and dear Lord, I am so glad that there is more to me than this.

Do you ever say things that make you cry?
Do you listen to music that changes your life?
Do you dive deep into the depths of thought?
For a second, have you had remorse?
Have you ever decided you were wrong?
Have you changed your mind?
Are you that scared of yourself that you have blanked your own mind,
numbed your own heart for fear of what it would tell you?
Have you ever sat alone and thought about your future?
Have you ever looked at someone and told them the truth?
Have you ever walked by yourself and felt horribly lonely?
Why don't you tell someone?
Have you ever sat on a roof and watched the stars, not just for the aesthetic?
Have you ever felt in your core who you really are?
Have you ever screamed for joy?
Have you ever cried for hardly any reason?
Do you have songs that make you feel small?
Who would you live for?
Who would you die for?
Have you ever thought about that?

Emancipate yourself from mental slavery.

it is almost impossible to forgive
someone that you once loved.
it is almost impossible not to forgive
someone that you love.

we are the reason that the other can't breathe
people, a person, is the most beautiful of things
I am the fresh breeze while you shift beneath me
and the world looks brighter in another's heart
there's something about waking up not alone
that cheers your soul and stirs it
You can't change, but you are, aren't you?
maybe we just don't show each other
but we did, we did change, we boil within our hearts
and toss about, vaporizing the love we feel for each other
because we're too scared to pour it,
maybe people are so lonely because we burn so bright
we're scared to scald our neighbors,
we think we're too hot for them, we'll char their skin,
but we won't- their heart is as hot as ours
I am a coal who needs company or else I will die out
the soft red light from within me fades
until someone shows me theirs.

poetry is written into my heart
there is no turning back now
this sacred, undefiled art
has taught me how to break all vows

the lake is clear now, it's quite smooth
the sun is shining and shadowed
my car (their car) is set on cruise
and my thoughts appear to be scattered

poetry is written desperately through my heart
on the walls of my soul, divine
guidance in each individual part
taking into account every line

my mom's hair is not a bit soft
this lake is far too smooth
don't look around you, you'll start feeling lost
and you won't even realize it when you lose

poetry is engraved into the veins of my heart
pumping through every time
poetry is entrenched in who I am
I can't escape these entangled vines

my father's phone is older than me
my time here has run over
I look around but I just wanna be free
and get myself a wild-eyed lover

poetry is more than my heart- it's my life,
it's entrapping me, I'm in its power
my arms and its legs are inseperably entwined,
and I've given it permission to have me for a bit more than an hour.

God has blessed me so, so, so, so, so much

married to Christ
is a lot happier
than 'lonely'
and 'broken'
because unlike a marriage to a human
if I mess up,
my husband forgives me endlessly
and loves and understands me perfectly
"Men can't read your mind"
mine does.
My savior loves me more than I could possibly imagine
and He will never leave me.
With Him, I can always be happy-
and I will always be happy
as I strive to be faithful
to my one and only.
I am not worthy of Him in any sense of the word
but He thinks I am worthy of His love
and that's all that matters now.
I am imperfect and I felt kind of unfulfilled and unsatisfied
but it was because I was looking for God
everywhere except God Himself
and I was searching for someone to love me
and understand me
no human relationships can feel like this
and I'm lucky
because I will never be separated from
my God
this isn't a long-distance relationship-
He is around me in every molecule
every blade of grass
every cloud
every cat or dog
He is there.
I will not be lonely
unless I myself leave Him.
but He is faithful
and He calls for me every day I am gone
He cries for me day and night
and never gives up
until I return, one day,
to His open arms
that embrace me
like a human never could.
I will never be lonely again.
My God is more than enough-
He is the source of everything-
an ever-flowing river of mercy,
grace, hope, love, passion, joy...
what else could I ask for?

it's always that time of the year
and I'm waiting for it to not be
like this.

