you're awfully pretty for someone who
seems to be in a toxic relationship with the world
and for someone who doesn't realize the toxicity,
you sure do seem not-happy

I made a 'swimming in *****' joke in the locker room
and I laughed at how many people got offended,
"Whoa man, not funny," have you ever heard a drake song?
And for some reason, they all got upset about it
because '*****' is a taboo word
as if you don't see one all the time-
and while all of you say '****' every day,
I doubt you have any experience with THAT matter.

sometimes, I screenshot a poem.
sometimes, I'll add it to a collection.
a good one will be added to two or three.
sometimes, I'll add it to all of them,
but I've never, ever liked a poem so much,
I wrote it down on paper-
save two.
"A ritual to read to each other"
and
"the orange"

"Within me, my relative truth is..."
is implied when you say the truth in itself
you don't have to justify- it's a truth
for you, exactly how you said it,
and you're sharing a portion of how
you see the world.
you don't have to defend your position.
You can't leave your mind and perceive
other truths than that which you know,
and if you can, then the whole of your perception, including that concept, is a truth for you-
you shouldn't be responsible for
knowing every single truth that anyone could
possibly have.
there is no "I think...",
that was implied when you began speaking.
Opinions are facts within your mind-
that does not mean they are not to be shared.
When you share them, you open them to flexibility.
Do not step on eggshells around what it is you
truly believe-
truth might be relative, but it is relative between
individuals- it is a sign of our improved communal
consciousness that we are aware of this relativity-
but alone, your truth is not relative.
changeable, yes, but there is no other vantage
point to perceive from except yourself.
don't be afraid if your truth differs from theirs-
of course it will.
it's yours.
just say it.

I shouldn't have to beg to differ,
the right to differ should be inherent-
I will willingly reconcile my views with yours
in order to expand my consciousness,
and eliminate ego,
but I will not beg to differ.

Lord, I will be your house,
you need not roam unfounded;
I know that you're my one true spouse
on this sole path, I'm bounded.
You need not tents or broken hurting
I will take your light and from me shine it
I can't wipe away or ignore it by skirting
the issue, don't need to be reminded,
From the tallest mountain to the smallest mouse:
Here I am, Lord, I will be your house.

"how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you"

Who the **** is Jane Austen and
why the **** do we consider her works masterpieces?
Jane "boring" Austen lived an ordinary life and wrote very articulate
and pointedly ordinary examinations of character and mundane things
such as first impressions, and virtue, and proper court manners
She is the equivalent of an Oscar-winning author, because she has
mastered the art of being stunningly, fascinatingly mediocre.
She is precisely in the middle, and so balanced there that we applaud her
verbal gymnastics skills.
Works like these don't seem to carry an opinion of much of anything,
They just kind of blankly exist,
the kind of production that, if turned into a movie,
would have a nice, bland, Enya soundtrack.
There are no tears, nothing to make you feel,
It acts to make you numb,
leave you with a vague sense of discomfort and frustration, like
"What's eating gilbert grape" or "little miss sunshine"
in that everyone agrees blindly that they're good, but
they're not exactly sure why they're good, because
they're too close to life and too far away, there's nothing real,
it's too unpleasant to ignore and too familiar to watch.
It's useless, I can see this **** every day,
movies and books are about extraordinary life, to inspire us,
change something,
not just to make us okay with how stagnant we are,
or to examine our stagnation.
These books don't change anything.
I refuse to read or to write anything that steps around
the eggshells that are the fragile opinions and egos of
this, the 'everybody gets a trophy' generation,
I will not submit to anything less than feral reality and a
crazy, completely insane world, because that's what it is
my beautiful blood is more than beautiful,
it's wild and hot and pumps faster with every gasping breath,
and it deserves literature worthy of the heart that holds it.

