im so tired of the forgotten
and the dead
and the way your shoulders turn away
like mountains,
     falling boulders

I am a long way from home
(and the distance only grows as my skin gets thicker) until these bleeding fingers and
cracked teeth
start to feel just like
segments of destructive dreams.

your face is something like
rotting wood full of bodies of people i knew
(rough to the touch and cold inside)
and there's nothing 'magic' in the air of graveyards
or the morgue
or the funeral home (even though some people
feel that there is) but there is
blood and make up and
prosthetic chins  
that  make your dead grandfather (rest in peace) look twenty-eight
even though he was eighty-two.
please don't tell me that your spirit feels trapped
and your body feels wrong (even though i'd listen and nod) because
i already know what it feels like to be trapped  every morning (and sometimes at midnight) and waking up with my eyes shut and my
mouth sealed like a coma patient who didn't tattoo
NO CODE
on her chest soon enough and can hear her family whispering about what kind of
coffin and
what size dress she wears so that she looks pretty for
the reaper.

i like to feel broken i think
sometimes
  i like the way you broke me.

she told me once that she worshiped the
forest of her body and the garden she had grown (like spring
                                          all over her outsides).
she said she loved skin the same way i  loved
marlboro blacks and sweetwater blue (obviously and
                                         uncontrollably).
she screamed compliments at me in
soft words with rough meaning (like ****** knuckles against
                                        freshly cut grass).  
she assured me that it was okay to wake up
in cold sweats with heavy limbs (unmovable and brittle,
                                         buried under sheets).

but i knew better.

i miss you when you were
******* beautiful
with black eyes and thick eyelashes;
i miss you when you were
a mountain man with long brown hair.
i miss you when you were
untouchable and desired
with a broken nose and broken teeth;
i miss you when you were
a sentient being with stories to tell.

i can't always remember
if the sun sets in
the west or east
but it's okay;
i want to be remembered for thinking
the sun had a choice.