Am I supposed to write about  
How I feel you biting at my ankles while I sleep
How I’m having dreams again
but my cynicism is tearing them to shreds
How I spent all day labouring over
my own softness
and tying each strand of my hair to
lace curtains

Am I supposed to feel like blossoming?

Oh bring her back
Oh dew and robins
Early morn, tasting wild lettuce
dreaming of sweet lips
dreaming of wholeness

Oh she’s coming back
Oh open eyes
Afternoon, crying youth
dreaming of right here

Here I am in almost twilight
all day this hot sun through
soft curtains
and my own skin
Picking this mind for mindfulness
and my own tangled art
my own tangled heart

We reach for the same sky

It is not pretty anymore
I have no pasture
no sweet annie
or cider apples

I miss the nights on Myrtle Ave
always wine/music/friends
and Arlo’s playing guitar
and Brendan’s picking his mandolin
Zach’s holding my hand, we were crying in my bed earlier
but you
had wool and gold draped all over
drinking Italian prosecco
eating berries off your fingers
curled your hands over like a rabbit
tiptoed toward me
"drunk hands and sneaky feet”

Hey, that's just a memory now
Tonight there are no more
gimlets/dumpster food/hand carved spoons
it is cold toes/empty bed/hollow stare
I would trade this safety
for that love, wholeheartedly

Yeah, I feel like ****
And I’m walking with her and
she is so pure
in love and beauty
and yeah she’s talking
and I should be listening
but this park has flowers
and now all I’m thinking is
Nigella
Nigella
Nigella, where did I ever learn that?

Was I really so wrong
in wanting affection
(yes)
to satiate something I couldn’t have
(home)
I am hungry for a pasture
so I fill my stomach with the only peace I can find
(pleasure)

You are part lightbeam
You are soft as tulip petals
I have so much tenderness for you and
I am so scared

You have such lovely people and I am not here to ruin that
I only want to be here for you
and to share life

I am not unaware that
I have not always been here
I don’t know what to say,
but that I am here now and I am here to love

Yes, but I want her back
I want her to tell me
how she sees none of this pain
That she only cares for sheep,
her small box of love letters,
and the radishes on her windowsill

That she saw brightness in herself
and for her future
That there was hope
hanging onto her curls,
in the muddy light
of her fire escape at sundown

And even though she cried
and often called him
to resuscitate her
that she still knew
she was strong
That she would live
to fight for her own
broken mind

The universe is screaming at me
that others are not enough
that I cannot slide my heart
into other people’s pockets
and expect them not to wash their clothes

but how do you chose yourself
over others
when there was never a choice
in the first place

Yet I give my parts to these men
boys rather

Somewhere in Washington,
my tailbone

In Maine,
ten inches of my hair
taken out of desperation

In Wisconsin,
my fragile wrists

Italy,
my stomach
pulled straight from my throat
under cover of expensive wine
and exotic gardens

but here in California lies
the soft skin of my thighs
a collarbone, broken and replaced
several times
my *****, given willingly
and the dead cells
of my young heart

While you were here
you gripped my spine
and I still feel it
every month
when I lose more blood
to cleanse myself of the men
who have been inside of me

I am clean and still
full of holy light
but they linger in the places
on my body I do not see
but that they have
and I am desperately
forcing them out of me

I want to find
all the ways that trees speak to me
the wind consumes me
and my mind kills me

So that when he
comes back under my skin
I will be long gone

Spring in California
feels like the dream;
meadows high with sunshine
brushing hips

Oxalic sour grass on your lips
sweet sweet berry

Painted clouds, straight
from your breath

It is falling in love
only,
if you see it

We sat fireside
in the circle of my first hope
and I was sixteen
and it was the only light I had seen
since I came out of the womb

One by one
the poetry spilled from their mouths
as tears did from my eyes
and the cold froze them to my cheeks
the foreshadow of a winter I did not yet know

