11:45
Sitting on the beach staring up at my
"High School" friends,
Isn't that weird, having to put the word
High School before so you know I'm not talking about
All the other people I've met since college

It may not seem like it matters but it does
Because these are the people I grew up with and now
Everything feels so different

11:50
They're lighting another joint, I watch their eyes
Go from open and alert to smiling and red
I don't join them and they look at me like I've changed
Into an entirely different person
But it's not just that which makes me feel
So out of place

11:55
A white lie of feeling sick puts me back in my car
To send me back to the "comfort" of my home
But the only sickness I'm feeling is the
Depression deep in my stomach

11:59
I pull up to a red light and stare
Absent minded at the car in front of me

12:00
Happy Birthday to me. Green light.
I turn left and seriously contemplate
Driving my car head first into the stone wall ahead of me

12:03
Another red light
I tell myself I can't think like that
But am so surprised that college didn't make me
More normal. I expected it to change me
In so many more ways than it has

12:10
Pull into the drive way and
Carry myself up the same stairs I've been
Climbing since I was born
I don't think anyone should live in the same house
For nineteen years
There are memories hiding in the walls and
Secrets behind every closed door that can't escape me

Present Time
I'm in bed writing this meaningless poem
Thinking about him, and it's giving me this
Weird feeling in my fingertips

My computer has had this virus for the past two months
That I keep ignoring, too lazy to fix, too busy to find out
What exactly is wrong
I think my computer and I have a lot in common

So Happy Birthday to me
Nineteen seems like such a hollow age to be

Picture this:

You're at work
in your little
cubicle.
Doing nothing
too important.
Emailing this,
filling out that.
Talking to Bill,
George, Hank and Ken.
Laughing merrily
about some *****
that Hank ******
on Saturday.
When suddenly
BANG!

It hits you.

That feeling
deep in the pit
of your gut.
No, you're not
hungry.
Well not for food, anyway.
The feeling that slaps
you across
the face,
is the feeling
of emptiness.

It comes out of
nowhere
and stings like ****.
"What am I
doing?"
You ask yourself.
"Where am I
going,
what am I DOING?!"

Ok, maybe not that dramatic.
But it still hurts.
And it still stings.
And you don't know
what to do.
So you excuse yourself.
Head to bathroom
and look in the mirror.
You're sweating.
Your heart beats
at the rate it would
if you were doing
some heavy work.
Lifting a big pile
of clothes
and running down
a
long
flight
of
stairs.
And you don't know why.

But then you
do know why.
It's because you're
wasting your
******* time.
"You're dying, man."
Your brain tells you.
"You're
*******
dying
here."

I feel like crying when someone asks me to talk about myself
And I can only try to explain why
But self reflection tends to only see the bad things
I do not fit in with everyone else like I am expected too
Maybe I'm being dramatic, but I am constantly feeling like
Something is wrong with me, something has been off since I was born
And I am just finding out about it now

This is why I push away people
As quickly as I push away my meals
And why even now I sit here in tears typing away at a ****** poem
Or why scars cover my thighs and baggy clothes hide my figure
Why everyone I had known since a child slowly forced me out of their lives

So when someone asks me to talk about myself
These things are what come to mind, but
Overwhelmed with a feeling a failure, I still manage to sell a shy smile
And say something simple like:
"I like to sail and run cross country"
Because that's what they want to hear,
And I will wait until I meet another person that will ask, and maybe
I'll fork up the courage to spill everything out,
But probably not, I feel pretend

We used to like to stay up all night
Drink from sundown until it shined again
******* inthe morning dew with whiskey tainted breath
Smoking cigarettes until our lungs blackened
We all knew, in the backs of our heads
That we were having a little too much fun
Coming home drunk and stumbling up stairs
Is only satisfying until you realize that people care

We liked *****, whiskey and ***
Irish breakfasts were the only ones for us
Getting ****** up was the only constant
Going to school hungover and not caring if we bombed it
We were in for that rude awakening
We never knew how far we had to run

Those fateful, wilderness years
Very well could've been the best time of my life
Underneath the alcohol, blood and tears
You could cut the immaturity with a knife
It's really all kind of sad to think
About all the things I can't remember now
Lost in the cosmic consciousness
Innocent brain cells killed in the name of cowardice

But now I couldn't be any more thankful
Those years taught what no person could
I was only nineteen but now I know
That if I want to drink, I should double think if I should
I'm only human, despite the previous display
Of thinking foolishly or immortality
The weird thing is that I regret nothing
Everything progressed as it would, naturally
After all

if the curves of my stomach offend
you
i suggest you get the
*******
   of
me
but when this rage comes you speak
so
sof
      t
ly
and wonder why i look at you
like you burned
me but
you don't understand how predecessors of your gender have treated me.
kind words have never been spoken to me
soberly or
without weight behind them
like bartering in a dark corner bed while everyone else sleeps
where i stop being a woman, an entity, and become an unfeeling orifice whose name has suddenly become
                                          baby
because a few kinds words were mumbled against the shell
of my ear
you don't understand
how hands have grabbed me in the dark
and how my own hands have grabbed
only out of desperation
to feel something
you don't understand how hard it is for you to touch me and
for me not to feel lightening hot repulsion
as i lay drunk, ready to sleep.
you don't understand how when people touch my hair
all i can feel are hands curling against my scalp
and the way cold-shaking hands curled around my dress
and the way fear has been etched into the lines of my brain like a map of the city i know so well
like that alley i can't walk down alone at night
or that part of lexington where men shout at me hungrily
or the way stranger's hands sometimes 'slip'
you will never understand the weight of my insecurity because no amount of sweetness you can pour onto me can replace the venom fed to me by the men before you
no matter how 'enough' i may be with you
you will never understand how 'enough' isn't tangible
how beautiful doesn't really feel like a compliment
and how much
i doubt you actually love me