she told me at lunch that maybe her phone had
decreased her attention span,
because everything now seemed boring
and I want her to destroy that phone,
because I live when she is alive,
and these screens have taken us away,
made us focus up close to a false image
and we'll look up pictures of beautiful landscapes
forgetting that there's a landscape around us,
a person next to us.
We've become so focused on the blue light on
our phones that you haven't looked up to the
blue light of my eyes in the past thirty minutes,
"Helllllooooo?"
Why have we replaced who we are with these
technologies, you weren't born a robot
your blood is becoming electrical currents,
I can see the metal behind your ears-
plastic replacing bones,
our eyes are sensory latest edition LCD displays-
ears expensive hearing aids
and we still can't hear each other say, "I love you,"
these days are passing by and all we can do is
instagram them- we're so busy snapchatting
we forgot that these are our glory years,
we're all chronically lonely and maybe it's because
the person next to you says they care about you
but in the last thirty minutes they've looked at that phone more than you
and you can't help but wonder,
am I the only one that's awake?
we were born human and we should die human,
I am not a screen, my life isn't a profile,
I can't kiss you through a text message,
(no matter how hard eighth grade couples try)
and I refuse to let myself slip out of what it is that
makes me or you alive.

why do pretty people have to exist?
your bone structure is an art,
the way your hair falls is poetry,
you look at me with eyes that flash of God.
Your laugh is my favorite thing to hear
and I could look at you for hours if you'd let me.
I like when you're sitting there and you think
I'm not watching, and you do these weird things
with your lips
on whatever can you're drinking from
and I like the gross faces you make
because somehow, they're not gross.
I like your Dragon Army shirt when you just wake up
and it's stretched and ruffled and you should,
by all rights, look as bad as I do in the morning,
but you don't, you never look bad,
your eyes are stars and your heart is the sun,
why do pretty people have to exist?
and why can't I have one?

I HAVE TEN THOUSAND VIEWS.

what happened? why do you
hate me? where'd it go?

So, what's the deal with ******?
Why is it that there's this whole weird thing
associated with being unclothed,
as if we don't wake up and each of us
strip down for a completely naked shower,
and under our clothes, we're completely naked.
Why is it we spend so much time pretending our bodies don't exist
and fragilely hiding behind these pointless social
constructions about what and whom you should and shouldn't be,
why do we lie about who we are and cover it up
because it's not safe for children?
CHILDREN ARE THE SAME SPECIES AS US.
THEY ARE THE SAME SHAPE.
They get naked too.
and if they're not quite the same shape yet, why do we hide what they're going to become?
It's completely pointless to build walls and act as if they were set there by someone other than ourselves, we've given each other amnesia, it's always 'they', it's always 'society', that did it.
Why do we create all these rules and desperately
struggle to follow them as if we weren't the ones
who wrote the rule book and we aren't the ones
who can erase it?
Why does he cover his emotions because he's scared to be called gay or too feminine?
Why does she wear long sleeves or look down when you talk to her?
It's not because of some conniving voice in all of our heads,
an imaginary force,
It's every time you made a sarcastic joke about people who defied the norm
and every time you yourself were afraid to break it,
you built the walls and now you're suffocating within them.
I see you, there, hiding, just like me, and it's painful to repress it, isn't it? It hurts because there's something more we're longing to do, somewhere else we're longing to be.
What is it that is so broken within ourselves that
we can't be raw and we can't be free and we can't kiss random strangers when we want to?
****** isn't dangerous if you don't hurt
and you don't make someone else feel vulnerable
or like they're trash for displaying
the image of God.
Why are we hiding the image of God?
Why do we cover our hearts like they're shameful to show?
We are born into this world naked and our parents
try to instill this ridiculous idea in our heads
that we can't share our innermost thoughts, we mustn't display,
"society won't like that"
YOU. ARE. SOCIETY.
I am a member of this universe, just like you,
and I was born naked and I take showers naked
and when we get up on stage, we're naked
and late at night, we're naked,
and when we cry, we're naked.
WHY ARE THERE ANY SECRETS LEFT WHEN WE ARE ALL HUMAN?
I have pain and joy, just like you, so show me.
My goal is to unclothe the knights in shining armor
because I don't care about the armor, I care
about his heart.
I will strip down these walls dividing you and me,
because I want to know everything about all people.
I want to unravel the secrets deep within God's mind.
I want to open the doors that are locked,
and I want to see you naked.