On the other side of town a boy is waiting
with fiery eyes and dreams no one could steal
She drives on through the night anticipating
'Cause he makes her feel the way she used to feel.

our God is the God of goodness, yes
but a God of goodness cannot bring Himself
to hate, disapprove, or separate Himself
He is love
and He welcomes you
you cannot run from Him
for He is there in all, and especially in you.

"She said she would have been the most important thing in my life, but she is the only thing that I don't have."
"Kiss me like that and forget about the future of our lives and the other side of the story."
"There's nothing wrong with me and you, and it is not a bad thing."
"sometimes I get lost in the world and you are the only way to the point where it was."
"I don't know what I want you to be but I know that I want you for me."
"Girl you are the best thing about being in love and I don't know how much I miss you."
"I really want to be with you and you don't know how much I love you because you don't want it and you love it when I am not sure."
"Falling in love again and I don't think I can be found, I have no one else."
"I just want to tell you how much you mean to me."
"Please follow me please please don't let me go back to the point of having to wait for you."
"Why do you think you can get the best of me and I have to go back to the same thing as the first time since I've never had you."
"my love is like the way I am so excited to be the first."
"kiss me you say but I shy away in case you figure out you don't want to stay."
"Making me laugh so hard I try not to mention it was the best thing about being in love with you."
"I'd rather be with you and you are the only thing that would make me laugh and smile and say that I can be used."
"you make me feel like I have to go back and forth between us and the other side is that I can't."
"You are the only thing that I don't have to do with a lot of people."
"I'm not going to be the best for you but I will try to be if it means I am able to love you."
"You know how much I hate you and you know how much I miss you so I don't think that I can't even see you at all and I love you so much for a long way from my heart."
"It's all over again and I love the way you want a relationship with my mom and I don't think that it was the first time."
"you said let me go and I don't know how to."
"Wait I have no idea how much I love you so much."
"tell me you're not going to leave me too."
"It's all about you but I'm still waiting."
"Yes you do not know what I was."
"I love the way you want me too."
"Love is the only thing that I don't know if you want."
"Dancing with the best of me in your eyes and I love it."
"I miss the old days when you are the same as the one I love."
"what happened to forever and a day?"
"what about the love we had and why is it so easy to leave me?"
"Take me back to the point where you could have been the most beautiful girl in my life and the only one who can make me feel."
"I can't work without you in my head and you can't even get to know me."
"Half of my heart is broken and the other side is the most beautiful."
"You cannot find the right time for me and I don't think that the two sides of you agree."
" I have no idea how much I love you so much, but it was the best thing about being a girl."
"You are not the only person who can make me happy and you are not going to be able to get to me ever again."

The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.
-Albert Camus

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

the only requirement for a thing to be good and beautiful
is that it be true.

they are always talking about me, aren't they
when they look into the group and say
some of you will have a different vocation
they are always talking about me
because I am not brave enough to correct people
when they say, "when you have kids"
they are always talking about me
because I imagined a day yesterday
walking through an airport to board a plane
on a mission, with a God-loving group of people,
singing, heavy backpacks and joy in our hearts
ready to handle anything life could throw at us
and united in love together for the rest of the world
and I felt an enormous sense of relief,
"I made it. this is what I've been fighting for."
I finally made it, I'm home-
isn't that beautiful?
I know exactly where I'm supposed to be
I'm just not ready to exactly say it yet.

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.

so much of me is "if only"

Faces along the bar
Cling to their average day:
The lights must never go out,
The music must always play,
All the conventions conspire
To make this fort assume
The furniture of home;
Lest we should see where we are,
Lost in a haunted wood,
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good.

The windiest militant trash
Important Persons shout
Is not so crude as our wish:
What mad Nijinsky wrote
About Diaghilev
Is true of the normal heart;
For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.

I never want to sleep in the house again
I never want to look at my phone screen again
I never want to hold the hand of someone I don't love again
I never want to be feel like I'm sick again
I never want to look back again
I just want to run away
and live in the woods

It's not ******* about you all the time
let's all just grow up and have a little bit
of human decency towards each other
without ******* ourselves of fear about
what if she thinks or what will he think or
what does it look like or is this okay
because we're not the ******* sun. I'm not,
you're not, and thank God for that- hardly anybody
is paying attention to anybody else as
individuals. So you might as well grow up and be nice.
Nothing you do is as big of a deal as you think it is
nor is it as about you as you think it is-
so try for a little kindness. Just a little mercy.
It's not hard.

