I heard my eight year old cousin call his sister a ******
because she is bisexual.
I heard the voice of an angel whisper
Daddy says **** go to hell.

That poor boy's mind has been poisoned since birth.
He has been fed line after line
of over-analyzed,
misunderstood scripture
and he believes it is his ticket
into heaven.

I can't wrap my head around
why homosexuals would go to hell
but the ones flicking Satan's tongue at them
are saved.

Love doesn't send you to hell.

Hate does.

if I promise I don't love you can you hold me again
can you trace your fingers over my thigh and pretend it's not a sin
can you hold my hand and pretend that it isn't too cold
like we used to do before I got too sad and you got too old
can you kiss my neck like you just want to touch me
can you press my head to your chest so I can feel your heartbeat
if I promise I don't love you will you tell me that you love me

Breathe.*
Choke on the cold,
feel your lungs tighten,
your teeth ache.
Hold your arms in themselves,
cradle them as they shake beneath goosebumped skin.
Walk.
Walk slowly so you do not force wind against yourself,
walk slowly so you do not have to choose where you are going yet,
walk toward light.
Let it spill over you,
feel its heat,
you,
still frozen at the core but the light,
it is so warm.
This.
This is what you have been waiting for,
what you wanted but could not articulate,
this gentle touch.
*Breathe.

With your hands woven
into my spine
you led me into
the dark
where the icy wind
slipped my shirt off
leaving me exposed to you,
wishing I could walk away
but the trail
of breadcrumbs we left
has long since disappeared,
and now
that I am lost
beside you
I only wish
to have you closer,
but once daylight
touches our skin
and we are graced
with artificial smiles,
I will
shrug away
from you
again.

I grew up taking hits from my big brother,
I grew up on "boys' weekend" camping trips,
I grew up with my father calling me a princess but calling my brothers rock stars,
I grew up watching Boy Scout meetings from the back of the room,
I grew up on LEGOs and Hot Wheels and
I still remember the year my brothers got Nerf guns for Christmas
and I got a bracelet,
I remember being shot with foam bullets and having no way to fight back,
but at least I looked pretty.
I remember seeing my dad leave for work every morning
and wondering why my mom never did,
I remember wanting to be an astronaut, but my brother told me
moms have to stay home.
The phrase stop being a girl is branded into my mind
and I still curse myself every day
for the organs I was born with.
I remember the year my brothers went as zombies for Halloween
and I had to go as a princess,
I remember bringing a fake butcher's knife
because a princess is not scary.
I grew up on manhood meaning strength
and manhood meaning confidence
and manhood meaning respect
and I still wear dresses
and my dad still calls me a princess
but I'll be ****** if you tell me I'm not a man.

Sustenance for my frail body
contained in gel-coated pills
split into thirds,
one for morning,
one for night,
one to slip beneath my tongue.

A glass of water
–or milk, with breakfast–
rumbles through my throat,
resists peristalsis,
hits stomach.

The heater clicks on
as the thermostat flashes 68 degrees,
then shuts off at night,
replaced by
one sheet,
one throw blanket,
one quilt.

Your hand, inches from
my fingertips,
not yet near enough
for electricity to jump between,
will go unacknowledged;
one feeble attempt at loving within my means.

I am walking toward mirages
with the knowledge that they are fake
but with the thought that
moving to a new area of the desert
will not hurt anymore than remaining sedentary,
and I am thinking that maybe
if I walk far enough in one direction
toward these delusions
eventually I will have to reach something
other than sand
because this wasteland cannot be infinite and
I know these visions are malignant figments of my imagination
but one day there will be an oasis
that does not disappear at the touch of my dusty palms
and this will be what I have been walking toward
all this time
and these mirages are not lies,
they are promises,
they are foreshadowing
of a place better than this and
I cannot ignore these signs
because they are the only things
that keep me from sitting so long in one place
that I erode my own grave into the dirt.

I've stuck around for so long
even though I've wanted to leave
because I don't want to hurt anyone,

but I broke his heart
I let her down
I lied to him
I made her cry
I hurt them
I hurt them
I hurt them...

