we only ever call God's name in vain.
everyone's just killing themselves
around here, and I'm just cursing
his name and the choir's just singing hymns
of his blessing in intermission and I'm
just waiting for them to take a break
so that I can put on a show, we only ever
call His name when we've returned back
to the show. everyone's just killing themselves
around here and I'm just waiting *waiting.

Does it make you happy          - silly boys calling you       pretty?

you don't need me anymore

She thinks me a
springboard. A
project piece to
project to and then
to leave. I've known
more people that
believe in me
then I've known
me's that believe
in me.

There are mirrors all over this place
and each wall is hologram-ed with my reflection. I am pink and blue with the
pale ideas of hues and pleasantries.
I am not abstract but my lungs don’t quake
with the facts of air and the thrusts of life-
I am reality. Independently so, I am reality
perched on the back of a featherless bird and the flight takes wind of my throat and sets me on fire.

I’ve not had a powerful love that moons me hollow or jades me pale like the blistered stars that hangs on too long to something too dark, I’m not depressed but indefinitely so, I do not feel too happy or too sad or too anything. I am a stranger.

My emotions are not too stark or too raw, they linger. A little longer than yesterday’s Jack and I burn just a little darker than
this morning’s sun. I am awake only for this moment and the moment after that, my eyes will close and I will drift sallow into a putrid shade of hollandaise yellow.

to the girl who made the mistake of
standing auburn hair raving in the sun
knee deep in the city street,
lungs roaring and eyes giving,
you can't fight the rain
but you can beat the sun.

between yesterday
and today I wrote
thirty-seven poems
because I didn't know
how to feel
everything.

danny told me
danny told me
hold my hand
whenever
you need to
but my hands
pulsed from sweat
and his hand
kept slipping into
and out of me.

i wrote thirty-seven
poems simply so
my mind could have a
moment to dispose of
everything so that
it could have
room for more
than everything.

I haven't felt so
drained in my life.
I haven't felt so
numb in my life.

i rubbed salt on my lips and drank nothing but whiskey for seventeen hours while cleaning to help me forget you but you it only numbed me further into the idea of you.

on Saturday I lost my holey limbs to the turntable, jammed my finger down some strangers throat and hollared as he walked away from me, sweet nothings and everyday misjudgements but you said, "paint me neon like the hues of my lady blues as they crush between the balms of my legs and drain me." if I could flower you a rosebud the size of my browning fist and lunge it into the pit of your stomach, I'd hold you steady between the pressure pointed weights of my thighs, lick the sugar from my lips and wait for you to beg me for air.

see the rainbow but don't be
afraid of the rain.

this won't
save your life
or even your
neighbor's
but it will
make you feel
better.

do not forget the lies
that history told you
as you continue on
to spread your own.

tomorrowwon'tcomefastenough

he told me to tell her hi
as if their relationship
was something that i
wanted to help foster
and she said, "hiback"
as if she didn't know
all of the ways she was
******* up everything.
i hate her and the way
she makes herself so
comfortable everywhere,
i want her to stay sitting
on eggshells, i want her
hands to be branded by
nails, i want her leave his
lap alone, I want her to.

i am not yours to keep

Dear Alex,
I awoke into this world with a broken heart, that's the problem. Not you. I won't ever remember  a day before because I've always been like this. Not fragile, just broken. I was okay with just ******* you but I won't ever be able to handle your feelings on top of mine. For the first night ever, I slept at a guy's house, didn't **** him, let him cuddle me even when I was sober, even when my skin felt like it was on fire, spent the day with him and listened to his thoughts and it made me want to cry or puke or cut myself straight down the middle and pull out my soul and replace it with someone else. Someone better. Someone more human. But instead I laid there curled into you and tried not to cry because you needed it from me. But I could already feel it. I could already feel myself sinking away from you. And my head. Oh my beautiful head. It kept telling me, "Don't do this don't do this don't do this." But my heart. My nasty heart. It kept humming, "To who?" Very still. Very still. But then you started tracing your fingers down my skin and it started to feel like it was crawling away from me. From you. And so I told my heart and head, "it's already done." And I left. And when you kept calling and texting and asking me I was ok because you cared, I threw my phone at the wall in front of me after sending "I am toxic." I can't handle your care. It's a bit ****** for me to say but I can't handle anyone's care. And **** I miss you. I miss getting so high with you that my head felt heavy but after I left you, I spent three days in the fetal position under a pink blanket trying not to cry. You took all of me that night. And you didn't even do anything. You were just there. Please don't hate me but dear god please don't love me either.

I am
as
quick
as your
tongue.

the day I turned thirteen
my mother looked at my
hips and told me, "girls
with curves shouldn't wear
baggy clothes." since then
I've tried to stay out of
clothes as much as possible
because the tighest thing
that I can wear is my skin.

She's the kind of perky that asks
if she can have his autograph
instead of his signature,
and he calls her now.
Instead of me.

and still. and still. and still-the only thing that matters is you.

you gave me what I craved and what I needed and I didn't realize it until it was too late.

