if you're pro-life, 'American ******' should disgust you.
all lives, not just American lives.
if you're pro-life, torture should disgust you.
all lives, not just innocent lives.
if you're pro-life, sexism should disgust you.
all lives, not just male lives.
if you're pro-life, income inequality should disgust you.
all lives, not just well-off lives.
if you're pro-life, institutionalized racism should disgust you.
all lives, not just white lives.
if you're pro-life, violence, harassment, bullying, revenge,
should all disgust you-
all lives, not just the lives you like,
the lives that benefit you,
the lives you planned or the lives you agree with,
the lives that hurt you and left you,
the lives that killed your family, even-
all lives.

and darling, I will be loving you 'til we're seventy

fire that's closest kept burns most of all

why am I always so afraid?

and I thought I was going to die that night
but I would never have been happier to die
alongside those people, in that place
I could smell the dirt and the leaves
so happy hearted and warm
and we stood steady as the stars in the woods
as the old pine fell we sang
and we cried, it was just a blessed morning.

oh honey, let's run away together
I'm sure you'd look beautiful sleeping in the car
as the sunset fell over the mountains
and the whole world would agree with me, I think.

when you run make sure you run
to something and not away from

learn to control yourself before you try
to control other people

the heart of a Christian never ceases to amaze me
its breadth and wonder and beauty
extends far beyond this mortal world
and deep within every person it touches
oh, may that my heart resemble the Sacred Heart of Jesus!
may I love radically and fearfully.

no one cares enough to fix you,
nor can they- except for God!
and those who are strengthened by His spirit of love.

sleep it off, we're broken people
and I keep breaking people, don't I,
it was not your fault but mine, and it was your heart
on the line, I really ****** it up this time
didn't I my dear? I keep ******* myself up,
but I know I can't keep entertaining shattered dreams
and the idea of shattering them
the age of romanticizing pain is over,
no one wants someone who is tragically broken
everyone wants everyone else to be whole
so they can help themselves be whole
so all I can do is stop feeling sorry for myself
it's time for me to glue my **** back together
and move on with my life
so eventually I can help other people
glue their **** back together too
I can't care about you until I am whole and glued
my cup runneth over but only once it's full,
and it's about time to collect my own **** rainwater.

I'm half a man, at best
with half an arrow in my chest

my body fails, I'm on my knees

you make me feel short,
no one else does

I want you to need me
just as desperately as I need you

not everybody is perfect, but that's the point.

kick all my walls in
break me down
I'll let you

and somehow you kicked all my walls in
I am foolishly completely falling
I know how it goes for day and night
never together, for they see things in a different light
there's always room for common ground
riding on a wind and I can't give up
I think I'm gonna win this time
it's taking it's taking all I've got
I'm like a boat on the water
you're the raise on the waves that calms my mind
and I can't see two feet in front of me
only half a blue sky, kind of there but not quite
I'm walking round with just one shoe
I'm half a heart without you
half a man at best- with half an arrow in my chest
tell me with your mind, body, and spirit
but do you really wanna be alone?

why me? when did it become me?
and why not anyone else?

I want heat

you're so vain you probably think this poem is about you

I want a tattoo

I have a tag on tumblr
specifically called 'parenting'
so that if and when the time comes
I remember what I needed when I was younger
and I can be that person for my child.
I write love letters to my future spouse
sometimes in pen and sometimes on the typewriter
so that if and when the time comes
they know how long I've waited for them,
they know that they're a dream come true
and how amazing it is that I can wake up to see them next to me.

let's take shots from test tubes and
go on drives and smoke things
and laugh while our voices croak
grow hoarse together but not old.

you ******* twinkled at me
and you knew, so you did it again

I never realized the discontent within me
or, I did, and I ignored it, happy to shut it out
when my soul didn't fit the definition of woman that God provided
I told myself, actually told myself, that I could be a man of Christ
and I held to that in the quiet of my heart, silently
When I was little I used to pray to God that he would make me a boy
I used to cry myself to sleep because there didn't seem to be a solution
there was no way, except for a miracle, maybe one day
I'd wake up and everything would feel right
and as my hips grew in I couldn't help feeling upset
that my jeans would never sag and I would never be angular
I didn't know that blocking out these thoughts wasn't normal
I didn't know that most everyone didn't have these thoughts
I used to dream about growing out my beard
I only watch straight **** and I'm not sure why but I think
it's because I have never seen myself as a woman
I used to play outside with my shirt off, fighting off the dog with my 'spear'
I thought I was a warrior, I thought I was a king
I thought I was one of God's golden angels
I thought my voice was low when I began to sing
I made friends with boys and had crushes on girls
just like all the other boys
and when they left me it was the saddest thing
My teachers told me I should just play with the girls
and I cried. What child, when told to wear a dress,
tells her mother that it was the worst day of her life?
What child wants to grow out her leg hair and have pecs, not *****
what child wants short hair and a beard and narrow hips
what child wants to kiss girls in a chivalrous manner, not
like a woman stealing a girl away from her heterosexuality,
what child feels like she's in a costume when she dresses up
and wears makeup, what child immediately removes her nail polish?
who am I? Am I who they say I am?

every bird dies but only phoenixes rise.

don't **** the marrow out of me
it's all I have left-
I used to sing 'even heroes have the right to bleed'
well I'm bleeding, now, I was mortal the whole time,
a hero must make themselves while they bleed
not before, and they must not be made by others-
a hero has to carve themselves from the ashes.

