i ******* hate myself
because i have the most
awful feeling
that i'm going to do to you
what she did to me

and you dont deserve that

you said that you smoked too many
tonight, and that wasnt very healthy
but i dont think the tears
soaking into my pillow
are any better
than your **** cigarettes

tell me, brother bear,
what was it that made me so naïve?
what was it about you
that made me believe
you thought of me
as blood?
my mother always taught me
that blood runs thicker than water

but you were never water to me

I was fourteen when we
began mixing drinks for the first time
that night with you, I never knew
there would be a second time
the deja vu was nearly missed
but I felt it
I smelled it in your breath and felt it
as I tipped the bottle back

the second time around
I wasn't quite sure
who exactly I was drinking for
or who I was lying to more

we were never blood

the ***** flooded my veins in such a way that his name even began to taste
like yours
and I wasn't sure why the door
seemed like such an impossible feat
to reach

but it was

and so we drank
I drank until I couldn't see straight
and your face didn't look so much
like your face
you drank until you were drunk enough
to kiss me
and I was drunk enough to stumble up
the stairs
fall into my own bed
and never tell a soul

but let's be honest, brother bear,
our blood was never shared

strangely
there's something somewhat comforting
about nobody appreciating
your poetry
and in knowing that not everyone will read
and no one will fully
understand
there's something promising about the void of silence
and its perpetually unending eternity of emptiness
and quiet
my mind is a maze that no one bothers to play with
and this bothers me greatly
yet not at all

slowly ascending onto the world
reckoning with the shadows
and eliminating the worry of the crowd
tell me that we are not
tell me that the morning air isn't as dry
tell me that the thoughts I think are worthless
and the morning wave of light will wash away your fears
set your heart free and the pieces will fall
tell me you will find happiness in the moon and the craters of its surface
and I will shake your feelings of moonlight until you realize you are the sun, rising and setting endlessly
colliding with the stars
illuminating the blue world I live in
I must get up
and like the birds with the morning sun
I must get up
with you

You're just a substitute
Someone to hold in her place
'Cause if I close my eyes
I can still see her face

And I kinda like you
But this sure isn't love
'Cause when I fall asleep
It's her that I dream of

And it's her I want
When I'm alone at night
But you're in my bed
When I turn out the light

So I'll hold you close
But my mind isn't here
It's wandered away
Wishing she was near

You will never be her
I'll never be content
Because inside my heart
I know it's not meant
To be

when i was 13,
"if your friends jumped
off a cliff would you?"
was an effortless,
"no"
because when i was 13
the cliff was a tall,
intimidating
piece of land
with a neon sign that said
"impending doom"
lit up at the edge,
but now im 20
and the cliff
comes in glass bottles
and the cliff
comes in thick syringes
and the cliff
is drawn beneath
my skin
in india ink
and down below it,
i can see my home town
and i can hear the patient voices
of the kids i grew up with
that never got out,
shakily shouting
"come down here;
it's easier at the bottom"
and if im being honest
im stumbling toward it
with an alarming
lack of fear