You're someone who doesn't see the point
in unclothing the universe
or in thinking too hard about examining things
or in crying or in poetry or in love.
You're someone who doesn't love me
and doesn't work well with me
and has a beautiful voice but doesn't use it.
You're someone who doesn't value the same
things as me- you're unlike anyone I've ever met,
and I'm fighting my feelings every day
and trying to give up and lay down my heart,
but no matter how hard I look away,
every single face looks like you.

people are so bizarre.
adults, specifically,
they're locked in a scheduled repetitive structure
they built themselves,
and they're mutually desperate to stay there,
working together in dissonance to follow these
invented norms and constant lies
about who they really are
and in the midst of blaming it, they forgot:
they ARE society.

do you really dislike being with me that much?
When I say something funny, you giggle
and your eyes light up
and I thought we always had a great time.
Why don't you want to hang around me?
Isn't that what friends do?

it's so funny how everyone loves girls
girls love girls
boys love girls
and sooner or later, there's gonna be no girls left
who love boys

why is it that you always take the wrong exit
and end up in a village wasting your time
on some pretty girl
and write tons of love poems
then die slowly inside as she gets back on the highway
without you
because it's always been real for you-
you never wanted to leave,
but she couldn't wait to get away.

A rosary a day
keeps my pain and suffering away.
A dash of 1 John 4 to ease the discomfort-
meditations on Galatians or Ephesians for the tired soul
The letters of Peter for when you feel lonely
Colossians when you're lost without a hope
Philippians to ease a confused mind
Gospel of John to put in you in that state of adoration-
Isaiah for that destiny-calling
Job for the sad and broken
Proverbs for light reading, and
Psalms for all purposes!
No matter what the situation,
the structure and truth of Scripture
never fails to amaze me.
You can call me weak for relying on something bigger than me-
(as if my character is faulted for being humble
and not falsely believing I alone can find the answer [that's the biggest asset and the biggest flaw in the human psyche, by the way,])
sorry, honey, there are a lot of things bigger than me,
and my character has only been improved by acknowledging it.
You can call me ignorant but that's only ignorant to you
because within myself (the only place I can ever be),
I find solace in my God and my light-
I hope you're fine as you are,
but if you had a handy book filled with truth
and glory,
a beautiful, eternal story,
and hope when you need it,
wouldn't you read it?

Why do girls lie to themselves and tell themselves,
I'm a six
when they're really an eight?
Why do we inaccurately portray ourselves
and seek to obtain these impossible standards
and gaze at our thighs for hours wondering
why did I ever let this happen to me
or noone will ever love me if I look like this
we'll hunch over our stomach rolls and wish
we could slice them off with a blade and they'd heal back flat, all the fat gone;
we'll wonder how anyone could find us pretty
and we'll doubt if they do
because the only boys who have ever been nice to us
are either playing a cruel joke
or are our fathers.
But here's some news: who you are is not defined by your poundage or the amount of lipids stored under your chin,
when you sit down, how far your thighs push out;
or even that terrible bit of fat under your arms
when you wave bye to your gorgeously thin friends.
Who you are is not merely 'pretty'
or 'skinny'
and I desperately don't want you judging yourself
on what some boy's favorite part of your body is
or what passerby think of your ***-
your body is more than skin deep,
your body is more than fat,
you have muscles and organs and things too,
there are more important things, like how
strong your heart is or how many gasps your lungs have had-
those things make you a valuable, important human being
because fat- well- that's not what makes you who you are.
And that's not what I love you for, because darling,
my favorite part of your body is your mind.

You can't be what I live for.
I won't waste breath on you,
not anymore,
I'm done spending my happiness
where it won't be received-
I'm tired of living in torture
our relationship isn't what I wanted;
what I wanted isn't what you wanted-
I've been idolizing the thought of a door opening
when you're just a brick wall-
to open you'd have to be something you're not
so I'm giving up on you,
for me,
but also for you.

I can avoid you, sure,
as long as my presence makes you unhappy-
I can run from you and avoid eye contact-
and because you don't particularly care about me,
I can force myself to not care too and to logically
process the situation
but how long until I stop wanting to kiss you?

What are friends? I'm not exactly the authority on this subject. I haven't owned any for very long. Before 8th grade, actually, there hadn't been anyone that really cared about me outside of my family. Teachers, sure, but teachers don't count as friends. My life had been a series of acquaintances, backstabbers, and cousins. There's been people who I'd talk to, but it was like talking to a brick wall because they, like all the others, didn't give a **** whether I was talking or not. My innermost thoughts and feelings were not of importance. They actually told me to go away a couple of times, and got offended when my feelings were hurt. "Whoa, man, can't you take a joke?" Those words feel like a knife in your heart. Not only are you wrong, but your feelings also aren't valid. I started acting like these people. I became negative, dramatic, in order to fit in. They still treated me like ****. I eventually escaped, and I want you to realize, people who don't care about you don't deserve to be around you. Friendships are relationships, and if you are fine just existing alongside someone and not participating or loving or supporting within the relationship, you are not a good friend, sorry. You have to work at it every day, build it, care for it tenderly because your heart deserves to be held as gently as you would. I want you to spend the only life you'll ever live with people who want to be there alongside you.

