Something snapped in my heart
I don’t know when
but it’s been like this for a while now.
Like never trust anyone but yourself
nothing left to be loyal to
like I didn’t even expect to live this long.
Is it strength that keeps me here?
something has snapped.
Instead of taking a knife to my veins
I just don’t sleep.

I’m knitting something new,
it feels good.
The new ball of yarn unraveling like time
but I’ve still got plenty left.
There’s potential in this dark teal wool
and satisfaction when I decide
the way I want to weave it.
I make mistakes, I change them
to become part of the pattern.
The stitches are like a song in my head,
I sing them, I tap them out with my foot
and whistle along to the tune I’ve made up.
I thought it might be a hat when I saw the skein
but now I know it will be an
infinity scarf.
My six inches of beaded rib is a metaphor for my worries.
Working my hands intricately help me forget them.
I have time.

It’s started up again
just in time for winter
lighting fires on Wednesday nights
watching the sparks fly up to the sky
wondering what would happen if I stepped in
and became a spark too.
The train rolls by six times a day.
Six times a day I see myself under the wheels.
I stand a little too close. My hair is ruffled by the speed.
The rails still sing as the last car rolls away
steel polished clean by speed and weight
and heat.
I look at it leaving. Hop the ties and keep moving.
Carrying a pair of glasses in my hand I feel like some kind of omen,
as if anyone on this street would notice.
see more clearly
Threadbare white t-shirt and my three nazar bracelets
protect me from the evil eye to
see more clearly
Give me luck this time, in the tradition of my ancestors
but not my parents.
The paint on the sides of the receding cars
remind me of my artist breathing in deeply,
exhaling grey smoke. He says it opens up his third eye to
see more clearly.
It’s not my problem
This clouding of the mind though
I can’t see my heart and my soul  when the world around me starts to rot too.
Muscles obey other voices sometimes
near the knives or rail ties
rubber car tires.

Life is not always what you planned.
We were in the back yard of the abandoned house next door to his watching his two mutts chase each other around the perimeter. House after tiny peeling white painted house line the street “Summerbelle” with roofs covered in crinkled brown leaves. He runs his hand through his too long ***** brown hair. Tall and blue eyed, he could have been handsome maybe.
I had stopped by to pick up my glasses from on top of his coffee table. I don’t remember how they had gotten there exactly but at some point last night roasting-marshmallows-and-a-bonfire had turned into mango-juice-*****- forgetting-your-glasses-party with all the neighbors.
We were talking about fall, how the colors and the smells are beautiful, but foreboding, warning that winter and depression are coming. It’s a problem we have. On my walk over I had stopped to pick up a particularly beautiful leaf to give to him. It was just the sort of thing he would understand.
I reminded him we have to dress up for class on the 6th, and asked if he even had a suit. He then launched into a ten minute story about how he used to work on a senator’s campaign, 18 hour days and everything.
Not something I would have expected.
We gradually shuffle into the house, and I pick up my glasses from right where I had left them. The door is never locked in his house, but no one usually steals anything.  The walls are covered in crayoned drawings and quotes, over the top of it all “Fleetwood” graffitied in orange and red. I remember that is what we had decided to name the house last night. I had been sitting on the couch with a beer admiring the artist, bringing him a new Blue Ribbon can periodically for a kiss.
“Are you and A together now?”
I shake off the hazy memories. “Hm?”
“You and A.”
“Oh. We’re…yeah.” His signature grin never faded but his eyes had dipped to the floor. “How could you tell?”
“The way you spoke to him.” It was all the explanation he offered. “He’s a good guy.”
“He is.”
My mind wandered back to the morning, waking up next to the artist brushing my hair off my face, kissing my forehead. Surreal.
There wasn’t much left to say, so it was time for me to go. Turning to the door I saw what I had written on the wall last night, hidden under the windowsill, part way behind the couch. Under the song lyrics, clichéd quotes like “Be good or be good at it” and messages of peace, love and adventure it was nestled.
*All the same, we are nothing.

Tonight I married a graffiti artist.
This is the third time I’ve been proposed to
at some ***** house party.
This time there was an ordained all-faith minister
on the porch smoking a cigarette. That was enough.
I said yes.
We’re all strictly first-name-basis here, nicknames are even better.
So to him I’m just Mimi. Focused intently on my hand,
he draws my wedding ring with a permanent marker
and kisses each finger as he finishes.
There is a tiny replica of his tattoo on the underside of my finger
in addition to my gigantic drawn-on diamond.
It is my favorite part.
We talk politics and eventually art.
Turns out he’s sort of an amazing artist.
He said he’d put my name up on a wall but I don’t believe him.
Intricate, passionate, and thoughtful.
His smile is adventure.
That’s why I married him.
He asked to read my poetry and in my fuzzy judgment I let him.
Maybe he even liked a few phrases.
And he was polite as a hopped up boy can be.
Getting me home before three,
lending me his jacket without me asking.
I know he’ll forget to call, or that he even has my number.
and that we won’t watch Pulp Fiction
tomorrow.
That I was really just a glorified
snort of some white powder,
I am like all the glitter that fades in the morning
like smiles do, or permanent marker
after a few washes.

Not to confuse anyone,
but as more and more people read my work,
I think it's best
to use a pen name.

It’s three am.
Or actually 2:58, right exactly now.
Sitting in bed with my cup of mac and cheese
I made in the microwave
and woke up my roommate,
because if I’m getting sexiled until 2 anyhow,
I’ll make some ******* mac and cheese.
Blowing on my plastic fork
listening to Bon Iver sing about his skinny love.

That’s something that’s been concerning me lately,
Skinny love.
But I’m eating anyway.
Because rolling on the black top of the playground
(dark and secret, with just enough irony)
with a newly blue-eyed boy
made me hungry.