trading:**
scissors for hair
false smiles for real tears
cruel words for honest confessions
draining corpses for supportive souls
loneliness for solitude
the hum of numbness for booming self doubt
pretending for admitting
hard shell for nakedness
anger for sadness
distractions for reactions
avoidance for opportunity
wide open wounds for well deserved closure
indifference for uncertainty
emptiness for openness
hell for health

i’m trading
ingrained habits for a new consistent way of life
i’m really scared.

i inherited an entire library
full of books that offer explanations
as to why you are incapable of loving me.

the romance section was laughable,
giving me bullet point commentaries
as to why i am doomed to never
be loved or feel loved again,
reasons why i settle for beautiful boys who
enjoy my company because i'm quirky, cute, time killer material,
not anchored, solid, strong, soulmate material.
but that's just it, i guess, no one can deny it-
(everyone knows when they are in the presence of precariousness.)

the mystery section offered me nothing but
a full buffet  of questions i already had,
questions that always seemed to give clues to future answers,
delicious questions that tasted sweet at first
then turned suddenly sour,
questions that made me understand the meaning
of a deceptive cadence.
(these books made me wish i didn't leave fingerprints
on everything i touch.)

the fiction section made me feel like a child again,
these were the books that reminded me why hope
is and has always been my favourite bedtime snack.
(these were the books that reminded me that just
because i couldn't make you love me did not mean
that i couldn't make believe you love me.)
since i've stepped out of my fins every step has made me wish
for the courage to throw myself into the sea,
to dissolve in an instant,
to be a daughter of the air forevermore.
(perhaps Hans Christian Anderson was the only person in the world
who knew just how much it hurts to be a human being.)

the self help section gave the illusion of answers,
the way a fortune teller with a foreign accent
doused in flattery and jewelry might seem.
i have spent hours of my existence with these books,
laying on my stomach, furrowed brow, fingers turning white
from clutching the ballpoint pen for dear life thinking
maybe if i just keep
underliningunderliningunderlining
things will start to make sense again.
(because, don't you know? the more you underline
the parts of your life that are relevant on paper,
the closer you are to having figured out your life so perfectly
you eventually will walk by these books wondering
which unfortunate person you should donate them to.)

i inherited an entire library
full of books that offer explanations
as to why you are incapable of loving me.
i think maybe there are some things
that we are never meant
to know.

he died on his birthday,
he was born on his deathbed.
we were all there, standing in the same room
when his last breath
escaped.
“he’s gone.” someone said,
it’s all a blur to me now.
the moon was full that night
as if it was trying to fill
the emptiness in our hearts.
we watched him die,
we watched him live.
he was a brother, an uncle, a father, a son.
there’s no harm in remembering him.
but please, don’t give up your life
just because the pain of having people leave you
is too much to bear.
you couldn’t save him,
i couldn’t save you.
i hope one day we can all learn
how to save ourselves.
we deserve that much, don’t you think?

to grow out my health
to grow out my self esteem
to grow out my sense of adventure
to grow out my happiness
to grow out my honesty
to grow out my bravery
to grow out my laughter
to grow out my openness
to grow out my vulnerability
to grow out my forgiveness
to grow out my potential
to grow out my inner mermaid
to grow out my trust
to grow out my creativity
to grow out my perseverance
to grow out my patience
to grow out my motivation
to grow out my willingness
to grow out my beliefs
to grow out my soul
to grow out my desire
to grow.

twenty one and burned out
like a cup over a candle.
"you're so young, you're too young,
you're too young to even realize how young you are."
he said to me before i went home the other night.
i laughed and tried to believe him, while trying to laugh in a way
that would display the many lives that lay within me.
i wish the world would start noticing
how looks are deceiving and hearts are receding and bodies are forgiving.
i've spent too much time living the lives of the ghosts that haunt me.
i'm exhausted from moving out and moving in,
trying different lives on like clothes that don't fit -
peering into the lives of other girls who tell me
that they are addicted to feeling accomplished and not
defeated, while i nod in silence,
then spend the entire night awake, wondering
what they mean.
i've dreamt up a million ways you could have said goodbye.
i've spent two years in the waiting room of hope,
only to be called into the office of indifference,
which happens every time i show up
to my appointments with forgiveness.
i'm still waiting to meet him.
but it's alright, my name will come up on the list
of names soon.
it's all over now and i've grown into being glad.
i learned patience the way i learned to walk.
sometimes i miss it, the way the sadness was a lifestyle,
but novelties become exhausting and boring and
so overly dramatic and annoying.
i'm still frustrated, you know.
even though i make it look easy.
being pretty is like putting on a movie you have no
intention of paying attention to.
it's easy and i don't care.
by saying that, i mean i don't need you,
the way you think i look like i do.
what i'm trying to say is, i still love you
even though admitting mistakes is not
something humans brag about very often.

you spoke of romance as if it were a disease.
you treated poems like pick up lines.
you said there was no point in writing anything if the writer
did not have an audience.
you asked me who my audience was,
and as soon as i answered your question,
i stopped writing.
it's easy to stop writing about someone once they begin
expecting you to.
i still think part of me was wrong, but most of me was right.
there is a point to writing beyond having
someone who will read it.
it is a desperate demanding kind of feeling
that wishes to remain
anonymous.

sometimes i watch
eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
over and over again
on the days when missing you
hits me right in the face and makes me want
to call you, see you, hug you
to replenish the memories i have of you.
it makes me wonder if having you
erased from my mind would make this
whole thing easier, this new
chapter of my life.
the letting go, the detaching.
getting into the habit of walking by flowers
and not plucking their petals to see
if you still love me or not.
the realizing that it doesn't matter if you still
love me or not,
but being frustrated with the not knowing
anyway.
i don't want to erase you from my mind
out of hate or spite or resentment.
i want to erase you because the desire to go back
and do things over again is stronger
than the desire to accept things for how they turned out
and move on.
i don't know if it's missing you
or missing the person i was when i was with you
that is driving me crazy.
i think it's a little of both but mainly just the fact
that i want to tell you i'm sorry
without it seeming useless.
i feel you in my heart still and i guess i just want
you to know that.
but i also want to forget that because it hurts.
so i watch
eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
on repeat
to forget about it all,
if only for a little while.
why is everything always so intangible and bittersweet?