When you introduce yourself to someone, you should say the most important part of yourself first. Most people say their name. What the **** does that have to do with who you are? When I introduce myself to people, I say, hi, I write poems. That doesn't really mean much either. I'll let you in on a secret: Writing poetry is pointless. Poetry is this vain struggle to scrabble at our last dregs of humanity as they escape out the door. Poetry is a grasp at our fast-fading hearts as they beat their last and we try and grab them and shake them we can't get it back, we can't escape the inevitable cold and the crushing loneliness. Poetry is my dying breath as I write, write, and write, trying to light a candle as the darkness sweeps over the land. Poetry is the loud voice drowned in the waterfall because there's something within me that refuses to be silent, there's a voice that cannot be quenched and I will not sit down, I will not let this escape. I will attempt in vain to survive death and stand before time defiant, flipping time off like the ******* it is, shouting through darkness and tears and writhing limbs to spread light and to climb that ******* mountain because my lamp is going on top of there if it's the last thing I do. We strive every day at a hopeless cause: to immortalize the mortal and to describe the indescribable. To say, 'I write poems' is to check into the insane asylum. "Hello, my name is 'captain of the futile efforts'". I write poems, and I'm crazy because people die all the time and I can't do anything about it and our memories, our memories, are fragile and easily swayed. Life passes us by every single day and the writers, the poets like me try and catch it and not let it slip through our fingers because we're scared, that's who I am, I'm scared I'm gonna die and I can't avoid it so this is a last-ditch effort for you to understand me and me to understand you and maybe this time it will outlast oblivion.

You know how that quote goes, everyone does.
"If I was a drizzle, she was a hurricane"
I've got news for you: we're all just our own kinds of rainstorms
Coincidentally running into each other at different times
while we're just trying to drench whatever we can.
People used to tell me they looked up to me
and the same people haven't spoken to me in months
because what they saw was a figurehead instead of
a friend who is on their level,
and they like people who have flaws (not that I don't),
but tell us to strive to be perfect.
There's all these impossible expectations
of moral perfection- if you were the one who did it, it's
completely understandable given the circumstances,
but as soon as I'm late for school,
I'm lazy, a dropout, a slacker, partied too hard the night before.
You can lie your ***** off to me but you know
when someone did something wrong it was completely, morally unacceptable, but you, you're justified.
You can't get inside their head and understand them
because who we are, as humans, is not enough to forgive perfectly-
And I've worked so hard to learn how to love
flawlessly, but the more I love, the more I
bleed, with every breath you don't appreciate
and every love poem you don't read
And they keep beating me and beating me down
expecting this priceless gold mountain of positivity
and crushing me. It's like they're looking for flaws
in the statue I'm hiding within, and they seek to
destroy it because even tarnished gold is too bright
in their losing eyes. Maybe I'm the flaw in the statue,
my pink flesh and pale blood can't stand
these attacks and violent words, creating
holes in my heart where before there were none. They seek,
with every moment, for some trait that's imperfect,
and I'm only human, I can't maintain perfect posture all my life,
I'm on my knees,
because that's what they told me to do,
in the midst of standing up for what I believe in I forgot
how to breathe,
I'm begging because I don't think I can do this anymore.
The blood I live is torn out of me because I've given it out of lonely passion, I've had my suffering and death,
where's my resurrection?
I'm driving my head into the ground trying to
whip up the storm that will make me unique, beautiful, and valuable,
tear through the home where the heart is and skid across the highway of souls,
gather little tornadoes around me,
while they're destroying me from the inside out;
What I need isn't perfection, it's someone to love me perfectly
and I'm caught in a tortured cycle because no one can love like that-
so I'm kneeling for these things that are greater than me, and
watching in vain for an equal partner, since
no one can come too close to this lighting
and 200mph wind is fine to observe from a distance,
but nearby it's too much to take-
It's lonely being a hurricane, too, because
none of the lovely drizzles think they're worth your time.

