A quick whip of the wrist
and I've fallen.
I see gentle fingers
and porcupine hair.
Porcupines' aren't real.
They're fantastical creatures we made up.
You're mellow
your voice is hollow as your breath can be
well-labored and painful looking.
Is see beyond your bedroom eyes
and your needs
that say you to be the big spoon
in the little spoon bunch.
The last one put down,
the first one picked up.
Turned over of lust
and anxiety.
You're mellow
your voice is hollow as your face can be.
Life-like giraffe linen curtains
beckon me to
rest in your arms.
The length of your body from ceiling to floor
is equally as fantastical as
a made up creature.
The moon cries in equal fear that
it will not see me to be with you
for we are too far
and too late.
Like an enraged teenage girl
it turns itself over for a new day.
Listen;
there is a hell of a good universe next door.
Let's
go.

I've been thinking of the stars,
and all I picture are doorknobs.
Ones I hope you twist open.
The one to my sanctuary.
The sactuary which houses my bed and technology.
The place that smells like me.
The handle is always yearning your touch
It extends itself to every hand that reaches
and locks itself when it realizes that
the hand reaching for it is not your own.
It locks when it knows that it is not you,
And it never is.
I've been thinking of the stars and
All I see are beards.
Blankets of ****** hair.
And thick arms.
And legs.
And I wish that your feet arms and legs
and your whole self
would creak through my room.
Gazing at me glued on my stomach
with my eyes bleeding onto the screen.
I've been thinking of the stars and
All I really end up thinking of
Are you,
your shoes when I step in them
and attempt to walk
And understand that it is hard to
When you're going a long distance.

When I came over to your apartment
a couple of days ago
We pushed the couch to face the wall,
and tipped the lamp over
making it a projector for our hand's silhouettes in the light.
I taught you to speak in a Liverpool accent
Your voice glazed my ears like honey
dripping sweet vowels
Carrying your breath
To disperse in the air around us,
like fog.
And I feared that if I should touch
The glaze you left me
I would smear the sugar
and muffle the sounds.
But you spoke to me.
You spoke to me with your hands
casting shadows like magic
Speaking of time being a string
and we walk across it.
All of the time that ever has been.
And you stopped.
You stopped waving magic around.
You stopped casting pretty shadows.
You looked at me and asked me
if I would go back.
No I wouldn't. I'd be an elephant on a tightrope
Weighing the tiny string down
Walking across time,
Nimble toes
Forward, or backward.
Whichever way you are going. I could follow.

How to rise to the occasion:

I have broken everything. 
All of the garbage on the foggy cracked streets. Midnight starts humming softly 
at first
 winding over the streetlights
 shimmering
 off of the metallic wrappers from 7/11
My adaptability to your absence is a clear
 alarm buzzer by now. 
'because he was there and I was not.'
Bananafish swim in the thick of the foggy fissures
Of my new secret. 
The fat boy in the drivers seat
Compliments me
"thank you."i say and
One bananafish swims faster than the others 
Breaking throughout the tears
Passes the windows and rips the dashboard. 
I swallow the bananafish whole 
And after fat boys hands are firm and
Infatuated on my cheeks
Bananafish swims in my head violently 
He is so large that he wags his tail in my stomach
Scratching at the walls of my belly
Poking his head out of my throat. 
"I'm here. Let me out. Let me out."
And I hear your voice ask me if this is okay. 
And I imagine all of your long fingers 
Gingerly touching my cheeks. 
I think of your breath asking me if this is okay. 
The sax playing fat boy
 makes me open my eyes again
When we pull away. 
And that's when I know I've killed my bananafish.

Sometimes I think you're a druggie.
Because when I'm with you
I feel like we are
Redundant noises and images
And snorts of laughter
And we are holding each other tongues.
And I feel like
There are stars in your eyes
that are buzzing further into this dark hole.
In my mind thinking of you in a heavy coat
smoking when you're away.
You'll never know I write in cursive.
Because you want my words
From my lips instead
And you choose to peel them off
by typing letters into your phone
By thinking of what each letter in my name means
And you put the phone in your pocket
And think of the squack of a voice I have
And you picture my legs
thick with an ivory curtain surrounding them.
And the red on my lips speaking
Of the thing I know least of.
And that is love.

Sometimes
When the moon is up
I think of you,
More
Than when it isn't.
Out of a sense of fear
More so
Than anything else.
A security blanket.
Under that blanket
We'll hide.
You'll reach far down  near me
and
Touch glazed candies
and
Pull away shy,
because you don't understand why you did.
We'll bury ourselves deeper into the
Fabric squares our families made us into.
We'll make ourselves comfortable to
the texture and the sounds they make
When it chafes our skin and nails.
The doors will open,
hallway lights will prey on the dark and
We'll snicker rubbing our toes together.

Oily fingers the she-beast moans. 
She wanted those Saturday nights
Watching old reruns of cow and chicken. 
She never got there.
She only sank deeper into
Her petals. 
The Past
1) is of conquest
Experiences well made
She
Still hasn't kissed a boy
But she also 
Hasnt felt herself. 
2) it quenched you to know
How much
We can **** up in one 
Moment in time. 
3) her first favorite band
Was on a twilight soundtrack
4) ready to present herself
To the first naked man
She had seen
In a long time
She opens her robe
And uncovers all of her lies.