I used to be an eloquent girl
but when my time came
all I could say was
“I am here because I need to know
that there is still good left in the world”
That is all that I could get out before the tears became too much

That was a few hours
four years ago
Since then
I have seen an entire ocean
played hooky with wine and thunder storms
and lived as an entirely different woman

but tonight I need to be sixteen again
I need to see that goodness again

I have been living in poetry for months
and she holds me in her love
and her hope keeps my eyes open

but I have no life here
everything dies here

and you said we are not meant to live like this
we are stuck in what has been decided for us
and neither of us
can find the stars
to lead us out

You speak like I have answers
I am only lost in the light
It all seems brighter there

You were the first one
who brought me flowers
Held my hand,
told me you loved me
No matter what
All this,
when I was nothing,
and I believed you
and we believed in each other

And you are as far away
as this country can reach,
but I feel you in this drink
and in every acorn I see
In this place you would hate
and these people you would not understand
Neither do I

I’ll always have tenderness for you
but I do not know how to love you
from here

I was sitting at a traffic light
and I saw this huge rosemary bush
in bloom
and the lilac poked through
whatever tender golden blossom
lie next to it

and it made me think of you
and your sweetness

All these soft people are hurricanes
Have you ever seen a storm from space?

I just want to know what hold this town has on me
why it won’t let me go
and why it breeds such pain

We used to sing barefoot with shooting stars
your lips boozed and my heart fluttering
taken sun tea or sun kissed
always drenched in river rocks
Your hair changed like the moon
and my heart stood strong at your feet

but where are we now
I’ve let this heart free
But it will always chose you
and I’m not sure I can sing with the stars anymore
they just remind me of what was

I was once a little girl
with ringlet curls and grass-stained knees
I was scared of the ocean
and soft for my mother’s tomato vines
but I was not pure with youth
because I did not feel clean then,
no white satin or freedom
I was not full of love

I feel pure now, softer
I know my whole, my skin, the corners of my mind
I know the flowers I have planted outgrow the ones I will pick
That lambs come in twos and ewes make me cry
I know how much one honeybee is worth and why I had to let you go
It is all bringing tenderness
It is all tenfold my young freckled face and sleeping heart

It is all too loud
and I am crawling into myself
and I am bowing my head
and I am leaving now

The light, two redbuds, and your moss covered roof
take me home
take me to the light
where the grasses hug your toes and the flowers glow like sunshine
Pieces of canyon, ivy, the woodpecker’s holes
It is soft there, I am no longer afraid

the light
the light
the light
and Her
and Her
and Her
and this place, these soft people
please heal me
please let me be strong
but only for myself

I’ll whisper flowers in your ear
leaves to your palm and petaled pockets
latin and ancient
and walk away when you look back
you need not know more than what speaks to my heart

It is not perfect,
but it is something

So you lay here wondering why he doesn’t touch you like that,
or why he does

And it doesn’t seem fair your beauty be ****** in like this
you are only woman but you are holy
sacred light, hallowed bloom, and Her

I only like nasturtiums
only bachelor’s buttons
calendula

I think you only like me this way
only soft and silent
when apparently you love her any way

I am soft and loud
I am the rose, the thorn, and the petal
The rapids
and Her love

do me raw fleece
under the full moon

touch me soft light
toes curl
jaw drop

**** flower petal
don’t look
come strawberry stem
arch
under this skin

taste me like lemon
taste me in heaven’s gate
a backwoods trail

do me sacred
I’ll see you poppy field
too far to run

Be soft and evoke those who are
Let your eyes wander

Open yourself to this world despite its sharp edges
You will bleed, but you will heal
Some of us bleed with the moon anyway

do not feel the need to fill silence, it exists to bring peace and truth
but you must also speak your truth
You are blessed, glory
the light

Do not touch me with filthy hands
I am holy skin in blooming cocoon
My skin in jasmine; yours in blackberry
How can you fill me without looking
how can you feel me without knowing

