it really is a shame
that you're choosing a life of
secrets and drugs and alcohol and *** and partying
and black nail polish and black eyeliner and black leather jackets
and ego and emptiness and anxiety and insomnia
over
a life
of
three children who are learning how to need you
less and less as the days pass
one by one by one by one
it really is a shame that you're choosing that life over
one
of
potential and talent and adventure and music and laughter
and a daughter who is wondering
why she still has so much love left in her heart for you and
where to put it when you're
vanishing into nothingness,
blackness,
right before her eyes,
it scares her.

where do i put all this love when the person who it's meant for
is going
going
gone?

but i'm still here, and i guess
you are not but
i am still here
i am what i started with
and i am what i end with

it really is a shame, though
that you are letting all this precious love go to
waste.

For once in my life
I'm not craving you
For once in my life I'm not
Needing
Waiting for you
To say
I miss you
I love you
I need you
I want you
I'm sad come help me
How are you? Come over
You're brilliant
I'm sorry
Please, come back

For once in my life I feel understood
Even if it's by one person who lives
3,781.8 km away
Someone is better than no one
I'm understood and loved unconditionally and for once
I'm not scared
Of abandonment because I've learned
That I can only ever really truly
Abandon myself.

And actually sometimes,
What's gold
Can and will
Stay.

This year will be better,

Good,

BRIGHT, even.

I promise myself that.

And I don’t plan on breaking that promise,

Or breaking any other part of myself

For that matter.

i’ve gotten so used to thinking i don’t have a choice and just going

with what my self destructive mind tells me to do

that once i actually just notice my options

and evaluate them, simply

no strings attached

and make a choice to do the opposite of what i usually do

i feel so empowered and happy and hopeful and

in control, in the good sense

and it’s like

thank god

i’m alive

to know what this feels like.

*freedom

Fear
Of being what you are not,


Happy.

hey baby
hi
i'll miss you when you're gone
no you won't
yes i will
okay
i like your scarf
thanks
are you wearing my old sweater?
yeah i've had it for forever
i do want that back someday it is a special sweater
okay
would you like some blueberries?
no thanks

i put on Beck's 'sea change' to drown out
the sound of the things we wouldn't say
the music replaced the melancholy
i postponed feeling
i'm good at putting a rain-check
on feelings
i think i learned it from you
it is both
a curse and a skill,
what can i say?
you taught me well.

i watched you remove your black nail polish
i watched you put on a new coat of black nail polish
i lit another cigarette,
inhaling what i wish i could say,
exhaling what i knew i couldn't.
an hour went by and i could no longer
breathe

i have to go
okay baby
have a good eleven days
you too, have fun on your trip. i'll miss you.
no you won't
yes i will
okay
goodbye*
goodbye

this year*:

the one person i thought was my soulmate left my life without so much as one word

i fell out of love with the first girl i fell in love with

i was reunited with someone i hoped would be my new mother

i was repeatedly disappointed

i met the most amazing friend i only ever imagined having

i quit my job

i got a new job

i fell in love with a pathological liar

i went to my grandfather's funeral

i was lied to by the pathological liar (surprise!)

i was there for her when she went to detox

i was there for her when she relapsed

i had a rather epiphanic moment where i was brought to inexplicable sobs and repeated screams  on my knees saying "help me" in desperate hopes of being heard by some unknowable God

i quit the new job and got hired back at the old one

i lost trust in all humans, including myself

i moved in with my dad

i got to know the depths of fragility

i was manipulated and in turn, i manipulated

i had random panic attacks

i met Regina Spektor

i wrote poems

i wrote songs

i painted

i read books

i drank a lot of coffee

i smoked many cigarettes

i laughed less

i cried less

i felt less

i denied anti-depressants

i worked on letting go of unhealthy persons, including my mother

which lead to learning the repetitive lesson that overnight success does not exist

i booked a flight to Mississippi

i learned how to be alone without being lonely

i became even more infatuated with the moon

i wanted to die,

i'm still alive.

i made mistakes,

i learned from them.

this year has been a whirlwind, a teenage drama gone half right topped with a questionable ending

2013, here i come.