i want saturday mornings to always smell like
black coffee and your cologne

i want to wake up before the sun rises
and walk around in wool socks, sing elvis presley
under my breath because i'll never admit it
but when i fell for you it was relentlessly and without
inhibition and
                          i just
                                     could not
                                                   help myself

i want to carry two mugs back to bed instead of just
one and i want to be there when you wake up
slowly

you swear that you know that he
was wrong, but his hands were the
closest thing that ever felt like love,
and if he tried again, you wouldn't
tell him to stop

i think maybe i only love you because
you're older, because you have large hands
that have held more than mine ever will

(or maybe it is because instead of choosing to
hold the world, you chose to hold me)

it's not that
i still love you,
it's just that
i don't yet know
how to be
around you without
reaching out
for your
hand

maybe my hands shake because
i've been told settling is wrong,
and my fingers have been kept
in their skin for too long

(if i shed, i'm sure i'll grow wings)

do not worry - you
will not be the
first to die; when
you lie down
you will not be
alone.
            
             instead you
will watch the stars
with cleopatra
or quite possibly a
king.

you had always
kept your
**** together
when you felt like
falling apart, and i

i want to be brave like
that.

he likes to call me dollface

and i let him unravel my threads,
because i'm not quite porcelain like he seems
to think - more so a rag doll, yarn for
hair, buttons for eyes, soft and
easy.

we started as a series of stolen things:
glances, secrets, moments in a walk-in freezer,
and i keep wondering how that all led us
here, stealing time as
he lights a bowl and i
dance circles in his living room

all the while he is watching
like he is in a museum, and i am
art behind a glass to
stare at, never
touch

he reaches out and falls short,
calls me over but never follows through,
pulls my threads and
sews me up again
each time
he calls me
dollface

my biggest fear is that i will
stop wanting to become more
than the person i already am

(i will not settle for just getting by
any longer; i want to be
magnificent)

imagine: there are two bodies floating
at the top of the lake, and you know them
by name-  one is the girl who has always
loved you, and the other is the girl you
have always loved, even though she tells you
she could never love you back. both are
drowning, do you save one, or do you
drown too?

i turned away so i wouldn't
have to watch you leave, but
i heard your car start and
i panicked

how do i breathe without you,
how do i breathe without,
how do i breathe?

call me an architect with shaking
hands, building buildings built
to crumble --
     if that what it takes to
     keep you, so be it;
     i'll find you in the rubble

i.
your hand on my elbow,
shoulder, wrist, and i
pretend not to
notice

ii.
you sing quietly on the
way home, like maybe i won't
hear you but
i always do

iii.
call me doll, and that's
okay,
i can be yours to
play with

iv.
we smoke together for the
first time, and you blow
rings, and i dance
for you

v.
chew me up, spit me
out, it's fine just as long as you
don't watch me clean my
messes

vi.
you mention your girlfriend's
name and i
crumble

i was not meant to run
through fire or hold
stars in my hands, but
my fingers are calloused
from trying.

i wish i could love you
gently, but the beating in my
chest is echoing like a choir
through cathedral halls
and i don't know how to think
about you quietly

(maybe, if there is a god, he
meant for our song to be
heard by heaven)

please don't leave me.

i thought this would be
easier, knowing months ahead,
but i'm scared that
b e i n g  a l o n e
will sound even quieter
than it used to
before i knew (and loved) you.

it seems like time is tearing us
apart

i am reaching out to you from a
different dimension, from ten years from
now, or two years ago
and i look like nothing but a ghost

be quiet, and maybe
you will
hear me

my street has been
dark for a while, but
now that there are
lights on every porch,
this neighborhood feels
a lot less empty
and i've been thinking that
maybe it'd be okay now
for you to come
home

i keep thinking about the way
your fingers don't leave bruises on
my hips the way they used do

when did you stop trying to hold
on so tight? when did you stop
trying?

i started popping pills when i was twelve and
pretended they would save me until i couldn't
feel them anymore, and i'm scared that i'll only ever
love you like that, because i'm beginning to feel
numb when you're around, but i get headaches
when you're gone. &when; the time comes that you
have to leave, i want to be able to let you go gracefully

(i'll spend the next three months whispering your name,
trying to remember what it felt like to want to say it instead of
to need to)

at night, you wonder if anybody actually
saw you today, and if they did,
had they noticed your shaking hands?

(sometimes you question if you were
taught english correctly, because every
i love you comes out as i'm sorry

and you are so tired of stuttering)

when i was a child
i was told tales of
mosquitoes' songs and
car crash children;
i covered my ears
as tightly as i could,
but it is common knowledge
that nightmares always
prevail, and i was haunted
        night after night
with the reality of
what our world has
come to.

tell me, when you were young
did you dream of
drinking with the
'grown ups'?
    --i did--
     then i met a razor blade
     who told me
     i have an addictive
     personality,
     and i fell in love with
     a boy with an
     alcoholic father
(things changed after that
and i learned that
naivety is a gift
i gave away a long time ago.)

some things don't change:
there will always be three hundred
and sixty five days
in a year,
( except for when there is
threehundredsixtysix. )
there are times when i
wished i was a constant too,
but then i realized
i'd be stuck in my past
and that was a very
scary place to be-
now i am thankful for
the constant flow
of in and out, the constant
change of the tides.
although i cry at change
i w e l c o m e i t.

