I swear to God I am not giving up
but every breath I take feels like smoke
and I am not sure how much more
my tar-stained lungs can endure.

you haven't lived
until you've been in a
flophouse
with nothing but one
light bulb
and 56 men
squeezed together
on cots
with everybody
snoring
at once
and some of those
snores
so
deep and
gross and
unbelievable-
dark
snotty
gross
subhuman
wheezings
from hell
itself.
your mind
almost breaks
under those
death-like
sounds
and the
intermingling
odors:
hard
unwashed socks
****** and
*******
underwear
and over it all
slowly circulating
air
much like that
emanating from
uncovered
garbage
cans.
and those
bodies
in the dark
fat and
thin
and
bent
some
legless
armless
some
mindless
and worst of
all:
the total
absence of
hope
it shrouds
them
covers them
totally.
it's not
bearable.
you get
up
go out
walk the
streets
up and
down
sidewalks
past buildings
around the
corner
and back
up
the same
street
thinking
those men
were all
children
once
what has happened
to
them?
and what has
happened
to
me?
it's dark
and cold
out
here.

I DON'T KNOW WHY
I'M SO HELLBENT ON
DESTROYING MYSELF

I am sorry for all the harm I have done
I am sorry that I cannot heal the scars I have left
I am sorry that you have wounds and I am the blade
I am a double edged razor and you cannot hold me
without slicing open your palms
drop me please
let me go
I do not want to hurt anyone anymore
if this is what I have caused
I no longer want to be

That first puff,
the first sip,
the burn in my throat,
light headed
and shaking,
another hit
another shot,
I remember when I promised
never.

I am not
the person I used to be,
I am not
a beacon of hope,
I am a shipwreck
and I can see
the smokestacks falling
into the sea.

Sometimes I have to
remind myself I am awake,
that this is not a dream,
maybe one day
I'll wake up
and it will be.

Do not look at me
like a sob story,
do not ask
for a happy ending,
there is no ending,
this is my life
and it is
ongoing
smoke bumming
***** stealing
blunt passing
cold turkey
relapsing
screaming
screaming
screaming.

Red ribbons
and markers on posters,
this is not
the person
I was
before.

I CAN FEEL
MY TEETH
BEGIN TO DECAY
WHEN YOUR
ACID NAME
SLIPS THROUGH THEM

I am sorry.
I want everyone to know that this is no one's fault.
If anyone were to blame, it would be the universe herself,
and even that seems unfair.
She is trying to survive, just like the rest of us.
I am not sure where I will go now.
Whether it will be pearly gates
or eternal sleep
or a fire place
I am unsure,
but it is worth the risk to escape this reality.
I remember my mom holding me as I sobbed
because my best friend had been ***** and I did not save her.
My mother whispered like a lullaby into my ear,
there was nothing you could have done.
As if the fact that horrible things happen to innocent people
and there is no way to stop it
should come as a comfort to me.
I realize that this is just how life is
and if everyone else can live with it then I should be able to, too,
but I cannot seem to keep myself from trying to rescue everyone.
I am throwing myself into the ocean to resuscitate those seen drowning,
I am being swept out by the tide,
gagged by the salt water,
pulled beneath the surface by the ones I am trying to hold up.
Maybe I am weak.
Maybe I am too dense to fight the pull of gravity.
Maybe gravity will finally get what it wants
when I, in my brown box, am lowered as deep as this life can take me.
My spine is no longer strong enough to withstand this pressure.
I am breaking.
I am leaving.
I am gone.
I am sorry.