I hide everything away and have the appearance of not caring about a lot of things,
yet I stay up all night and wonder what is wrong with me as I  rip apart every second of my past, remembering that I don’t know the last time I was happy, and I destroy myself in the process of thinking.
I stare blankly everyday in a crowded classroom tucked into the back seat, listening to music because the silence causes me to panic and stress myself out over the future because how can I know what I want to do if sometimes my only thought is when I’ll die and yet while I don’t believe in a Heaven and sometimes feel as if I’m already in Hell, I am scared of what will happen after I die because what if Heaven is real and those thousands of times I lied and said I was okay when I was so depressed I felt like my chest was caving in and I couldn’t even tell if I was breathing or said I wasn’t hungry as I tried to steady myself from passing out because I haven’t had so much as an apple since last week, all add up and I end up going to some place worse than here?
And recently I’ve convinced myself that feeling absolutely nothing is better than feeling anything at all. I don’t know if I’m better, worse, or settling for middle ground as I wait until the end of the line. Some nights I’ll allow myself to feel and I’ll panic because I’ve lost so much and so many people just use me, and it is so heart breaking to constantly be the person everyone uses. I feel like an old cigarette that is used to temporarily calm someone down, but they aren’t even a smoker and I wasn’t an addiction, just a phase. Yet,  I was their 4 a.m and sometimes 4p.m and what they didn’t know was I am a smoker and I was so addicted; I never intended to stop. I was ready to die from corroded, blackened lungs. Now I stay up till way past 4a.m going through the physical pain that comes along with withdrawal and the ache in my head is nothing compared to the ache in my chest that has me so broken down I couldn’t even stand up if I tried and I cry so hard it makes the pain in my head worse and some nights I worry that my head will explode.
The next day I go to school and I’m numb, I don’t feel anything for days, sometimes weeks, until one of those nights happens again. I’ve found comfort in feeling nothing and I’ve mastered the art of shutting everyone out and no one takes the time to take a second glance.
Maybe I don’t want them to ask questions, or maybe being used so much has made me completely horrified to even let someone know my name, let alone anything.
I don’t want to feel anything with anyone because I become so addicted to the euphoric high I get when I think someone cares just for them to treat me like a cigarette once again, as they throw me away without even thinking about it, stepping on me to make sure that my light is completely gone.
I’ve decided that feeling nothing at all is the place I am most comfortable, replying on the few people that make me happy. And even though I don’t believe in a god,  I pray every night they won’t throw me away like everyone else because no matter how good I am at fooling everyone else, I can’t keep lying to myself and no matter how good I am at feeling nothing, some nights I feel every little thing and I need someone to keep me sane because at 2a.m on a Tuesday night I drive myself to the point of insanity and if I didn’t have someone to hold me up, I’d drown myself and I don’t know if I’d be able to come back up for air on my own.

day 1: today i found out about the machines. sometimes i can feel your hand in mine. you used to grab it and pull, like you couldn't go as fast as you wanted to without taking me with you. war is never pretty, but you sure are. were. you were pretty. i still remember the last time i saw you.

day 2: do you remember when our names were joined together? people used to spit them out in one go, 'cause there wasn't a day either of us went somewhere without the other. they don't do that anymore. wish you were here.

day 3: i had a dream about you last night. i still can't feel my left arm. i miss you.

day 4: they're working on building machines that look and act like people. maybe i was a test drive. i still miss you.

day 5: i remembered something today (this is rare for me. if you were here i'd tell you why). you used to curve around your sketchpad, like it was a part of you. one night (june. i don't remember the year) i traced your spine and you shivered. i think about that a lot. i'm not sure why.

day 6: i miss you.

day 7: i love you.

day 8: remember our old bean plant we had growing in the windowsill? you used to fuss over it so much. (i used to fuss over you so much, too, but to be fair you're slightly more important than a bean plant. slightly.) you wasted a summer's worth of water on that **** thing, and never regretted it once.

day 9: we used to fold into each other during brooklyn winters, when the heat cut out and we had nothing but each other. now i just have nothing.

day 10: i can't get drunk now, either.

day 11: i saw my gravestone today. yours is right next to it, did you know that? they're both empty. they never found our bodies.

day 12: monochromia. that's what you had. i wonder if it went away after. you never saw colors and i saw too many.

day 13: i dreamt about you last night again. i've been remembering more. it's slow, but steady. fragments of memories every day. maybe one day i'll remember it all.

day 14: again. i think my subconscious is trying to punish me. i wish i could just forget again. maybe it would make everything easier.

day 15: again.

day 16: i haven't left my bed in twenty-one hours. this is the only way i can see you.

day 17: i wonder if you'd have married her if you hadn't died. a part of me (i'm sorry. all of me. every single ******* atom in my body) hopes you wouldn't have. it also knows that you would have. i miss you.

day 18: it's your birthday.

day 19: anachronism: a thing belonging or appropriate to a period other than that in which it exists, especially a thing that is conspicuously old-fashioned.

day 20: hello again. i missed you.

wring your mismatched hands together they don't belong to you but they're still yours
you watch old reels, the war replaying on a silver screen
relearning a past you still don't remember (your hair used to be short, but you like it better long)
your smile is crooked when you look at him
you don't know if it's fondness or hatred (or something in the middle,the point between rage and bone-breaking love)
he'll never understand how easy it is to make men into machines
but the blueprints for your breathing patterns are hidden away in ones and zeroes in the back of your mind
your tongue and teeth are stained with your old body, ten thousand lifetimes ago you still feel your arm sometimes
ghost aches haunting your every step
when you close your eyes you see an ashtray, blood filling your eyesockets like saltwater
you've forgotten about that night (1942, the war playing in the background as you looked at him, soft around the edges) stars falling from his palms into your chest
you're an ampersand, your fingers interlocked with his
when you ask him what it was like
(you aren't sure what you mean, but he is) he says, soft around the edges,okay
and it's enough
war isn't pretty, it's a tragedy and so are you but it's enough for now
press your fingers into the sway of his back
cough russian winter into his lungs
and try to forget about it

these horns, these horns, they weigh me down
they extend like branches towards the sun
and my head is forced to face the asphalt
while I never get to see the rushing headlights

my shadow is sewn to the soles of my sneakers
feet slowly being molded to cloven hooves
as I tip toe through then new year silverdust snow
to feed my few remaining stray familiars

I still live behind the old car wash
so there isn't going to be an inspirational landscape
only drunken demi-gods, dollars falling on deaf ears,
and a cutlass ciera in need of a catalyic converter

inev idiv iciv

The salty sweat of his chest
lingered on my lips,
so I tasted

pulled into the depths
of all his discovered
unknowns
my crevices of happy findings
warm tidings
delightful hidings

shut eyes, thoughtful, reliving
memories, flood of pleasure
losing control
I could smell his savage desire,
anticipation giving me chills

we find an everlasting truth
that even though
this distance will remain
we're bound through many domains
and no matter the end result
you and I
can't feel this real
from any other

*s.q.

honeysuckle heart, beating so fast
listen in sin the hummingbirds sing
and devour the poisonous pollen