just lie to me and say the emptiness will go away someday,
tell me it gets better,
tell me I won't always feel like this.
I need something to hope for,
something to look forward to.
I don't want a light at the end of the tunnel,
I want the tunnel to be lit on the inside, too.
I don't want to wait until the end to finally be able to see.
improvement is not getting used to the pain,
improvement is the pain going away.
if you had a hole in your hand your entire life
yes, you would get used to it
but there'd still be a ******* hole in your hand
and I am trying to hold on but everything keeps slipping through the ******* hole
and no one is telling me how to make the hole go away,
they just keep saying I'll learn how to live with it.

This is a lonely phone call,
this is the hole in my chest,
this is my 7th shot.
This is spelling please wrong in texts,
this is crawling out the window barefoot,
this is driving without headlights.
This is him, being there.
This is his hand on my thigh,
this is whiskey flavored kisses,
this is turning the lights off.
This is not love making,
this is bone ache
heart break
bed shaking.
This is avoiding eye contact,
this is telling him I should leave,
this is getting dressed on opposite sides of the room.
This is a quiet drive home riding shotgun,
this is trying to act casual so he doesn't get the wrong idea,
this is secrets I keep from my best friend,
this is ***.
That's all this is.

I'd like to thank

*****
for giving me the confidence to ask her out

Drunk texts
for the brutal honesty

Flannel shirts
for hiding my scars

My cats
for always being the cover story

My brother
for never telling my parents

My best friend
for finally telling my parents

That girl in my art class
for calling me kind

That guy I dated
for calling me selfish

My counselor
for telling me to mind my own business

The boy who said he loved me
for teaching me what love isn't

My bedroom
for keeping my sobs concealed

My headphones
for keeping my **** private

My ****
for keeping me from ******* that guy

That guy
for ******* me anyways

Guilt
for killing me

Guilt
for keeping me alive

You said I was a god and I believed you
thought you would always pray to me
thought your devotion to me was eternal

called you crying because my word is divine
even between thunder storm sobs
called you a sinner because fear
is the root of fidelity

but I remember when you said you were an atheist
realized I was just as human as you
decided you didn't need my wrath
you walked through my fire
stole my halo
became your own savior
and now I am alone and godless

you were the only one to ever love me
but you have denounced your faith
and if God doesn't exist
then who the hell was I

how can you love someone and then
not anymore

how can a feeling
just not be there

maybe you're not looking
hard enough

maybe you should start digging a little
deeper

it's buried six feet under along with the way
you used to say my name

I have a friend
who is in a state of
constant action.
Whether it is
talking
or walking
or kissing
or smoking,
she is doing.

I never understood why,
never understood how she could
always be bored
when things slowed down,
never understood why
silence wasn't peaceful to her,
until now.

When there are demons in your head
that whisper into the empty spaces,
you look for other sounds to drown them out;
you look for something
-anything, really-
that gives you something to think about
other than the aching in your chest.

But soon it becomes less of a habit
and more of a necessity.
You start getting desperate,
calling friends at 2am,
sneaking out to walk to the park
because at least you're not
trapped in your ******* room,
and with desperation comes regret.

You start doing things you're not proud of
but at least the demons were quiet
while you were doing it
so you do more to
forget about that regret
and so on.

And it works for a while.
But the demons will creep back in,
hiding between teeth
and in ash
and under beds,
until eventually
there is no where left
for you to run.

When you
wake up in the morning
do your bones
ache?
Have you forgiven
yourself?
Because I
haven't,
and I don't understand
why you get to
feel less guilty than
I do
even though
you're the one
who's done wrong.