You’re allowed to enjoy things
even though you are having a terrible time

You are allowed to feel pain
without being afraid

You are allowed to fear pain
it is never your fault that this world hurts you

We are all ancient
with past and future selves
Do you know who you have been inside of?
Who has been inside of you?
Who you have guarded your soul from or taken step to embrace
I feel all of them at once; I am stronger from this

When the screaming finally stops,
and you are left with yourself,
you must find a way to come to peace with that.
Be afraid to be alone,
but do it anyway
This is your way of loving

Wake up to the birds chirp
and truck engines rev
Despite all, I am still peaceful here
I still want melody and affection
but I do not need it to bloom

Break me holy like bread
Take your step toward heart song
I am here at the gate
All linen flower and no regret
Open me holy like sunrise

These sad eyes and tired shoulders have make me weak with the promise of someday. The weight of the world is pressing down so tightly on my vision that I can’t see anything but the sun’s glare. And I am waiting so anxiously for the days to break and the river to warm so I can try to wash my dusty eyes and smooth my crumpled up soul so I never have to come back to four white walls and a picket fence.

I am the lady grey
torn from a tattered box
and hung up on your wall
I am the bracelet engraved with the exact place of your youth
and I carry it with me
I am the letter you wrote me in the hospital
I’ll only look at it when I need you
These are not things to take lightly
I am not a thing to take lightly

I am both cold and warm in heart
So it feels balanced and peaceful
The world sings sin and you can hear it or love it
Don't last this way, but notice when it appears for you  
Feel heavy and clean after rain but know you will feel this way again
for that to happen it must be ***** and free
We should be ***** and free

I remember when we would both rest our star-crossed tresses on that mattress
When you were asleep I could never stay under long. There was something about rain on the windows and how I looked up to see water on the windowpanes, but mostly saw little plants and knick knacks you had collected, all lined up on your windowsill.
Mornings like those, you'd wake up and smoke sitting there in your underwear. And you never wore a bra. It's like they didn't exist when we were out there.
It was calming just to know that the house was filled with magic, with tea, with art and nature.
That Isabelle was always there, speaking rapid french outside your door.


I remember laying there in the middle of the night just looking at you fast asleep and thinking "I must be the luckiest girl in the world to be laying next to this gorgeous person right now. You are so remarkable." There's a lot about your mom's house that will always tug at my heartstrings, but it never would have meant anything if it weren't where I could find you.

There are havens in our lives
They're all tiny places I couldn't live without
The spaces we run to without thinking
Without second thoughts
They're decorated like our souls
And feel like a cabin in the woods

Peach House still makes me think of you
but you never even lived there

The world around us gets bigger when the snow melts. Suddenly there are new plains of the earth that our life has been deprived of. It’s not necessarily a happy thing. At least not at night when the spring winds are blowing strong and my mind is wandering to places darker than the retreating winter.

It was an early summer morning. The fog set in overnight as it often did on the island. We were a pastoral painting; buckets, rows of crops, and all five of us hunched over picking the morning harvest. Only visible as curves among the eden that swallowed our bodies.
The things that I remember from that summer are not what was painful then, but what is painful now.
I was crying. I cried because of her yelling, but my tears were more than self-pity and frustration.
There is no rest in this life that I've chosen, yet who I am inexorably needs to be rich in soil. And is it any way to live? In constant fear that the world around you can swallow your livelihood with their greed and destruction?
The farm is a living being. She will hold you tighter than any lover. She will take your hand and lead you to riches and paths of contentment
But just like falling in love, you never realize how deep you're in until you look up and your underwater.
In those rows, amongst the spinach and morning mosquitoes, I cried for everything I have chosen. I wept for that farm, myself, and the weight of my life as the solution to a problem.

