I have thoughts that capture me, enrapture me,
That scare me so shitless I just close my eyes,
Hiding from them like they are a buzzing squad of bees.
They buzz in my ears and in my brain,
Up my nose and in my veins.
Thoughtless karma, quick and cool,
Teach me to act with such self-assured judgment.
Burn my bone marrow, burn my brain,
These memories of you drive me insane.
These whirling twirling thoughts of you are inane,
For the you I miss is no longer alive.
I’ll smoke and create my own brain hive,
Hiding from all these bees.

Sweetheart silent killer manifests all inside my mind,
The moon’s a magnifying glass as it rises in the sky.
At 2 a.m. it giggles, a thick knife in its teeth,
And drops it down into my head as I lie underneath.
The glass I keep so carefully to remain ***** in the day,
Shatters and releases a burning, breathing self-assay.
A kaleidoscope catoptric, all frets out in the free,
A band of thought-filled thieves invade to steal my sleep from me.
Tossing and turning beneath the stars, I’ll wait til I burn out,
At night my brain is flooding and in daylight there’s a drought.
Lullaby myself with tears, wake up way too late,
Stuck as an insomniac, suicide’s sweet bait.
I wish I was an autumn leaf, I’d float into the sky,
And every fall I’d have the opportunity to die.
I don’t want to die, I just want to dream,
Instead of replaying my sick realities that make me want to scream.
But this will still all stay the same as my brain and blood run white,
I’ll feed myself with Satan’s sugar, the depressed primrose of the night.

Those moonrise eyes, that darling stare.
You could glare at me all day, I don’t even care.
Smile like violets, laughter like beer,
My head swims when you’re far away, scuba-dives when near.
Walk the streets of superficiality with me,
And we’ll roll our way downhill until we love ourselves to sleep.
I’ll love you straight to sleep.

One day you’re going to find someone
Who treats you like a rose found in the snow,
Who treats you like you’re the only place they will ever want to go.
They will always be there to lullaby you to Dreamland.
When you cry they’ll pick you up and slow-dance you back to smiles.
When you tell them of your dreams, they’ll chase after them for miles.
And they will build a nest for you inside their heart.
One day you’ll find them, and you can’t help but wonder, who?
Well, maybe, today that person is you.

Hedonist bloom,
Nurtured by the rays of pleasure.
Your heart is an ego,
Rooted in dark dirt.
You are what you are rooted in.
Karma will be your grave.

Daisies in hair, freckles in laugh,
Summer camp dandelions,
Bubbles in the air.
Cling like a koala to your back
So I can fight off the pirates
And the dinosaurs
And the giant squid
And my mother's meatloaf.
Where do teachers go at night?
Do they sleep in their classrooms?
This caterpillar is my new best friend.
But so is this firefly. But not that moth.
Roll down hill into mud puddles of chocolate goo.
Sing songs and jump on clouds like trampolines.
Mouth like an innocent firecracker; 3-2-1 blast off.
Kissed and tucked and loved into bed.
Dreaming of how good we're going to have it,
Not knowing that we already did.

Maybe we’re all just snowflakes; nothing more than crystallized water from above, doomed to finally land and melt into nothing. We are snowflakes, plowed and pushed by what is bigger so that we may be out of its way. We are all falling through a path fated from the start with a fluffy and slow descent, and an ending we all see coming. Thousands fall each minute, and each one is unique. But we’d never know if a snowflake four miles away is identical or not. Who could prove it? They tell us that is the truth, so we catch it on our tongues and swallow down the minuscule truth. We are snowflakes. And it makes me sad.

Lucky breather
Lucky dreamer
Smiling face above the water
Free-floating swimmer just letting flow
The water where the riptide goes
Ride the wave and taste the foam
Salty laughter tears hit home
Hold your breath, drift to the top
Instead of sinking like a rock
Not constricted in a pool
Smiling swimmer, laughing fool
If you fight the current you will drown
So you smile instead of frown
Let the tides pull you where they wish
Happy human like a fish
Wiggle your toes through the waves
Seeing silver-lining sea-storm saves
Lucky angel
Lucky seashell

singer singer
wedding ringer
kissing ducks and sitting ducks
waiting for the tires to screech
watching for the eggs to hatch
waiting for the gun to blow up
back in our faces
and the singe of powder will burn us up
and we'll die in fiery anguish
or maybe we'll be fine
the pond glimmers in the starlight
nature's nestle sings at night
and her heart beats out of her chest
into mine
and i sit and think to myself
of all planets i was born on
in all my lives i've lived
*******, how wonderful
is this

