand
because she at least
deserves you.

and the movie said that
high school love
can never last
past college
or at least
that's what they
wanted us to think.

but I have met her.
and I like her.
I would rather you love her
than me or deb or whoever
because she understands you.
she loves you, still
she has always loved you.

I wouldn't have ever understood Brooklyn.
in 2009; I would not have
understood you at all.
no more than you could've understood me,
the way I was back then.

I met you at just the right time,
in the right way.
when we were both ready.
when we could both be friends,
and easily.
I am so grateful for it.

no, truth be told.
I like her.
I like the idea of what you both used to mean to each other.
I like how you cleaned you room for her.
I like that you still can love.

I like that she smiles and laughs
and leans right into you
because she feels safe.
she is a part of who you are:
and I love her for it.

the thought of her
sleeping in your bed
costs me absolutely nothing;
I won't lose any sleep
knowing somebody
appreciates you
they way they should.

you gave me one month of happiness.
and that was it.

wide awake with heartbreak
and a stomach ache.

my favorite movie
clueless
my favorite song
nocturne
and you would never see them through
and so you would never know me.

tonight I asked you
when you last saw me sober
and you couldn't give me an answer.

tonight, I told you
just how many bottles
of *** I go through
in a week.

that night that I cried
over you
is a continent and a month away
but it existed.

I listen to nocturne
and blues.
and I could've spent this night
alone on your sofa.
but instead I spend it alone
on my floor
because here
I play Chopin
for myself
and not for you.

I will not come back with my nails bitten down.
not even for you.

I've been listening to the front bottoms
looking at the spanish moon.

I deleted your number for the last time
on the sand at Barceloneta beach.
there is something in the word
Catalunya
that makes me want to wear colors
and forget you.

I don't care about Monday's weather
because I won't be here
while you're sleeping
I'll be arriving at an airport
and when you wake up
I'll be across the Atlantic

I'm skipping ahead to the part
when I come back home
a month from now
to see if anythings changed
between us.

and I'm doubtful.

but I'm going to leave that note
somewhere where you'll find it
when I'm already on my plane.
and if you read it
maybe you'll think
of how
I shouldn't try to forget you
and maybe you'll be happy
that I'm going to miss you
every bit as much as I will.

you know I sleep here more often than not;
it's not my home
but I just feel like
I'm happiest here.

this morning
I did not wake up
in your bed.
and I am all the much sadder
for it.

drag a knife down my spine
I had forgotten pain
and now
I need it

I want to forget today
but never forget this feeling
because knowing
that this type of pain existed
could've kept me out of a lot of trouble

and it'll keep me far away from you.

too hot to sleep so I
stayed awake for three straight days
stole this poem
from Sherman Alexie
and he was right;
I opened my bedroom
window tonight.

I forget
who to love
until you are right in front of me
and I always make sure
that you are right in front of me.

I am in love
in my ****** little cobweb room
I lay in bed
look at the ceiling
and think of you.

tomorrow
I will
text you pictures of the asylum
wake up
in time for work
and tell you about
the night before.

it is such torture
to love you
and I do it anyways

at night I can fall asleep by counting the rolls of fat on my stomach
a steady, calming, everyday weight that doesn't feel as bad as it looks;
but sometimes what I feel seems foreign, and I am restless
because I once had a flat stomach and I can remember how that felt,
almost.

in the mornings I wake up,
get out of bed
and mark the start of each new day with the very first collision of my thighs.
I think that I don't hate my body as much as I should.
I feel sorrier for whoever has to see me like this than I do for myself.
these are things I tell myself; I think I may believe them.

I notice my round stomach trying to escape the waistline of my jeans
I have picked and pulled at the stretchy skin that drowns my arms
I have sat down and gaped at the remarkable resemblance that my thighs have to a pair of lumpy, fleshy, potatoes

somedays I say " it won't look that way when I stand up"
those are good days.