I guess maybe it's because I've left more scars
than I've taken
and skidded across the highways of too many
broken hearts
that I've never thought of myself as scarred
but I have to be- I must be,
car crashes leave more than just marks
and I've danced through this world not-too-lightly-
everything I've done has affected me some way, some how,
but they don't feel like scars- even though they're
mentally there, on my heart, forever;
the marks she left there when she saw that green light
and didn't go,
or when my light was red and I dashed through- destroying everything in my path.
I've been on fire millions of times.
Each of them tested and refined,
some of them destroyed.
my engine's been upgraded, revamped,
my paintjob's a horrid mess;
my insurance won't cover me much longer.
There's been so many flames-
my oil seems to act of it's own accord-
and maybe, just maybe, the scars that have been on my heart
are more often *burns.

Flame burn bright when we are bornèd
every laugh and tear we shed
Flame burn bright when brother wakens
under broken tire tread
Flame burn bright when kissed the first time
soft warm eyelash on the nose
Flame burn bright in late night slumber
wrapped in arms, a sweet repose
Flame burn bright when we grow older
Flame burn bright when young and crazy
Flame burn bright in stars at night
Flame burn bright, soft and hazy
and when the evening comes at last
to the only cold we'll ever know
Flame goes out.
but- while the drunken stupor lasts,
while we're living, wild and fast,
Flame burn bright.

How do I see the world?
It is not the I that is important- or the you-
but rather, the we,
in that I am inseparable from you;
my love and my burning desire are not 'my'
the mind is an illusion, a pervasion of 'self'
and the sky is a cycle connecting the earth.
We're in a universe of ironies and I
am amused at this, the metaphor of metaphors-
the typology of who we 'are' is forever enlightening.
And in the midst of all this are the slightly insane,
I among them; those who try and put
a name to the unnameable.
Your beauty cannot be described,
we are all doomed to be lonely, and
poetry is a vain attempt to connect a string
and draw an arrow to the unity of things.

I am doomed to forever be lonely
and I might just bleed to death with the pain of it.
Sounds melodramatic but I won't apologize for
my feelings
or cover them up
because you're gonna have to ******* get over it
if you're gonna read my poetry,
or for real, any poetry at all,
and honesty leads to understanding
and understanding creates love
and if I'm not honest, no one will love me,
and if I am honest, then some of them will hate me;
it's worth it, if maybe one day someone will
hear my voice carrying and want to actually
*listen.

I've faced that I will never be able to tell you.
You can't handle it.
You don't want to deal with, or particularly care,
how I feel.
We value different things- I value communication,
passion, emotion, life,
And I think you're so worn out that you value home,
comfort, laughter, and simplicity- no figuring-it-out, please
and there's always one who gives too much and it overwhelms
and there's always one who's unwilling or unable to receive
and we aren't compatible,
and no one I've ever loved has been able
to understand or attempt to understand
the depth at which I love them.
When will there be an equal match?

you matter to me- and since you matter to me,
you hold power over my heart
that you can't abdicate unless I fire you.
Because it is I that bestows the crown and you
physically do not have the power to remove it-
and if you try, all it does is rip my heart out,
because you're trying to take it with you
and I want to keep it;
my rootstrings are yours to do with as you please
and maybe you don't want the burden but I'm sorry,
it's too late, I can't stop now,
this has been going on for too long;
you could tell me to abandon my family and I would,
for you,
and without agenda, and
declarations of love do not require returns,
for it is like gift-giving- mindless social
conventions, and my darling, you are not conventional.
You can't let someone else carry the yoke, you
have me at your will,
and just as much as I can't make you love me,
you can't make me stop loving you.
If you must, you can let me down easy-
but my heart is in your hands.
So please, please, please, darling,
be gentle.