And I don't know what to do
because I'd hurt them by leaving,
but I hurt them by staying, too.

Drunken words
tumbling out between
sips of liquor,
eyelids
heavier than usual,
she thinks
I can't tell
when she's been
drinking
but I have been here
through days when
she swallowed nothing
but whiskey and
antidepressants,
through
sobbing nights,
these walls are so thin
I hear every
tortured breath,
I have been here
through hollow chest
and empty bottle,
and she has never been
a mean drunk,
only honest,
but it seems like
she only tells me
she cares through
wine-stained teeth
and I wonder
if she can hear
my heart break
every time she slurs
the words
"I love you".

In speech class they taught us that people speak only to entertain, to inform, or to persuade so when I texted you at 4:31am after swallowing the liquor cabinet and talked about three years ago in Michigan when we watched that movie after everybody else had fallen asleep, I was trying to entertain you, trying to remind you of all the fun we used to have together before you changed and when I told you I missed you I was trying to inform you of the pit in my stomach that you left when you removed yourself from me, of the way I feel when you say my name and of the fact that yes, I did notice that you stopped saying my name and when I told you I was dying I was trying to persuade you to come save me, made it life or death so you only had two options and if you made the wrong choice at least I wouldn't be around to see it, I was trying to convince you that you needed me by showing you how much you would miss me and when you showed up at my bedside, I know you were trying to tell me you loved me.

Arms tight,
grabbing fistfuls of t-shirt,
your mascara wet on his shoulder.
This is the hug you give
when something is falling apart.

This is the hug you give your ex boyfriend
when you promise you will still be there for him,
this is the hug you give him
when he wishes to stop existing,
this is the hug you give him
when you tell him you love him,
this is the hug you give him
when he doesn't believe you,

these embraces will break your heart,
they will make your ribs curl in on themselves,
they are apologies for the harm you have caused,
they are guilt for the scars you have left,
they are acknowledging that
terrible things happen to beautiful people,
they are the realization that
you are not a beautiful person,
you are a terrible thing.

Nothing has ever broken my heart more
than feeling yours beating
*and knowing you wanted it to stop.

I am trying to write a poem
about the way stars shine
but I keep realizing
that what we call stars
is really only light,

and I am trying to write a poem
that isn't about you
but I keep realizing
that what I thought of as you
was only the parts you cared to show,

and I am trying to believe in magic
and miracles
but I keep realizing
that I am only wishing on light
and the word love has a definition that fits in the dictionary.

You were in my dream last night and I think we were in love and my head didn't hurt anymore and suddenly I remembered how it felt for my chest cavity to be full of something other than steam and I swear to God it was real, I could feel your heartbeat while you slept but still I woke into a dark room and let the world slowly come back to me and I don't know how but that illusion felt more real than my life has for a while now and I started grasping for someone on the couch next to me only to find I was alone, and I keep waiting for someone to tell me to calm down, that this is all a bad dream, I keep hoping I'll wake up and this will all seem foggy and distant because last night couldn't have been in my head, I could feel your heartbeat while you slept.

attacked me like
a rabid dog
eager to taste flesh

bit into me like
raw meat
(because really that's all I am)

tore me open like
wrapping paper on a gift
you weren't supposed to see yet


I shut down like
a restaurant with health code violations
infested with rats

fell into you like
pavement
from thirty stories

poisoned myself like
a carbon monoxide car garage
falling unconscious long before death

there is a noose hanging in my
throat
and when I try to tell you I love you
it tangles around the words and
I start to choke
so I keep my mouth shut

and this is not to say that I do not love you but
love doesn't feel like a blessing anymore,
it feels like guilt,
it feels like another promise that
I will not be able to keep, it feels like
an apology that my lips will never speak.

when I try to tell you I love you
I remind myself that
you don't want me to anymore,
remind myself that
this is not what you want to hear from me,
remind myself that
you will not say it back.

when I try to tell you I love you it is not because
I think you need to hear it,
it is because
I want to say it,
it is because
that word has been eating a hole in the pit of my stomach for
too long,
it is because when I
repeat a word too many times
it stops sounding like one
so I'm hoping that if I say it out loud it will
regain its meaning,
it is because I do not know if it's true and
I want you to tell me it is,
it is because I am
selfish
and this is entirely for my own
benefit and/or destruction

and I am sorry because
when I tell you I love you it will be
the last thing I say to you.