High rise, veins of the avenue, bright eyes and subtle variations of blue
everywhere is balanced, there, like a rainbow above you
street lights glisten on the boulevard and cold nights make staying alert so hard
for heaven's sake, keep me awake so I won't be caught off guard
clearly I am a passerby but I'll find a place to stay
Dear Pacific day, won't you take me away?
small town hearts of the New Year
brought down by gravity, crystal clear
City fog and brave dialogue converge on the frontier
make haste, I feel your heartbeat
with new taste for speed, out on the street
find a road to a humble abode where both of our routes meet
The silver sound is all around and the colors fall like snow
The feeling of letting go, I guess we'll never know

Cheer up and dry your damp eyes and tell me when it rains-
I'll blend up that rainbow above you and shoot it through your veins
your heart has a lack of color
and we should have known
that we'd grow up sooner or later
cause we wasted all of our free time alone

This my cross by which I shall be crucified
and slain by it, my eyes fixed upon my Lord
She'll never know why I died
I wield the penitential sword
To cut off all advances
to shield her from my fault
these shady, pained romances
should never have happened at all.
This my cross which I shall bear all my life
till death do us in heaven unite
for God will be my spouse,
my lawful wedded wife.
I learned grace, first and foremost
from loving someone in every breath
and holding myself back for their sake,
I must now seek my death.
This my cross which God has shown me,
This my cross that I shall bear.
This my cross for the noble battle
that I must fight, and not despair.

I fall in love like the leaves from the trees:
every autumn;
I have to be scraped off the ground yearly
for I have lost all sense of direction
collapsed, dead
can be molded by anyone who stops by
unsettled by children
and, amid all of it,
it is frighteningly beautiful
and wondrous
as the wind takes me once again.

some birds aren't meant to be caged

The whole world will shatter, whether you forgive yourself or not.
The difference is that if you forgive yourself,
you will still be there, standing above the rubble.
You will still be whole, even if nothing else is.

this life is so, so, beautiful
and I am grateful for being able to feel it
thank you, thank you, thank you God.

I want to ask someone for relationship advice
but the only person who's been there for everything between us (aside from me) is you.
and I can't ask YOU for relationship advice
about OUR relationship.
why, that would be ridiculous!
and there's no one I really trust to ask
so I guess I'll talk to myself about you.
just like I always do.

like when I close my eyes and don't even care
if anyone sees me dancing
like I can fly, and I don't even think of touching the ground
like a heartbeat skip, like an open page
like a one way trip on an aeroplane.

“Your battles inspired me - not the obvious material battles but those that were fought and won behind your forehead.”
― James Joyce

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.

there is something unifying about art
and something terrifyingly divisive
yes, we have all felt this- we are not alone in this theatre
millions of eyes have scraped this painting
thousands of hearts have beat to this music
and yet, no one will ever feel exactly the same way as you do
you will walk together, but not the same
supported, but alone
art reminds us of this- of the smallness of our beings
but the vastness of ourselves too, that to an ant I am an enormous mass
to the sky I am the smallest of matters, and to myself?
Why, to myself I am everything.
And one day, to someone else, I might be too.

spring is when things start to boil over
people fall in love, break out of it,
burn, awaken- the world wakes up and is born
you look out the window and the air doesn't make you numb
it quickens you, quickens something within you
and your soul is alive again your soul is alive again
your soul is alive again, so alive- and you can feel,
and in this thawing, everyone collapses and falls together in a muddy mess
we were pillars of ice standing alone but now we melt
our fur stands on its wet ends as we yawn, calling for our mothers
when for so long it seemed broken, dead and gray, all things suddenly are green, and so
we find each other in spring.