I have never argued to be the happiest person in the world nor sad nor intellectually gifted past the point of pretentiousness-but I have argued to be the least truest artifact that ever rested my whole entire weight soley on the ***** of my heels, cresting my chin rounded to the pins and points of the skies that buzz life into the rowdy blacks of my eyes, ready, ready, ready. I have-time and time again reminded my own-self of the fickleness that rapes me of sincerity and so I've told him-her-you-they-we-and-even me -that alone is self-destructive and togetherness, well, well, togetherness is over-reliant.

I tried to not take us
so seriously because
in the wake of a long
stream of non-commital
commitments, I've
begun to understand
how intense I become
when someone matters
to me on a personal level,
that's why I left you alone
when I found out about Marla
and Darla and Carla and all
of the Lala's that you ******
and then you decided to be
different for a day (let's be honest.
more like five minutes tops)
and you found yourself
with the proud and loud
feminist, Mandie with an
i-e in your bed and I keep
telling myself, it's not the
feminists fault that she likes
men. This man. My man.
And so I decided un-invite you
to the party I'll be throwing
for you in honor of you
being accepted into so and so
acting program in the city.
I'll drink everything they
bring for you, **** everyone
that only loves you. I'll
leave your car beneath
some distant bridge,
**** your boss and
and take me a little more.
It's not your fault I didn't
take us seriously.
It's not your fault
the feminist liked
you more than me.

Don't tease me with the pursuit of death. If you're going to destroy, please just go on and do it.

marie-niege is jaso bolay
i am an empty pill bottle
of nothing more than
just emotions, a stack of
empty liquor bottles. i
am nothing. just nothing.
isn't that classy? but um
you see, marie-niege is
cleaner than me. more
sterile. less edgy. but
sicker in the head.
we're never just
one person.
welcome. to the
madness in my head.

Some boys you look at-
you begin to see
fatherhood etching it's age
against their shoulder blades-
creating lines between their brows
some boys you look at
will die young
of mere stupidity.

I want nothing  more
than to snuggle into
someone else's blankets
curl into someone else's lungs,
and smell,
someone else's skin.

what are you waiting for.
      he used to say to me,
a silly song that used to numb the very *tip of my ears-
           a silly song that used to make the very tip of my tongue dance-
the stretch up his neck, the range of his chest, the span of his lips-
           and he'd swear that he'd love me never  using the word forever
because he said that there was no need,
                      his love was indefinite
and now I'm asking him what he's waiting for and he's telling me
       something better
and I'm wishing that I could travel back a few months younger
                    so that I could tell him:
*everything

Reggie just gets a little
too excited for my taste
and so on most days
when he sees that I've
responded cordially
to his invites to
come on over at
two a.m. because
no, no he's not
just a little bit wasted
he just wants to,
idk watch a movie
at two a.m. probably
in his bed so that we can
be chill. and to all this
when I say no, he just
keeps on asking
night after night after
night, I finally grow a pair
and tell him that I admire
his persistence but not
at two a.m. because all
he sounds like at this hour is
sloppy and I like to know
that whoever I choose to ****
will remember me and how I
got there by morning come.
But I do admire his persistence.

you took my grace and slid it between your bed sheets, the next day, i stayed comatose in my room until the sun hid itself, i hummed silly rhymes and watched them waft away, the following day, i dropped everything i tried to hold, my hands didn't shake like they usually do, they stood still and uncertain. kind of like you, clearly, oh so clearly of you and me

I write three times a day
so that my mind stays
leveled.

I squat a hundred times
every morning so that my
thighs stay taut.

I base my face every night
with Jojoba oil to help
maintain the oiliness
of my skin and every morning
with organic honey
to help bring balance
and newness to my face.

I dance every night
just to feel my heart
beat beating.

And still, they ask
what do I do for my
soul?

she's never
known a man
that could walk
on water before.

'come on in,' he said
the water's fine,'
as he wades farther
and farther out into
a tided pool of nothingness.

'i'd rather stub my toe
against something sticky like a
starfish-
then feel nothingness
with you.'

she's never
known a man
that could
walk on water
before.

do you

rinsed my mind clean of the words that caved in on me with the whiskey on your breath.

the whole point of love is the heart break of it all. what a concept.

Streamers are stars
that can't seem to find their
proper place in the sky and so
they just keep on falling
again and again and again,
and I just keep on
shooting them up
into the blues every time they
hit the mid floors of my night.

was it not the camel that
broke the straw's back
had it feeling like
it's straw was made of
unmendable water
had it feeling like
it's back was the only
piece he could sit upon
nevermind the ground
and all the pressure it
could handle.

you're like a moving photo in my mind. i've had this reel spinning in my mind for days now of all what we could be. all that we can do. my body shivers in anticipation and shudders out of fear. i've thought it over. backwards and forwards and all i can seem to do is want you even more. always in my mind, always on my time. allison says i'm in love. i say i'm just having a really hard time. focusing. breathing.