All of my firsts,
all of my beautiful memories,
my sacred bonds
have been cracked open,
tainted,
the ties have been cut,
I am drifting,
floating off,
I have no anchor to drop.
I have given away
everything I can, and
there is nothing left of me
to offer but
salt water pouring from
my heart, trying to nourish
this thicket weaving through
my rib cage.
My collar bones are
shelves holding books and
love songs that I
can no longer listen to.
My knees are rubbed raw,
carpet burn from kneeling
before a God that only
called me a sinner,
I have nothing left to offer.
Palms facing upwards on
the ends of outstretched arms,
I have given away all
that I can,
I have siphoned the very
blood from my veins,
I am empty.

I have had seventeen birthdays including the day I was born.
I have lived in three houses and two apartments, have had four dogs and five cats, have dislocated my left elbow twice.
I have kissed four boys and three girls, have been one boy's first kiss, one boy's first time, another boy's first "I love you", I have never touched him.
I have smoked marijuana twice and been caught once.
I have worn a bow tie three times, have been called a **** four, have hit someone for it once.
I have been a vegetarian for three years and have slipped and eaten meat five times.
I have been through the same divorce twice in one week because my mom thought she had changed her mind; I have never told her how much worse that made it.
I have tried to eat grapefruit twice since the night I regurgitated that flavor of *****, I have failed both times.
I have gone forty-two days straight without drinking alcohol.
I have woken up and mistaken morning breath for the aftertaste of beer too many times to count.
I have held three of my closest friends after they were touched without consent.
I have made the boy who convinced me to sext him even though he knew I was drunk apologize once; he never felt sorry.
I have heard the three words "I love you" from one boy, I had to tell him he didn't mean it four times, had to tell him not to kiss me six even though I wanted him to, reminded myself every time that he was on his tenth shot.
I have forty-eight visible scars on my body from the times it was too hard to love myself, have told three different therapists the same two things phrased differently every time: one, I'm sad, two, I don't know how to stop it.
I have cried three times in the past week.
One was over the three friends that I have held after they were touched without consent, one was over the boy who said he loved me, one was over the boy who convinced me to sext him even though he knew I was drunk.
I still talk to him five times a week, take one deep breath, count to three, and force myself not to pull away every time he touches me, spend the next eight minutes between classes trying to pull myself together, remind myself it was only one time.
I have not been alone with the boy who said he loved me in six weeks.
I have thought about kissing him every day for the past three-hundred and eight days.
I have had three dreams about him, each one recurring two, seven, or four times.
I have been reminded by strangers of the way he looks at me six times.
I have almost died once, drank four beers and seven shots of five assorted liquors, drug a razor across my skin eleven times, called three people for help, one answered.
I stopped trying to hide the scars on my wrist after thirty-four days of wearing sweaters in eighty-something degree heat, have seen twelve people stare at my arm, received disapproving looks from four of them, have never been asked for an explanation.
I have commented on how pretty the sun looks on the ten minute ride to school with my brother every morning for the past two weeks.
I have complimented at least one person a day every day for the past two years.
I have worn my favorite beanie at least sixty times in the past year and there is nothing wrong with that.
I laughed fifty-seven times yesterday.
I said "I love you" eleven.
I have chosen to be alive every day for five thousand, nine hundred, thirty seven days.
I have never made the wrong choice.

Listen closely for
creaking floorboards
above your head.
Memorize his steps;
how he walks gently
when you are not alone
but plays music
with his shackles and
dances on granite soles
while you are sleeping.

When you wake
in a cold sweat,
know that he is there,
that he is with you although
you cannot see him.
He is a cold draft
after you take a bath,
he is the book you could have sworn
you put back on the shelf.
He is begging you to turn around,
to feel his touch,
to remember how
that book had started
your first conversation.