I'm going to be everything I can, and more
for you, yes- but also for me
and eventually for someone who will need me
and for everyone, right now, who already needs me
because I'm tired of living in dreamland.
It's time to wake up. I'm alive.

people who need structure
make me think they don't have strong self-esteem
people who don't like structure
make me think they're wild and a bit disorganized
people with father problems
make me think they have something weird going on with
abandonment, or sexuality
and people with mother problems
make me think they need more nurturing
what about people who analyze other people and try to understand them?
is it because we desperately want to be understood?

maybe if you didn't want them to fight back
you shouldn't have brutalized them in the first place-
maybe, rather than hiding photos because you're scared of what they'll do,
you never repeat the actions that are in the photos
maybe start considering what you are doing
to be an act of terrorism (because it is)
and we're all just fighting for our own lives-
so stop taking everyone elses'.

if someone has faults, it's impossible to be angry at them
once you realize those faults stem from brokenness
and that it's not a whole person yelling at you
or manipulating someone, it's not a whole person that
forgot you or stopped loving you, it's not a whole person
that looks past you or laughs behind your back, it's not a whole
person that is proud or sarcastic or spiteful or unreasonable, it's not a
whole person that abandons someone they once loved, it's not
a whole person that can hardly feel love at all and doesn't know why, it's
not a whole person that steps on the hurting and the downtrodden,
it's not a whole person that is apathetic and bitter and lost.
it's a broken person, someone who needs healing. They aren't
complete in themselves and choosing evil anyway, from a developed place.
They are broken, they are beaten down, there are chasms in their soul,
addictions and sadness and pieces left for dead. They are not choosing
of their own perfectly free will, because they are enslaved,
enchained by their own fear. It's not their fault. They are broken.
Forgive them, heal them, love them. A whole person, once healed
is a truly free person. And then, only then, will we know who they
(these people we once ****** in our hearts) really are.

You show your age,
when you drown your rage.
But I see past those laughter lines,
so baby, lets split tonight,
I got a tank full of gas till light.

Yeah we can drive for miles and miles
But you just said,
"Not for all the love in the world"
"Not for all the love in the world"

Cause she didn't realize, now that's a lot of love.

Pipe dreams fade,
and all the underdogs get laid.
Left your heart in the hands of a jugglin clown.
And so you crave recognition,
but the keys to the city went missing

People are all puzzles to be figured out
But you just said,
"Not for all the love in the world"
"Not for all the love in the world"

Cause she didnt realize, now that's a lot of love.
Oh Oh

I guess that everybody,
went to a better party, oh no
Not for all the love in the world
Not for all the love in the world
But she didnt realize, now that's a lot of love.

There's so much within me
so many years of memories that I don't have time to think about
I'm constantly on my phone or stressing about
the problems of the day, but the truth is that
my life has been long and will be long- there are
people who have changed me for the better and the worse
there are thrilling memories and terrifying memories
there are firsts and lasts and drunkenness and heart pitter-patters
fair lights and dubstep songs and harmonicas and the taste
of numbing on my tongue, warmth and palm trees
and jolts in my heart, sisters and dances and love and weddings
there are moments that should have been kisses but weren't
there are moments that were kisses and shouldn't have been
there are people I have loved and lost, people that
have slipped away, people that told me they'd never let go
and we woke up five feet from each other
there are so many tears shed for so many different reasons
so much love for me and so much love from me
and it's all been worth it. And there's so much more to go.

I have never been perfect.
I have always been too much, in fact
although that gives me too much credit-
I'm just a normal human being.
A normal human. Not romanticized,
not aggrandized, not more, not less. I'm just a person.
Just a person. A person who has her head ******* on
the right way up, I think, a person that sees
the light of good above her and the pit of evil below
and is trying her best to search the vague waters
for an answer to her navigational questions
a person that, sailing eastward into a west wind
knows that her wings are not wings but only arms
only arms. And only two eyes and only ten fingers
that don't deserve to touch God. I'm just one soul
floating and trying to find a rocky outcrop in the
midst of hurricanes on hurricanes. Trying to love
and live within reason. Trying to wake in the morning
with an attitude that lets me put my feet on the ground.
I'm just moving and learning. I'm only seventeen years old.

