A friend asked me
how to be a writer.
I wanted to say,
lock yourself in a room,
scream until you have
a poem and no voice.
Open your veins and bleed
until you know that your bones
are pure words and sorrow.
Act as if you slit your own throat
and all you can bleed
are your own regrets
and all of the darkness
you boxed up for inspiration.
Write your mom a letter,
tell her you're leaving
and you won't be back for awhile
Because being a writer is traveling
through all seven layers of Hell
and denying anything is wrong.
Forget loving yourself
when all you have is a pen and paper
fused to your wrist
and Jesus is tapping at your skull
saying turn back now.
Warn the neighbors that if they smell burning
It's just your soul
clawing at the front door trying to get in.
Learn how to be alone.
Learn how to lose everything you have
in order to feel release,
learn how to only feel deceased
from now on.
A friend asked me
how to be a writer.
All I said was
don't

i wrote you
a letter every day
letters to tell you
just how i feel

written in neat, curved
writing i told you
just how sweet
i thought you were
how you made my heart
glow

letters in which i wrote
with various colors of ink
pouring out my whole being
to you

i wrote you
a letter every day.

i wrote you letters in which
i told you how you made me
bloom.

eventually
i found myself
pressing harder on
the paper
than i had before.

creating tears in them
similar in shape
and size
as the ones
inside of me.

i began to send
letters
with creases
and bumps
and stains
splattered with tears

pouring
from my eyes

as i wrote
the anger
bubbling within me.

my last letter
addressed to you
contained
no words

but was blank.
because
i had none that

could reach
as far

and deep

into the cracks
of my
heart

to describe
just
what you

had left
of me.

Roses are red
Violets are blue
My love is a gun
And the bullet’s for you