He will tune the radio to
your song and
play it louder
and louder
until he sees you fall to
your knees with his memories
cradled in your bony arms.

As you watch him shatter
the picture frames beside your bed,
remind yourself that
he is not malicious;
this is still the
pastel-eyed boy who's hands
made you feel safe,
he is trying to prove that
he exists,
he is shattering glass
with his illusory knuckles,
yearning to feel a sensation
that he can no longer perceive.

You are letting go of him.
You are telling him to move on.
He is alone in a dark room
and you are begging him to
go toward the light.

You come back to an
illuminated house.
Every lamp has been turned on,
every candle lit.
He is flooding you with light
because he cannot find his own.

I'm sorry I took your virginity, it's just that
I was so sad and we were so drunk and you were so eager,
and I kind of thought it was cute that it was your first time
and it kind of went to my head that you wanted me to be your first,
and you were warm when I was cold
and you were dry when I was drowning
and now I fear that I've chilled you and drug you into the water with me,
and do your bones ache like mine yet?

You left bruises on my thighs;
that's not a metaphor,
I have blue splotches where you held me
and I've never been ****** like that,
never been ****** like I was supposed to enjoy it.
You were the first person to ever care if I was comfortable,
you were the first person I ever laughed with during ***,
you were the first person I ever laid with afterwards
and you let me hold your hand and rest my head on your chest
and your heart was beating so hard
and the room was dark
until we had to find our clothes scattered on the floor,
and you laughed when I tried to hide myself
and I guess it's just easier for me to show myself when the lights are off,
when you can't see my scars,
Jesus Christ I hope you didn't see my scars,
those are the only piece of myself I care about keeping private.

You dropped me off at home later
and as I got out of the car you thanked me and I just laughed
because I didn't know how to say that
I don't want you to think of it as a favor,
I didn't ******* out of pity,
I ****** you out of loneliness and ***** and cold hands,
and I'm sorry I took your virginity but you were the best I ever had.

Husband and housewife
He left every day
Came back at night
Wasted
She comforted him with
Laundry basket kisses
He yelled
He knocked a lamp off a shelf
She locked the bathroom door
Slept in the tub
Apologies over French toast
He left again
She swept the shards of glass
Under the rub
So maybe when he drug his tired feet
Across the ground
He would bleed like she did

boy finds brand new camera in his Christmas stocking
photographs the night sky, Polaroid comes out dark
tiny feet slide inside of Daddy's loafers
tie drags on the ground between chubby legs
there's something hiding under the bed, Dad
never saw anything
said night sky, only saw dark

When you decided to stop smoking
you kept buying cigarettes,
still carried them around in the
pocket of your jeans
but told yourself that
every time you lit one
you'd have to put it out on your hand,
and so you savored every moment
that smoke rushed through your lungs,
let them all burn down to the ****
before you took a deep breath
and pressed it against your palm.
You still smoke.

To fill the emptiness with hollow things

To speak through our teeth only in whispers

To find remorse in the beautiful memories

To pour the milk ourselves

To walk away from that which we hold closest

To clog the drain with pebbles from our shoes

To hate those who love us

To hate those who cannot

To dog-ear the pages in borrowed novels

To hide lies beneath our skin

To lie thorns beneath the bedsheets

To forget to say hello

To forget to say good bye

When I gave you my bracelet I told you I wore it to remind myself that most pain is self inflicted and you still have it somewhere but you haven't mentioned it in a while and it's just some safety pins hooked together so I don't really need it back and I think you need it more than I do because you named the cuts on your arms after people and you blame them on events and it seems like you've forgotten why it's called self harm you say you tried to **** yourself because of your ex girlfriend and your dad and I know this isn't what you want to hear but I'm not going to sugarcoat anything you tried to **** yourself because you overreacted to a breakup you tried to **** yourself because you made yourself believe your dad hates you you tried to **** yourself because you thought yourself into a black hole and you named it after them and now you're on the verge of doing it again but this time you're screaming my name into it and I have apologized much more than necessary even though I didn't do anything wrong and you still blame me when we're on the phone at 2am on a Monday night and I'm trying to make you feel better and you keep saying you hate yourself and I'm wondering if that's actually true because most of the time it seems like you hate the people that are trying to help you and I'm begging you to start wearing my bracelet again