I'm sure people have told you your name is beautiful,
but darling, it's not just your name that's beautiful
it's your eyes
and your soft hands
and all the times we've fallen asleep next to each other
and that little smile you get
or how desperately and painfully in love I am,
with you,
and how much it hurts to be near you,
and sevenfold is the pain of being away-
how nervous I got when your sister sent me a picture
-you were seated next to a man's arms-
who was he? your small body
is a bullet straight through my soul
I fear every day I've lost you and you're gone already
or that you'll find a boy and fall for him
and never think anything of me ever again
I've felt the way you moved around me-
I never want anyone else to feel that-
because I want you, all of you,
you and me,
forever,
and all my stupid lines of poetry
are cliche and hurt my own eyes reading them
but they're honest
and still fall short
because I'm so in love with you,
and we've faded so far, so fast, from what we were and have been-
how can I get us back?

I must be clear.
My mind, heart, soul, must align
with that of truth, and that of God
and it must come out my mouth
perceptible, so that all may know of what I speak,
and I must go there, and speak to you, because
it is my calling, and
today I opened my Bible to a random page
and, a highlight, left there from a long time ago
like I am prefiguring my own future,
"Here I am, Lord."
And I think, I've known the whole time.
Ever since that day,
when I saw those trees and the mountains and started crying
And the second day, when I felt the ground beneath me and the stars above
and I was whole, and humble, a full servant of the universe
And the third day, today, when the class was silent and I said,
'Prophet.'
And that's why I'm tall and my voice carries,
because there is something I must do.
I have walked in that path and I'm ready, because
having been aligned with the universe's purpose for me,
I have created and allowed for the bigger purpose to begin:
to perpetuate that egoless love,
and spread the word,
because agape, and only that, is how we can live in harmony.
You can feel it within you, can't you?
It's the human compassion that drives us and creates a straight line
from my heart to yours- if you are tugged, I will follow,
The strings of the loom are woven, not tangled;
how can we make each other happy?
That's the question.
Humans exist with one goal in mind: happiness.
The Buddhists believe something, as do the Hindus
and the Christians teach about it too.
They all seem to say something about love,
and something about suffering,
but there is one truth-
throughout all religions,
one message.
Give fully.
Give wholly.
Forget yourself.
Value your brother as much as that which you are-
We are one.
It's time we started acting like it.

I love seeing you happy.

there's a cliff in front of me
and I'm about to step off-
wait.
isn't that... isn't that the cliff, behind me?
where am I?

but at the same time, it worries me.
what if you don't think I'm worth
figuring this out? and you want someone
to just be there and laugh with, for easy access
and I'm too complicated and carry too much baggage?
my biggest fear is when I tell you how I feel
you'll say, "nope, can't deal with that." and just
emotionally check out. like what y'all did to that
other guy who had a crush on E. simple solution:
ignore him and make him feel isolated, alienated
until his feelings go away.
I'm so scared you don't value me enough to
even want to spend time with me.
and I can't be absolutely sure how you feel
and you probably don't even care particularly about my welfare.
maybe I'm just imagining you'd be willing to work
on our friendship, even.
maybe I'm just imagining you ever valued me as much as I valued you.
and the worst part is that I can picture you reading this, shrugging, shaking your head and saying, "she's right. I really don't care that much."

maybe we don't compliment each other as much
as I'd like to think.
we've always had problems, aggravated each other
too much- I'm so sentimental and can't quite
get across what I want to say perfectly,
and you are picky when it comes to a lot of things
so when, not if, I ******* my wording up, you'd
take it the wrong way,
and it hurt me I couldn't let you understand
but we've had brilliant moments, remember those?
we've gotten closer to the ideal wavelength,
we've been utterly in sync,
with just a few mistakes,
and we danced,
or that time when we figured out why
it hadn't worked before
and when I stopped telling you to sit down
and when you read the poem I wrote you without telling me
(the expression on your face was worth the anxiety giving it to you)
do you remember when we fell asleep on the couch together?
all those times I held your hand?
do you remember the look in our eyes when
we decided to let each other fly?
and though we'll never be perfect,
for you, I'm willing to try.

You read these poems, don't you?
Every time I post one, you act differently
is it a coincidence?
If you know I love you, why don't you say anything?
You've got to know, by now.
You're smarter, more aware than this.
Maybe you're still deciding your feelings. I don't know.
You haven't said anything.
Once you figure it out,
at least say, one way or the other.
I'd like to stop vaguely hoping.
"The signs we give- yes, no, or maybe-
should be clear. The darkness around us is deep."

you get this beautiful expression
wait, 'this' is singular- you get THESE beautiful expressions,
on your beautiful face, all the time. more recently
there's been that one, kind of playfully suspicious
and your smile has gotten more and more dazzling
daily. and there's that other one with the sleepy eyes
like 'I don't have time for this' when really,
I can tell you care. and maybe I'll be able to stop loving you,
but the chances of that happening are slim to none.
I'll stay here, be who I am, love you tenderly,
tenderly enough so one day you'll
fall in love with me too.
Not sure how you feel now, not sure where to go...
so, for now, I wait.