& I remember all of the clothes I have given away to christie
two beautiful coats that I had picked out myself not all that long ago,
and they were loved very much
and worn very little
and they were bought by my mother
two beautiful coats that press my arms so tight that I can't move them
not even to take a drag off my cigarette or unlock my car
they look like they were made for her.

my jim morrison shirt that was black&white;& I bought it at the boardwalk on venice beach out of the back of a pickup truck barely thirty feet from the ocean
my jim morrison shirt that I cut last spring to the midriff and beaded it myself for an hour on my dorm room floor, had my roommate hem it & never wore it again.
it looks like it was made for her.

& there are days when she comes home from the thrift shop,
with full plastic bags of dresses, and lace, and florals, flannels and blouses
and she'll say "lookwhatIgotisntitnice?andofcourse you can wear it too."
and I don't know if she actually means it
sometimes I think she does & I don't know how that makes me feel
and I don't know if she actually means it
but we both know that I'll never ask.

late at night
when the dextromethorphan
turns on me
I can't get your name out of my head

breakfast is a cigarette

an accidental toast with another empty bottle

it hurts the most when it's repeated

just the mention of your name
was enough to send me into
what they thought was a suicide
but was just my sobbing in the shower
I guess I was too loud

my eyes are green, and red
how festive
sometimes I think
I have the best and worst
understanding of Christmas

history belongs to the victors.
and so;
if I get through this,
I could say,
that my hair wasn't cheaply dyed and ratty;
but a perfect bottle blonde.
and the way that it fell across my shoulders,
as I slowly put on my leather jacket
in the dark,
was something meaningful,
and something beautiful,
instead of a last resort.

dropping every vile line I needed,
I needed to keep you at a distance,
for a year.

from what little I remember,
I said too much.
from what little I wanted,
I gave up too much.

delaying the inevitable isn't working,
even though I want it to.
vain to the point of forgetting, all the
little lies I tell myself to stay sane.
in the very best way I couldn't do it,
nobody is worth feeling for again.

even you.

doesn't this mean I should give up?
even when I have before?
visiting your living room,
leaving flannels by your bed.
if only I could stick with my denials.
never admitting what's left unsaid.

I've spelled it out.

when I was younger and fresher,
a little less lost,
and could still see straight,
over the wall I built to keep everyone out.

I spelled it out.

I could still see you on the other side.
and thought about letting you in.

doesn't it seem scary to you?
everything I know would change
very few people know this
looking at you from across the room
I imagine I am by your side
never imagining it could ever happen

no more.
no more coming of age indie movies.
no more love stories, love songs.
no more wanting what I can't have.

there used to be a time,
when my doubts would come bursting into my life, loud and unmistakeable.

and now when I crawl into bed at night,
I sometimes notice them there;
sleeping soundly, because I'm not.
lying peaceful, dormant.
accepted and tucked in.
because I'm not.

I could embrace them.
and still be alone.
or I could kick them to the curb;
and disappear.

no more.
no more summer nights without a care.
no more night walks without a jacket.
no more comfort, no more rest.

my doubts will stay sleeping,
so long as I don't.

after a day in bed,
an indie film.

a glass of captain morgan on ice,
or three.

we discussed film theory
on the porch.
cigarettes in hand.

I'm willing to admit that I am lonely.
maybe that's what today has been about.

isn't it so much an easier form of torture,
to wholly love those who'll you'll never meet, never know,
but may fully deserve?

after years alone,
you can get used to it.

we find ways to cope,
we get high in bed alone.

I want to be immortal.
I want to dance to old records.
I want to be half dead and feel alive.
with someone I haven't met yet.

I'm willing to admit that I am lonely.
I'm willing to admit that I may die alone.

it may not be somewhere as far or exotic as Ithaca
and it turns out that a new life is never anything different than your life, except now.

the sounds of the city are just as independent as they were for you.
just a little closer to home.
and my ***** window pane is just the same as yours,
the beer cans in my driveway are just as empty and full of memories
a little bit later
but I'm a little bit younger
and still full of potential, I hope.

it doesn't feel like my jealous sophomore soul,
but rather a home.

it's not often now I wonder what could have been.
growing up is somewhat like growing into the notion that you will never have exactly what you are jealous of.
but you can always come close.

he bit me and
left a mark on the throat
I had been singing with

every brush of my hair to my shoulder
is a reminder of a stain I can't brush away

a lingering fog has hit campus
and I wonder what kind of old woman I will grow into.