Today I woke up and told you I wanted to jump off a bridge and you said you would talk to me all day and call me as soon as you got home to make sure I was okay but at 11:19am you stopped texting me and I would've understood if it was because of class but school ended at 3:30pm and you didn't call me like you said you would and you didn't text me until 9:17pm and you were surprised when I said I was doing well and I guess what I'm trying to say is I thought I needed you to be there for me today but you weren't and I got out of bed and pulled myself together on my own and I made everything better on my own and you might need me but I sure as hell don't need you and I hope you hate that I can be happy without you I hope you wish you had held onto me tighter I hope you know I'm okay on my own I hope you know I don't need anyone

****
isn't always dark alleys
and whistles
and pepper spray.
It isn't always
a stranger,
they don't always
look dangerous.
Whether it is
your boyfriend
or your teacher
or your uncle,
they are no longer on your side.
This is your attacker.
Do not be silent.
Do not be afraid to make a scene.
Whether it is a movie theatre
or a street corner
or your bedroom,
yell,
scream,
curse,
bite,
spit,
let no resonate from your lungs
so they cannot say they didn't hear you.
Send him home,
tell your parents,
tell your friends,
tell the police.
****
is not always
drunk men outside bars
or keys clenched between white knuckles.
Sometimes **** is silent.
Do not be silenced.

I don't know why I can't write anything today.
I am so ******* empty but my mind keeps slipping back to
you,
and I hate myself with a fervor
unmatched by any passion I've felt before and that is
terrifying.
You aren't allowed to leave without saying
you'll come back,
you aren't allowed to love her without killing your love for me first.
Why do you do this to me?
Why do I do this to myself?
Honestly, you're innocent but
I need somewhere to place the guilt other than
myself
because my arms are full and
I cannot carry anymore.
I haven't seen you in weeks.
We used to talk,
you used to love me,
now do you even ******* care?
Do you ever think of me anymore?
Because I think about you all the time.
You are the reason I've been hungover the past two days,
you are the reason my friends are worried about me,
you are the reason I can't turn in any of the poems I write to my English teacher.
I do not love you like you want me to,
at least I don't think I do,
but I do love you,
oh god I do,
but what the hell does that even mean? All I know is
today I felt like crying because of all the things you've said to me
and the only thing I knew would make it better would be if
you said my name.
You didn't.

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.

Oh, how perfect it is to want you,
how perfect it is to long for that which I know
I can never have, to see
the futility in my desires and to
desire them in spite of,

how perfect it is that you do not love me
anymore,
that we will not fall into mutual complacency
which would inevitably tarnish and blanch,
that the
unknown
will remain
unknowable,
that anything will continue to be possible
because nothing has been tested against fate,

how perfect it is to wish for the infeasible,
to strive toward a goal I will
never attain, to
never lack
something to search for,

oh, how perfect it is to want you;
how perfect it is to want too much.

You called me selfish.
For a long time I felt guilty,
until I turned you from a victim
into a villain.

As the anger has faded
from the lights of an ambulance
into the dull, neon red glow of an
emergency exit sign,
I have begun to realize that

you saw me as the bad guy, too.
You probably still do,
and maybe I am selfish,
and maybe I want to apologize,

but what if they're all right
and you were just trying to
get me to say sorry?
What if you're just dying to
see me come crawling back to you?
I don't want you to think
I need you,
because I don't,

but I'm not selfish,
and I don't want you to think so.

I haven't written poetry
since the night with all the blood
because I'm afraid that the demons
might crawl out from underneath my fingernails
and singe the edges of my paper with their hellfire
and I am trying to get better,
I swear I am,
it's just hard when
I can't tell my own voice apart from
the monsters in my head.

Sleep with a mason jar
Under your bed
Try to forgive all the things
That we never said

Ache within reason
Regurgitate your pride
There is strength in always
Having something to hide

Dig you claws into the mountainside
Feel slate crumble and fall
Get a grip on something permanent
Or on nothing at all

Face your fears with
Grace and poise
Use your screams to drown out
All this **** noise

Remind yourself
Of where you've been
And where you'll go
When your time here ends

She loves every one of her victims.
From the bottom of her cold well of a heart,
she loves them.