Sun is up, expansive, out, and enveloping
Moon is down, within, internal, and intuitive
These two inside you are constantly connecting
It's impossible to be just one or the other, but if you're not, then punitive
measures will be taken to ensure we're protecting
that God-**** marriage covenant, a twinning of sun
and moon; a ******* that's worth correcting:
those couples that are neither, or only one-
Women are 'supposed to be' moon,
Men are 'supposed to be' sun,
But femininity and masculinity into our genders aren't hewn
There's some that are neither and none.
This isn't just one culture, not just one idea
The yin-yang is Chinese, the Word God's favorite son.
Within the human soul is the forbidden black María
we all know within us what is true and to be done.
Although I'm not of that culture, 'Two-Spirits' were a boon,
To hold a special place, set apart, but the white men have begun
A regime of 'this is it, this is you, you cannot sing your own tune,'
But lately, the real ones, the humans, we've won.
Hey, guess what? I'll break it.
Not sorry. I'm sun.

They're flying around now
and I'm on 2% so
I need to write this one fast-
Maybe, these lovebugs
are what's spreading this, along with
the quickening of the heart inside
with the warmth
And maybe if I catch enough lovebugs
I won't have to love you anymore.
Or maybe, just maybe,
if you catch a lovebug,
you'll love me, and I can keep loving you,
just like I always have.

"The Balkan Peninsula is surrounded by the Adriatic Sea, Aegean Sea, and Black Sea..."
Looking around, I wonder which of you
have problems with your family
and who's kissed a girl
or a boy
and who has nights they barely remember
when they were broken beyond repair,
And who's skipped through a field, and batted their eyelashes
and cried on someone's shoulder
because I know we're all alive and we're together
here, and I'm not alone, I have to believe I'm not alone
you must've done stuff like this too
why hasn't it been communicated?
Why do I, like you, hide behind these uniforms in this class
because the wounds are too raw to display to even
others who have the same wounds?
Why am I scared to tell you and to communicate who I am
and these polite little lies cover up everything I say
we're too scared to offend or hurt those around us
and keep a bottle of feelings in the bed next to us,
not-to-be-shared with any but one who is inside the bottle.
Why do I write all these poems instead of paying attention in class?
Because there's something unhealthy in that
I can't say these things out loud
and everyone is sitting writing their own poems
privately, the cuts on their heart are more painful
than the ones clearly visible.
I can heal you. Show me.

Who is it that does not know of Hercules?
Tragic hero written in the stars
and of the stars to tangle his string
with that of Megara's. He watched the sunset
with twisted arm and muscled thigh
alone, his bride in the Underworld.
he thought he'd be strong enough to rescue her
maybe not- maybe the grasp of the ghosts
was too great- the cycle and spiral down, down,
down into the chasm, leaving Hercules
alone, once more. he couldn't save her,
not for all the trials in the world, even with a divine
parent who guides his hand, He can't weave
the strings in Hercule's favor, he watches the sunset
alone now; the moral of the story:
everything we love will die- we must learn to never
make our home in others, for we will be homesick forever.

You know how that quote goes, everyone does.
"If I was a drizzle, she was a hurricane"
When we're all just our own kinds of rainstorms
Magically not working with each other
Just trying to drench whatever we can
But I'd rather spend time with you than anyone in the world.
People used to tell me they looked up to me
and the same people barely talk to me anymore
because what they saw was a figurehead instead of
a friend who is on their level,
and they like people who have flaws (not that I don't),
but tell us to strive to be perfect.
And I've worked so hard to learn how to love
flawlessly, but the more I love, the more I
bleed, with every breath you don't appreciate
and every love poem you don't read
And they keep beating me and beating me down
expecting this priceless gold mountain of positivity
and crushing me. It's like they're looking for flaws
in the statue I'm hiding within, and they seek to
destroy it because even tarnished gold is too bright
in their losing eyes. Maybe I'm the flaw in the statue,
my pink flesh and pale blood can't stand
these attacks and violent words, creating
holes in my heart where before there was none. I'm on my knees,
begging because I don't think I can do this anymore.
The blood I give is torn out of me from the passion I have for
you, I've had my suffering and death,
where's the resurrection?
I'm driving my head into the ground trying to
whip up the storm that will make me unique, beautiful, and valuable,
trying to gather little tornadoes around me,
while they're destroying me from the inside out;
standing for these things that are greater than me, and
watching in vain for an equal partner, since
no one can come too close to these whirlwinds
and mountain-high clouds.
It's lonely being a hurricane, too, because
none of the lovely drizzles think they're worth your time.