TOMORROW
She will wake up in love 
The first time. 
The past is a liar 
The past is
A secret
Fear. 
   The future is an unbearable truth. 
Not the eyes of mothers,
Steady hands of fathers
Nor the she-beast
Can complete the feat. 
Mass suicide sways oceans 
Beside the globe. 
The inevitable 
Shakes it's ******* on
National television
Through
Nuclear war and bitter missionary men. 
The future is losing circulation 
As the she-beast welcomes a man
Into her home
The future is like her
Well labeled. 
The future is a *****. 
Saturday nights blot at her itchy flesh. 
She is finally ready to get up.

We share a room. The light from her iPod stopped bugging me after a while.
We took out the bunk bed after we decided to be grown ups.
On a double matteress we gather hours of rest,
Our bodies barely touch or coil together
Just the breathing sounds we make in our sleep states are comforting enough.
When we hear a bump, we consult each other of whether we should leave the room or just go back to bed.
She started asking me to cover for her.
So mom wouldn't know what she was up to.
Mom trusts us as we would hope. And we hardly break that trust.
Life stopped being complicated for me.
It's like it began anew,  
Unfolding
Straightening paths
Smoothing the crinkles in each sheet that layover my little body
The bends disappeared, crusted confrontations
Forgotten.
I met him from a great friend of mine. We argued over something silly.
He called me after I explained I was upset.
I beat myself over the dry branches of thick trees
Scolding myself. Insulting myself.
I did nothing but remind myself of my exclusive habits to handsome men.
But he visited me and upon that spree of him skipping class, he was beautiful like the men. So I thought maybe, in the back of my mind, that I could explore him like the others and relieve him and myself of whatever we were clinging to.
He was clinging to something short of sadness. Much like grief.
And he explained that I was good and shouldn't place myself in a damp hole when the sun is capable of more than being bright and warm.
So we spoke and lay together in my bed resisting silly things.
Sitting up together he is ready to leave he says 'I'm glad I skipped class today.'
He kisses me. Telling me that he isnt interested in much else.

My mouth is filled with sweet smells, bitter tastes. This boys limbs quake, heart punching rib bones as fast as man boy can take, his glasses tremble to his skin too. Everything sticks slowly. I can see the ceiling moving. The shadows against its popcorn texture. I can hear my mother clicking her mouse by the computer. He breathes in, pupils enlarge almost as loud as an animals shriek.

I think I twitched.
My sister forgot to make the bed that day.
And I'm glad becaus he doesn't make his bed either.

For Dylan:
I use to love things when I was little walking to school all the time. I remember how good everyone was and how pure the world could be. I know that I'm different now. But I can tell you that I love you more than watching the sunshine peek out of the mountains every morning.
I love you more than garden gnomes and pink flamingos painting dew drops on people's grass before we go outside and it's early.
I love you more than the smell of freshly mowed lawn on a warm summer dawn. Radiating that green color.
I love you much more than  the people who meaninglessly love their spoiled children with puffy pudding faces. Their never ending adoring smiles cast down at the kids who've learned to hold other kids.
I can't stop thinking about how we are going to love these things when we begin waking up too early and can't fall asleep, sitting on the front porch, watching our old friend sun rise and fall each day.
I can't wait to find the time passing effortlessly in front of us in crummy walks where the golden face stares at us and the slate city we might never leave.
I'm still a child and so are you.
We are gonna have so much fun.

Brilliant hues of pink shades.
They pass my face and make me whimper.
I whisper as equal halves of the both of us.
Between many winding fruit you
Cake yourself in sugars and oily juices.
Private parts all waxy and gelled up.
Slick
Skin meets skin.
We say hello a number of times.
You have prickly hairs.
We rise and fall in the moonlight.
Parents haven't come home yet.
It'll be days before we speak again.

Sun soaking through bitter
Winter winds
The air begins creeping around
The lotion I applied this morning.
My legs have been bare for a while.
And the water cuts clean through me.
Icy knives less than dropped.
River cold begins to feel new and dry.
All of it blew passed me
You and your skin.
What I imagine it to be
It could purify
Every bit of me
I think I'm lost
Kiss me,
Withtheworstbuzz. Withthebestlips,
And you will see how important I am.

To someone just like me;
Be my hero and pop out of the closet.
Be my savior and erupt from my ***** bathwater.
Be my true friend and stand up to Grandma and tell her to '*******,'
because it's our life, body, and future, and we can do what we want.
Be my revolution by leading me away from a diploma and into a traveling backpack
that bounces in the dirt of Arizona, and grazes the meadows of Oregon's woods.
Be my friend and tell me what I'm doing wrong. Smack my wrist, but not too hard.
To someone just like me, only more tired, please go to sleep.

**** I hope it stays.
The snow outside looks like the white noise I hear in my dreams.
It's like holy whispers too powerful.
Thousands of tiny frozen pieces of wind and water that stick to the sidewalk.
It's been seven years since it stayed this long.
Little eight year old Alex says, "It's supposed to storm."