"I know I had a plan... what was it?"

"See, this is why I don't have plans;
I kept forgetting all my plans!
One day I thought:
'I know I was gunna do something significant with my life, but **** it.
Art.'"

The depth of pain he's feeling can't be described.
He walks the halls alone with no one by his side.
He's slammed into a locker or punched in the face.
There's nowhere to escape in this scholarly place.

He walks home burning.  
His world has stopped turning. His heart holds a yearning.  
His stomach is churning.

He goes into his dad's room to look under the bed.
The colors in his mind swirl a ****** red.
He grabs the gun and begins to plan their demise.
For once he'd like to see the fear of God in their eyes.

He slowly walks to school.
He won't be anyone's fool.
His bag holds revenge's tool.
They'll stop whipping the mule.

When he walks through the door everything goes black.
He blindly squeezes the trigger during his insane attack.
The screams and pain around him don't reach his ears.
When the bullets run out his eyes begin to stream tears.

He drops to the cold floor.
Did he cause this gore?
His soul spills from his core.
He's wide awake once more.

Later that day he sits alone in a cramped cell.
He already knows that he's been ****** to hell.
He wishes that he could change the fury he showed.
But he was a ticking time bomb ready to explode.

He prays for his soul.
This was never the goal.
He's dug his own hole.
He hears the bell toll.

My family eats dinner underwater.
We bounce between the seats of our chairs
and the bottom of the table,
we pass the stuffing
as it floats off the plate,
and no one seems to blink.
My parents just talk about how safe
it is, here,
below the surface.
No gay fiances
or athiests
or postmodernists
or liberal Christians.
I am the only one with an oxygen tank.
“I have never owned a tent that kept the rain out.”

My family camps with gear from the 80s.
We cook in bare aluminum
and eat with volatile plastics,
a crusty dining cloth pinned
to the warped picnic bench.
My feet and head push
through the tent wall
and into the rain fly.
I always wake up wet.
“I have never owned a bed that was long enough.”

In house 1 and 2,
my feet hang off the end
of the bed, circulation halted
at the ankles
by the wooden frame.
In dorm 1 and 2,
I lie diagonally on the bed,
my shoulder hitting the wall.
In dorm 3,
My feet are pressed
flat against the wardrobe.
I fall asleep not knowing
who I wake up for.
“I have never loved anyone I didn't have to.”