I know I have to light the way for others and ignite their sparks
but there's nothing left inside me to burn.

*******

you're right
I am absolutely a hypocrite
I don't know why you hate those so much, honestly
because everyone is a hypocrite, we all say things
and do other things
because we think we're excluded from the rules
but that's not the point, the point is that between you and me,
I can cross the line but once I'm over I panic
and hop back to the safe side of the fence-
I don't know if the grass is greener on the other side
but the real question is if you or anyone can keep me there.

we were both too real for you, I think
if you couldn't touch me then I would never think you love me
even enough to try, at least.

it's easier for both of us to love someone who is not there
safe, isn't it? while simultaneously breathing danger
we'll never have to get close, never reciprocate,
we'll be fine alone pining away at endless galaxies
that we can never reach out and touch.

yet again, I have to ask myself,
what am I *doing

the fault line between us shifts
setting us on edge as we grind against each other
wearing us down, breaking pieces and chunks
we tear each other apart, the world is made of just us,
floating alone, none without the other
we lean, quaver, and break, rolling tides spin around,
the sun is scorching each of us the same
and we quake.

I am a criminal
someone who should never be allowed to touch another person
maybe the cross is not made of material you can recognize
but it is cross-wood, heavy, cedar, oozing on my garments
walking slowly uphill with no Simon to assist
and it's better that way.

it's just your mother and your father getting into your head,
I think you've never been more beautiful

what am I?
please tell me about myself
something you notice that I've always taken for granted
can you see right through me? or am I an enigma?
can you paint me? draw me? play me on your instrument?
who am I to you?

what am I supposed to do
all I've been doing is trying to center myself
lower the weight
so my gravity can focus me
calm myself down, write while I'm alone
find secrets to keep
but all this is just confusing me
because I know I want you but
I don't know if I should have you
the nights are getting later and I want to drink so badly
I want to be so intoxicated right now
and I sure as hell don't think I should be posting this poem
on the internet where you can see it.

no one wants to become a therapist
unless
something inside them is ripping them apart.

wow, people care about me

if God is anything like my own father
then I pray for mercy
and if God is nothing like him
then I weep with joy.

God knows what He's doing
every seed He plants in my heart will bloom or die
exactly the way it's supposed to

I want everything to feel good and beautiful and healthy again
and I want to refrain from anything that makes me sick
to my stomach
I want to spend time alone and learn how to be alone
to be my own best friend
to love fully but not to throw my heart into someone's arms
because my heart's place is inside my chest
the only place where it can pump, keeping me alive
I want to cast off all the things that make me feel sick
and all the people that make me feel like
the walls are closing in on me
I don't want to go down any paths I shouldn't
I just want to go down a clear and visible path
alone, walking in love, with the wind on my wings
covering the earth with the songs I sing
and I want the miles to fly by.

I say 'this feels different' every time, don't I
but I have stumbled upon something that sets this apart
a very small detail that implies a very big change
I can't touch myself thinking of you.
it seems as though you've buried yourself too deep in my mind
all I can see is our laughter and your goofy grin
I find myself sitting here smiling to the dark room
laughing alone, and I feel guilty because you're not here,
maybe you're not a crush I'm objectifying any more,
maybe I get it now,
I understand WHY the rules are what they are, this time,
because to touch myself thinking about you
uses you, it takes something golden and makes it tarnished
takes a picture of it rather than having it here
it makes you less than you are-
I can't ignore the whole of you rather than parts I want
I have to love all of you, and I am finally equipped to do it
and I would much rather be touching you, than myself.

I am not in love with people who have fantasies
they trivialize the beauty of the world right in front of us
I am in love with real people
I love seeing people whose skin is off, whose soul is
burnt raw
the ice cold bitter air cuts them and they feel it
I love tender hearts who seem themselves for their own
beauty and brokenness
and beyond that, their own mediocrity
because we are all not clichès
but we are so **** beauitful because of it.

It is not that I am broken
I am not broken
I just keep telling myself I am-
I lose myself and forget my whole and beautiful soul
and it is so easy to get lost in these fantasies of shattered dreams
until you wake me up and remind me of me.

what's killing me is myself, getting wrapped up
in bandages of my own broken worth,
choking to death laying in bed, immovable, until I raise my head,
find the strength to tear through
but this, alone, I cannot do-
what's giving me life is you.

I cried myself to sleep too, you know-
for the past two nights
Christmas shouldn't feel this way
but at least we have each other.