Pride is a devil but your wings say otherwise.
I have been black and have been golden.
It’s hard to judge which is which.
But now I’m neither good nor bad.
Windows into people’s souls are never clear glass.
The only thing transparent about you is your promises.
I’ve got your letters all in boxes, handwriting of a beautiful life.
Who am I to judge when my memories of you are in a grave?
Your actions sliced me up inside but your hands feel so nice.
I’m scared to be your friend again but I’ve grown a mountain’s spine.
Kissing turns to coughing, hopeful turns to helpless.
I was once a good girl. You were once a good boy.
Nobody ever remembers how the roses looked dying;
They remember them brilliant in a clear perfect vase.
For the past year, all I’ve had is those roses on my mind.
I’m right to be afraid, but instead I just feel freed.
Let this day ring inside my mind, I’m happy alone.

Blood of a blueberry gushing down with tears.
Simple song and a car ride, maybe I feel something.
Your textual messages arouse my soul.
I helped my dad **** the front garden and we found a praying mantis.
Babies go from hopscotch to jumping street lines.
Blue glitter nail polish on a white coffee table.
I made an alien out of Play-Doh yesterday.
Wanting has driven me insane.
Chapstick, skim milk, platypus, wooden door,
Tickle me until I cry.
I don't know what anything means,
Least of all, this poem.

I am going to bloom,
Whether or not you want me to.
Replanted by a heartbreak,
I no longer grow between your bones.
It hurts to taste such liberty,
Your heart is no longer my home.
Your blood's no longer my sunshine,
I am free to grow and grow and grow.
I will water myself with my own tears,
Photosynthesize my fears,
Turn darkness into sugar,
And grow and grow and grow.
I will bloom where I am planted,
Take in every ray of light,
Push my soul into my petals,
And grow and grow and grow.
I am going to bloom,
Whether or not I want to.
Because if you're not blooming,
You are withering.
I am going to bloom.

Just give me one more taste of your precious toxicity,
And, baby, we can medicate; we can love ourselves to sleep.
And in the morning we’ll be mourning, the clock will laugh its chime.
This was all at the wrong time, this was all wrong at this time.
And I’ll dance my pretty toes away, I’ll nibble on your ear,
Pretend we were never apart, our souls were always near.
I’ll cry my ******* eyes out as we sit on the bed,
Because it feels right on skin, in heart, but wicked in my head.
Deceptive, delicious, witchcraft in your eye,
In logic you’re the devil but your lips feel like the sky.
We can nightmare through the afternoon, smoke up right at dawn,
But from the haze of my twisted thoughts you’ll never be gone.
And though this is poison jail, I’ve never felt more free.
You are so bad for me; you are so bad for me.

You better ******* sprint your *** towards that exit sign,
And grab your god by the hair,
Because after a while everybody just nods and doesn't really listen,
And everybody's sorry but doesn't really care.
I'm so sad but I can't even care enough to cry,
For myself or for all my **** on my shoulders.
I may not carry the weight of the world but I carry the weight of mine,
And that's enough to bury me six feet under in emotions,
So that should tell you a little bit about me.
People stand around muttering about kids these days,
When we actually try really hard to be good people,
But they set up a world for us that never lets us win; or lets everybody win.
And that's why we smoke **** and get drunk so we can just be happy for a little while.
And that's why we cut ourselves; for trying our hardest but not succeeding.
We never feel like we are enough for anyone, not even ourselves.
Mom and Dad are slamming the back door screaming about grades,
And our friends pretend they give a **** when they don't.
People in black stand around crying about all the young people dying,
Because when your body's in a coffin, suddenly everybody is nodding and really listening,
And everybody is saying how sorry they are and actually meaning it.
Mom and Dad and all our friends can't stop sobbing how much they loved us.
I tried ******* sprinting for the exit sign so I could live a good life but there was too much in the way.
So I'll be in the bathtub carving my own exit sign, out of my wrists and razors.
I'll grab my god by the hair and scream in his face because I only got one chance at this,
And I didn't even get to live.