I never will ask for anything more than to live
this one wild and beautiful life, to be anything more than human.

imagine believing in something so wholeheartedly
that you dedicate your life to sharing
whatever joy you receive from that: you want them to know
because there is nothing more important to you
and you teach them, you teach them, you teach them
and then you reach the ****** of your lesson,
at the end of the year- this is the single most important thing
that you yourself have ever learned- this is it,
they must know this, they must
you finish saying it and you look around and ask if they understand
half are looking down, some are sleeping, one makes eye contact with you
but none are filled with zeal, and you know
that another group of people has slipped through your fingers
a piece of you dies with every student that loses their faith because
you have failed, you have not expressed what you wanted
and they have not absorbed
and you realize the true destitution of experience:
they can never share in what you have, no one can
you are alone, and they do not understand.

i stole a kiss from her
she gave it willingly, then, maybe,
but i think she knew, maybe, that i was lying to her the whole time,
i stole her first kiss, and when we told stories about it around the fire,
we both lied, then, and looked at each other,
and my lips remembered hers and hers, mine,
she laid next to me on my bed and hearts pounding
we remembered the last time we had laid like that and i ****** myself
i took what had been not mine and was not mine to take
and she, that angel of a girl,
forgave me somehow,
how could she forgive me?
and I find myself tossing and turning
into love with someone
whom I do not deserve to touch.

Truth be told, I don't mind
not at all,
I'd rather sink in perfect peace
than count the stories as I fall

I am cracking, splintering
because of you
my screen shines bright but glints through broken shards
as I tumble down the stairs,
lost, confused,
but laughing the whole time.

I've never been one for halfway
never been one to lie
it's always been all or nothing
for me, every day is live or die
and it seems that even on mornings when I can't breathe
I can't, for the life of me, spell "occasionally".

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?

strange to think we once had our terrified
shaking, heart pounding first kiss,
slipping on each other awkwardly and you asked
you had to ask, can I kiss you, and
that's what I was waiting for
and we once called each other on the phone all the time
and we once held each other impossibly close
I'm half a heart without you, sure
but my blood pumped straight out when you were gone
and all that blood was not once beautiful
it was just red.

in spring, suddenly the sky falls
one minute it's sunny and clear and you feel
your skin toasting, the next the clouds overcome
and fat droplets swirl up dust and sink onto you,
sizzling and cooling, and it's dark again but it's all a blessing
it's all a blessing and maybe you don't see it
but God is on your side.

Ways to say I love you without actually trying or displaying emotion:
listening to me when I talk
saying hi when I walk up
valuing my presence
not groaning when I begin speaking
not telling me my presence is an inconvenience
wanting to spend time with me
not ******* about me while I'm within earshot
smile at things I say
don't complain when I talk too loud
actually talk to me occasionally
make eye contact or smile in the halls
appreciate me

see? it's not that hard. if other people can do it,
you can.
I don't need constant hugs or verbal affirmation
I don't need you to compliment me, even.
Just show that you care-
the simplest way to do that is to actually care.
and if you can't do that,
then you aren't ready to be in any kind of friendship with me
because I, like most people, only enjoy
being in relationships with people
who actually want them there.
If you don't want to be up to this 'tremendous' challenge
and you don't believe you can fundamentally change yourself
and if you don't want to,
then consider the friendship over.
Because it would be nice if I could accept you for exactly who you are
but exactly who you are is kind of an *******
and if you can't see that
then there's something wrong
and if you can see it and don't want to change it
then there's something wrong.
I'd like to love you unconditionally
but I can't be the only one doing the loving
while you aren't even paying attention to me.
It's unhealthy.
Compromise, communication, appreciation-
things you don't seem to care that much about
AKA the fundamental cores of a good relationship
and if your basic personality isn't conducive to a good relationship
we are going to have a problem, especially
if you aren't willing to solve the problem.