She would never ****
an innocent creature;
they all deserve it.

She stalks her prey,
she gets in close,
they begin to whisper

their evil little secrets.
No one is blameless.
She knows this.

Dig deep enough,
find the truth.
It is soiled.

She slits their throats.
You are released
from your sins,

she ensures them.
Through hot blood,
they promise they love her, too.

When I said you weren't paying attention to my feelings
you got mad at me and said
it hurts that you think I'm that awful.

I apologized.

Now here I am
crying in an empty bathtub at 3am
clutching my phone waiting for you to call back
because you hung up when I told you
that it hurts my feelings when you say
stop feeling so sorry for yourself
I have it worse.


Am I a bad person for calling you out on your ****?
Is it rude to stand up for myself?


I'm not sorry if I made you feel bad,
you made me feel worthless.
So you tell me,
which is worse?

Feeling like a bad person
**or not feeling like a person at all?

I told myself I wouldn't write another **** poem.

I told myself reliving the same traumas
over
and over
would not aid in the healing process,
but these are not
the same traumas,
this is not
another **** poem,
there is just
so much ******* material
that it's starting to run together.

She went to a movie with him,
somewhere public,
somewhere safe,
and still he drug his hand
up her thigh,
she kept her mouth shut,
tried to push him away,
wouldn't want to interrupt the best scene,
whispered
"stop",
he didn't listen.

He was in his girlfriend's bedroom,
watched her sit in silence
fuming
when he said
"no"
for the fourth time,
told himself to
man up
when she said
"what, don't you love me?"
He swore he did,
he just couldn't show it like this,
she didn't listen.

She was at his apartment,
told him that morning
she just wasn't in the mood today,
she shifted inside herself
as he kissed her neck
the same way he had
hundreds of times before,
forced a laugh as she said
"I really don't want to,"
he didn't listen.

She was sitting on his couch
when he put his arm around her,
unwrapped herself from him,
he told her to
"just relax,"
became comfortable in a body
he was never invited into,
she got away,
called her brother from the next street over,
explained to him from the passenger seat
that she had said no,
he didn't listen.

I told myself I wouldn't write another **** poem
because I had convinced myself it wouldn't happen again,
had convinced myself that
my friends and family
were not a part of the statistic,

but every sobbing phone call
or hushed condolence
reminds me that
this happens every day,
that pretending **** culture does not exist
will not make it go away,
that 20% of human beings
in the United States
will be ***** in their lifetime,
that 20% of the people I love
will be ***** in their lifetime.

I keep telling myself
I will not write another **** poem,

keep reminding myself
to look at the facts.

I woke up
to the sound of hail
on a tin roof.

Looking out the window,
I was still in a dream
until I saw my journal on the floor
and remembered why it fell there.

The window shattered.
Water in every form
poured onto my desk:
hail, rain, the steam from my hot breath.
Wind whipped through the room,
tearing my paintings off the wall,
reminding me that
I never liked them much in the first place.

The louder I screamed
the stronger the storm became;
my vocal cords are no match for a hurricane.
Please stop,
I whispered into my folded arms.

Silence.

I opened my eyes.
The window was not open.

Please understand that when I say these things it's not really me talking, it's the concrete in my stomach, it's the staples in between my toes, it's the zip ties around my wrists, it's the scars around my wrists, it's the coals in my throat, it's the liquor in my throat, it's the liquor in the cabinet my mom never had to put a lock on until I started hiding in it, it's the noose around my neck, it's the smoke in my eyes, it's the bullet in the barrel, it's the gun in my dad's closet, it's the gun in my hand, in my mouth, when I say these things it's not really me talking, it's all these things trying to get out.

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.

