It has been a while since I have wrote my thoughts out.

Perhaps its laziness or perhaps a fear of who I have been in the past.

But, as I stop to pack a few more things from the closet of my mother's home.

A handful made me smile, and made me feel the need to put my thoughts down somewhere.

A few Polaroids and some old notes from a girl who was once my whole world, but haven't talked to in years.

I wish her nothing but happiness, and I am eternally grateful for the happy memories we shared.

A tiny christmas tree small enough to put on a night stand, I remember a night in college that tree in the center of our dorm sitting and laughing with the man who is to this day my closest friend.

And of course the fresh wound.

My fathers golf clubs.

At first it's the happy memory of me and my father putting a golf ball across the small patch of grass behind his trailer drinking beer and enjoying a cool summer breeze.

Inevitably though any memories of my father return to that day just this past July.

Sitting next to the hospital bed clutching his hand and watching light fade from his eyes.

But, that was yesterday.

Today is a day to pack, I need to return home to the woman with whom I share my bed.

Groceries need bought, chores done, cats fed.

And come Monday work will need done a future of my making is calling me forward to each new day.

So for now I'll simply take these old memories and tuck them away.

my ***** heart is hungover
overdue for a kickstart
startled and *******
all for you,
all for you.

ill write about everything you hate
about yourself and make it sound like
the most beautiful ******* thing.

my teeth
sink into
instant coffee
cautiously; this will
never be the same
unless you are here.

            i might pick up
            a cigarette and
            a bible in the same
            breath,
            i still love you
                 all the same.

being alone has
taught me that
i miss you even
when i don't,
i want everything to feel
                                        close again.

i am a bad artist
my body is a vessel for emotion that nearly never gets opened
and when it does, it's confetti blown from a sawed off shotgun
but for now, the safety is on
and little pieces of colored paper decorate my sleep in the form of nightmares
putting my finger over that trigger feels a lot like losing control
i am powerless
fighting fire with gasoline in a house i live in, alone
i am alone
because the people who taught me how to love do not love me and that makes me
lonely

did it ever occur to you that maybe i'm exactly where i wanted to be?
years and years of self destruction in hopes that i'll eventually be sick enough to take the medicine
sick enough to be bed ridden
mother in the chair in the corner of the room, praying for me
calling all the doctors, saying "she needs help"
but i tell her im sick and she says "i need help"
and i don't know how to get well with a hypochondriac

they told me to use sage
cleanse my soul, my environment, my headspace
and i agree with them because i don't know how to say that i'm already clean without having to explain that i've taken 2 baths today
and yesterday

lately i just can't seem to find my faith
i think it may have gotten lost somewhere between the hotel, three different therapists, and the letters i get in the mail from a team of people that want to know my truth
my truth?
well i apologize, your honor, as my truth is
an ocean, a non-linear mass of blue, only 5-7 percent discovered

i guess what i'm trying to say is

i am afraid
that when you ask me to take the safety off and pull the trigger
i'll forget how to aim

Cigarette ash and coffee stains in the veins of the threads of this white shirt.
More stains in the veins on her skirt from my vain, biological ability to pain her with my existence.
Days passing and nothing stays the same in this place.
But her and I will spend the summer days is in better places.
Sands, oceans, ponds and bikinis.
We can sit in silence or talk until my ears bleed.
I'm happy either way.
Happy these days.