Touch crisp and break heavy

falling pieces that will never shatter

but hang heavy

todo esto de espera

It’s windy here

but there is no use worrying for the newly sprung greenery

or small chipmunks already awoken from a long winter

because this wind comes every year to dry out the soggy April soils

it takes some lives just emerging from the earth but

we need it so we can finally break ground and wake up our gardens

there’s this thing in agriculture called hardening off

when you grow seedlings indoors they aren’t accustomed to the harsh climate outdoors

they need to be hardened off

slowly introduce them to the winds and cold beyond green glass

gradually and then all at once

just like how the spring comes every year

it may feel like a sudden drop of heaviness on your chest

but you are hard and strong just like new seedlings

and you will survive the storm

The thunder rumbles in sore throats

and rivers of yellow speak of high hopes

for the people who plant flowers and complain to pollen

the earth will give you too many chances to worry about sunflowers

because drizzles help

until there you are,

achey muscles and grey face ******* on Ricola

crossing a street to go to work

and how does it happen to be that the first day of rain in a month comes on the day you lose your sunshine

Well today the sun came in a bottle of Tropicana

and tomorrow I will count the losses of those who just can’t take one rainy day

BRING BACK YOUR HOLLOW HEART
FILL IT WITH THE TEARS YOU LEFT ON HIS PILLOW
NO ONE WILL EVER NOTICE YOU AREN'T WHOLE
IT STILL LOOKS LIKE YOU'RE PINK AND PULSING
HE WON'T NOTICE, HE'LL NEVER GO THAT DEEP

THIS IS NOT ROMANTIC.
THERE IS NOTHING ROMANTIC ABOUT CRIPPLING SELF-DOUBT.
THE HOLE IN MY BEING DOESN'T NEED TO BE FILLED BY ANOTHER PERSON.
YOU HAVE NO POWER OVER ME.
YOUR LONGER DAYS DON'T EXIST ANYMORE.
JUST BRING MY BODY BACK.

I've been waiting out these rainy days
with my head down
and my ears waiting eagerly for your call

I had my own whimsical hopes about you
and how maybe we could be
because I liked the way you don't say much
and how you only smile if someone actually deserves it
and when you sit alone in the farthest corner of the gardens
because it's exactly where you wished to be

I was captivated by your mystery
and the possibilities I had told myself were more than a good chance
My hopes built higher after you mentioned one evening alone together
they peaked, and pointed to a plateau of so much fantasy I could finally see clearly

There is always a caveat in these situations
and mine starts with a but,
but, you rarely look at me when I speak
but, you never even held my hand
but, you never ask about me
but, I can hardly get a word in when we're alone
but, I can't be with someone who doesn't value me

I've spent my entire life building up fantastical stories and telling myself that boys liked me because it was the only way that I could feel like I was worth something.
My main objective for as long as I can remember has been changing myself to make it easier for people to receive me,
but i'm not a ******* package waiting to be delivered to price charming's doorstep just so he can open me up, use me, and throw me aside.
No longer will I pretend that I am not a whole being.
The parts of me that are not soft and pink are still worth something.
I have baggage and rough patches but I think those scars are beautiful.
My thoughts may come out scattered but they're still worth hearing,
and I cannot go chasing down the love of someone who doesn't care to understand that I am more than just a sum of a few pretty parts.

Not even the vines
that come creeping through
the cracks in my cabin
Not even the dreams
that come as omens
or the weeds that have grown taller than me
I consider it all irrelevant until I'm threatened
Where have I learned this selfishness?
Where has my awareness gone?

The spoils of our labor
turn heavy in the heart
and light in your arms

I hate this feeling of not quite ready to leave
having an ever present flight date
and that it only rained once while I was here
but that it will rain next week when I’m gone
I thought California held magical promises
of summertime gardens fruitful to the point of exhaustion
and reckless freedom
but the only thing I found here was a truth I didn’t want to hear
that I’m lighting the candles and playing the records
I’ve created everything I love inside my head
that doesn’t mean its not real
just that I’ve wasted a lot of days blaming the sun for being too bright.