maybe I should be a nun
or date that boy in orchestra
or adopt more cats
because anything would be better than
spending my free time learning love songs on guitar
so i can melt your heart if need be
and constantly dreaming about you
and being crushed every waking minute.

You're playing this little game, like,
slowly shift away from Maddie when she's standing on the balcony
and yell at her for yelling
and tell her, "GO," loudly,
like, "we don't want you here,"
and you laugh at my feelings as though they're
cliche and not worthy of your attention
and you ran away from me when I walked up
the stairwell, saying, "Watch out! she's coming!"
and I know you think it's funny
or it doesn't matter, but
if you only knew how much I loved you,
you wouldn't dare. and I think when I
gave you that hurt look just now,
you knew you had pushed me too hard
so hard that you might have broken me.

We're talking about evolution in biology
makes you think a little about things like
cause-and-effect, or the-natural-flow-of-events
and it makes people like me think about summer,
how the fires of our hearts have been numbed
for a little too long,
and they're just now getting rekindled.
The grass pokes through the matted sheets of brown,
and the world's pulse goes dun, dundun, dundundun,
dundundundundundundun;
I wake up in the morning and it's a brave kind of day.
I've never felt the awakening as much as I am this year, but then,
I've never felt the winter as hard as I have this year;
so my blood, was frozen, now finally pumps with the coming of spring.

"I'm depressed," she said, laughing a bit.
You gave her this glare, like "look you lil ****,"
"You know not what you speak, you don't even get
what that means," we live in a world when as long as you
have an excuse, you aren't responsible
and "I'm ADHD" is enough to be able to do
whatever you want, and you aren't held accountable
At what point do feelings become genuine enough
to justify your actions? When is it okay to hurt
others and plead insanity, your morals aren't tough
You're confining yourself, staying in the dirt,
"I can't get higher, the world's stacked the odds,"
is enough to believe you're 'fine just as you are'
When you use, 'I'm okay as a sociopath, why don't you love me'
instead of, 'I can be better, I can get very far,'
Everyone will be held responsible for their actions,
Boys will NOT just be boys, and girls are not all *******
We don't have to break into meaningless factions
Hurting each other, you gave my heart stitches,
you don't have to do that. You can be nice to me.
because in reality, you ARE fine, you ARE free
These limiting conceptions are what's holding you back
It's impossible to believe you can get back on track
You're stuck in this rut and it hurts, it tingles
The rays of this roof is breaking through the shingles
I want you to be happy, I want you to see light
The will of your body is the will of your mind
You can conquer these words, these diagnosis confines,
You can do it. I know. Believe me. You're fine.

Whenever my mom talks about gays, she says,
"Why does it matter if they sleep with someone of the same gender? You don't have to tell me about your *** life."
But it's not just a *** life.
It's a love life,
and love holds everything we are together
and if my love is different from yours,
in a world when people like me get bullied,
destroyed
for something they can't help,
then I want to know I am safe.
I want to stop lying to you, to my mom,
to my dad, my teachers, my friends.
I want to stop coming to school and being terrified someone will
realize who I am.
I want to be able to be honest about these deepest of feelings.
I want to be able to tell the truth to people who love me,
and I want them to be able to still love me after it.
I long for the day when this won't even be an issue,
and I can look her in the eyes and kiss her,
without gasps or gags or threats of death.
That day is not today.
I long for the day when we don't have to come out
and everyone is free together.
That day is not today.
So, until then, I will wave my ******* rainbow flag
and scream until I can hardly breathe
until it's safe for you and me.
It's horrible we have to use the word gay.
Love is love and it shouldn't be defined a certain way.