Don't want to do this
don't want to be here
don't want things to get better
just want them to end
just want to drink myself to death
just want to die
want to be gone
want to slice up my arms
want to bleed out
want to wake up in a hospital bed
want to stay there forever
want to stop trying to recover
want to get worse
want to die
want to die
want to die

We used to spend hours
driving around looking at houses and
I never understood why you went to
the middle class neighborhoods
with the big homes that all looked the same and
pointed to the ones with
heavy wooden doors and thick brick walls
and all the cars in the garage and
called them your favorite
until I heard your voice crack when you said
they just look so sturdy
and I knew that
your walls were rotting and
falling down and
your foundation was cracked and
your windows were shattered and
the ceiling was starting to
cave in and
you liked the
big homes with
heavy wooden doors and thick brick walls
and all the cars in the garage because
they were
strong
when you
weren't.

if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it
it doesn't make a sound but you can feel it shake the ground for miles
feel it rattle the good china in the cupboard

if a tree fall in the forest and no one is around to find use for the wood
it just lays there until the early morning damp soaks all the way through
just lays there until pieces of it start to flake off

if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to count the years in its rings
it might never have lived at all
might never have been alive in the first place

January is ice cold, but it never snows.
You're always so angry but you never want to talk about it.
February it starts to get warm, then there's a week of snow days.
Just when I think you're letting me in you shut me out again.
March has cold mornings and hot afternoons; the trees start to turn green.
You call me at 3am crying and you're fine in the morning; you have good days sometimes.
April is hot and cold and wet and dry.
You've never been a very stable person.
May is rain. The humidity makes my clothes damp.
You get so broken sometimes that it breaks me, too.
June is perfect lake weather. The water is cold.
I want to know all of the dark corners of your mind.
July has no rain. The dirt dries out and cracks.
I wonder how many of your smiles are faked.
August is too hot to go outside. The lake is bath water.
As soon as you get close to someone you find an excuse to leave.
September has cool evenings. The mosquitoes are awful.
Sometimes you feel at peace with your demons.
October is more rain; autumn oranges and reds and yellows.
You say you're dying and I try to convince you it will get better soon.
November is a dry cold.
I wish you would let me help you.
December freezes the plants; the leaves are gone from the trees.
*You destroy yourself and wonder why you're so broken.

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

I keep trying to find a song that can describe
how I feel with the hope that
maybe it will make this emptiness seem less empty
but you can't rhyme
"scars" with "I'm sorry"
or
"sixteen" with "alcoholic"

Standing before a once white canvas,
brush in hand.

Paint runs together,
reds and blues and yellows
are now indistinguishable.

Stained palms are reminders
of the source of the mess.

It is so much easier to ruin things
than it is to fix them.

I AM SCARED
TO LOOK AT
MY NAKED BODY
IN THE MIRROR

I keep writing these poems
emptying my chest onto paper
thinking somehow
this will make it feel less hollow
thinking someday
these words won't be so tortured
but every scratch of pen
every patch of black or blue
covering something that just
didn't fit right
looks so vacant
and everything I say
is starting to sound the same
I am pulling words from a thesaurus
trying to rephrase the ache
into something I haven't felt before
trying to justify
why I haven't been able to fix this yet
talking myself into a fire
this ink is gasoline
and combustion
is something I am all too familiar with

I'm not saying I've fallen for you
I'm still not sure
but you said you loved me
and I think maybe I could love you too
if you were a better you
and I know I shouldn't ask you to change
but you've been gone for a while
and no one knows where you went
and I'm hoping that when you get back
you'll be better
and maybe then we'd have a chance
and I know this is wrong of me to think
but I keep thinking it
because you said you love me
and it's been four years
and you still do
so I think I have time
to decide how I feel
and you'll still be here
waiting for me
or maybe you won't
I don't know what you think of me at this point
I don't know if you'll keep waiting
but I hope you will.
I hope you still love me.
I know that's selfish,
but I hope you do.
I think I might love you,
if you give me a chance to.

I love you but I can't trust you anymore

Please just leave me alone for a while

I don't care how you're feeling, this isn't about your feelings

No, you don't get a say in our relationship now, the same way I didn't get a say in my own ******* bedroom

Do you know how much this ****** with my head

You were my best friend

Go **** yourself

I'm sorry