one of these days
my mind will no longer be sharp
and i won't remember
my children's names
and my sister will be gone
and i will be
                    alone.
i would like to think
that i'll be happy
just to know ( silence )
but in reality, i will probably
spend my time wishing
i had treated my mother better
and had not let the
alcoholic's son free.
(i will be plagued by
nightmares once again,
the same ones of my
childhood.)

i don't know the difference between
the words you spill when your drunk
and the words you whisper when sober
anymore, even when you're intoxicated
you're a liar.

i wish i wasn't
so ****
human

days like this, i want to
apologize to the sky
for not thanking it
every time it rains--

(too often i got
distracted by the way
your heartbeat sounds
alongside a storm

or how your eyes
become cloudy
like it is
outside

or your smile
you can't contain
when lightning strikes
and turns everything
purple)

but you're gone now,
and even still
i feel butterflies in my
stomach
every time it pours.

i wish i knew then
i didn't need you
to make things beautiful

sometimes i wonder if
kacie would be happier if
she didn't smoke, or
if that is the very thing that
holds her together

(judging by the way she is
now, i suppose i'll never
really know)

i don't need photos to
remember you;
you are burned
onto my
heart

have you ever loved
someone so much it
hurts? i can't explain
to you what it's like
but i hope one day
you can love me the
same

he said
it's just easier this way,
to let you go before you're
gone

she said
you're only hurting yourself
more, letting go instead of
holding on to hope

he said*
i just don't want to hold on
anymore

she said*
but you have to, for me
please

(but for her own sake,
she'd already prepared herself
to get ready to let go)

i am scared
you will tire
of hearing
me say
'i love
you'

i'd sketch you in charcoal,
then paint your eyes in with
watercolours

(i'm no van gogh, but it
would be hard to make you look
anything less that
gorgeous)

the most honest i've ever been was with the boy
who lied to everybody else but me; i told him that
i didn't know why i trusted him but i didn't mind if he
never wanted to let go of my hand, that as long as he held on
i'd keep on talking, that all i wanted to be was an
astronaut so i could write first hand-accounts
of the stars, that i imagined creating a new name for myself
every time i woke up so that i wouldn't have to live with my
past, that i didn't know the difference between love and
fear or if there was even a difference at all

in return, he told me a truth that only he believed in
(you're perfect, i swear it)

from then on, i choked on every truth i tried to say, so i ran away
and that night i whispered to the dark over and over again
to convince myself i'd be ready the next time somebody dared me to say it
(i'mscared, i'mscared, i'mscared, i'msorry, iloveyou, i'mscared)

you once told me that you had always
wanted to climb the water tower
at crescent lake park

so why don't you
i asked, and you shook your head

it's just a stupid dream

(but i didn't see anything wrong with
wanting to feel
above the rest of the world)

i want to live my life slow
and sweet, high on your couch,
lana del rey on repeat

we lounge in the backseat to
wait out the rain.

your fingers still against my
thigh, grapefruit juice drips down my chin,
and we stare ahead like this is
what we were meant for --

you pack another bowl, lana sings
on, jazzy and sweet, and i

i overflow

your mind is a forest, and i
want to carve my initials
onto every tree

every poem i was afraid
to write ended with
you.

step one:
find somebody who is
beautiful, kind, charming, intelligent,
witty, caring, and
broken

step two:
fall so in love that you are convinced
that no matter how many problems
this person has,
they are absolutely perfect

step three:
when they break down and show you their scars,
hold them when they cry,
kiss them on the cheek,
and make them tea

step four:
when they tell you they wish
they weren't so ****** up,
and that they wouldn't blame you
if you walked away

promise that you'll stay

step five:
realize that just staying is too inadequate,
that everybody says they'll stay
then has their bags packed in a week

immediately upon realization,
swear that you will not-leave
because staying requires no change or effort,
while not leaving is a risk

step six:
let the person know that they are worth that risk

they told me happiness would
come, if only i'd look

                                     (but i am tired of searching
                                      only to find nothing)

and it goes like this:
one day you will look at me
and tell me i'm beautiful like
you always do and i will
not be able to take it anymore

i've been trying hard not to
be in love with you like i know i always
have been, because since day one
i never wanted to just ******* or lie to you
or push you away

i just
wanted
you

beautiful you, with
your quirked eyebrow and your
mother's nose and your love of
stormy afternoons and most recently
me

(i think about you all the time)
you tell me, like i don't understand
but one day you will learn that
i have written hundreds of lines of
poetry about you and i hope that they
will make you
smile

i am scared to find the
person i'll have to become
when you're not around
any
more

(so
much
of
me
is
you)

i still
feel you
in my
ribs

where they bend
and (some
times)
break

some days i think
you're a saint, and it's
stupid, because all
you have to do is
smile or refill my coffee
before i can even ask,

but it's more than
anyone else has done,
and if i let it slip
that i'm a little bit
in love,
i wouldn't even be
sorry.

&las;; night was the first time i had faith
in anybody in a long time (maybe because it's easy to breathe
when you're speeding down back streets
and i only just then realized that i'd been
held under too long)

(maybe it had something to do with the way
your hands glided over the wheel like you could care less
about where we were going or when we would come back)

(maybe it was the way you promised that there would be a
next time)

(maybe it was just you)

as a child, i was more of a
hide-and-seek kind of girl;
i had no mind for playing
pretend.  

yet here i am now, and these
past three months have been
my greatest show yet--

but ****,

               where
      have
                                 you
                                             gone?

because i've been seeking for too long,
and i can't find you anywhere.