We’re rumbling like thunder, sky’s shot with purple blood,
I sing to you with roses and you ****** me with guns.
I cradle smoke inside my hands, you run away with drugs,
And when lights go down and we go high, all we have is love.
Watch the time with caution, for someday this will end,
And the past is round like the clock, mistakes come back again.
Drunken bruises, holding hands, what are the words to that song?
Me and my moonstruck valentine, so numb that we belong.
We can cry in the afternoon, but when midnight comes we’ll smile,
Just pretend we don’t remember and hangout for a while.
We’ll bicycle with monsters, the ones inside our heads,
And play these games until we’re too old, or gray, buried, and dead.

In deep raincloud days and the nights we can’t sleep,
I remember the night of July 15th.
In worlds we didn’t drift like sailboats at sea,
Under blankets it’s your arms that cradle me.
Maybe someday you’ll look into my eyes with love,
Like you used to, giving kisses instead of a shove.
Or maybe these chords will mean nothing someday,
As you go with the wind into a distant bay.
Sweet harbor, sweet harbor, fading with time.
I was lashed to your deck, and you tied to mine.
The sunshine was fleeting, the gray had been sent,
But it all changed so quickly, maybe it will again

Klementine Applemeyer knows ballet
And she says Jesus Christ lives down her street
I don’t believe her but she promises me
That she played him in Monopoly
And he cheated as the banker

Klementine Applemeyer knows how to jump rope
And she says it’s like escaping snakes in a jungle
I don’t believe her but she promises me
She explored the Amazon at age five
And next year she’s going again

Klementine Applemeyer knows how to French-kiss
And she says her daddy’s friend taught her
I don’t believe her but she promises me
His hair is purple and his feet are red
And his breath tasted like onions

Klementine Applemeyer knows how to time travel
And she says she met Vincent Van Gogh
I don’t believe her but she promises me
She took his ear and it’s in her desk drawer
And it’s in a little pink box

Klementine Applemeyer knows about Mr. Henry
And she says he felt her ******* after math
I don’t believe her but she promises me
He wore three rings
And his nails were bitten

Klementine Applemeyer knows how to throw up
And she says it makes her feel better
I don’t believe her but she promises me
Her gag reflex is strong
And her ******* is even stronger

Klementine Applemeyer knows how to roll a blunt
And she says it’s easier than ***
I don’t believe her but when I ask her
If it was her daddy’s friend again
She gets quiet

Klementine Applemeyer knows how to be generous
And she gave me her bike and Van Gogh’s ear
I don’t believe her but she promises me
My birthday has come early
And the ear is Vincent’s

Klementine Applemeyer slit her wrists in the bathtub
And a man with purple hair and red shoes was at the funeral
I didn’t believe her even when she told me
But there was an ear in the box, her neighbor was named Jesus Christ,
She had seen the Amazon, and Mr. Henry’s nails were bitten

Your muddy shoeprints are engraved into the carpets. And at night when I stare at the cracks in my ceiling, your soul is all I feel. All the watermarks on the coffee table remind me of your brown irises. The sky is gray, the ground is cold. In the living room, flowers are sprouting in pots, and his smile flips my frown. He’s growing, taking up space, a mere fraction of the space you hold. I miss your rumbly, sleepy groans, your thighs intertwined with mine. I hope the sun comes out soon, because it’s growing darker in here each day I live without love. I know she makes you happy, and it both makes me laugh and cry to know that. I hope you’ll understand someday just how much I loved you, when it all has faded like smoke into the summer air, and I walk in a white dress to a man who didn’t just rent my house, but bought it. But for now at night I lay with lonely legs and one heartbeat and tears in my eyes as salty and bitter as our handful of goodbyes. I wish you were here, and I wish you’d never come in the first place. Every day I check the weather, and I feed the boiler, and I do my best to stay warm without your body, but it never works. Teeth chatter while I count sheep, and I lie awake wondering why the sparks ever faded and why you can barely say my name anymore. Blood nourishes the ***** but not its treasures. Dogs bark and sleep folded in half, inside their little cottages. Where is mine, where is mine? I cover the roof and walls, with their creaks and faults, with convenient and daily tape; it’s holding it all together but isn’t healing it. The sheets are forming ice, and my head is forming thunder and snow. Darling, oh darling, why did you go? I swallow the medicine, I shovel the walkway, but I’m stuck in eternal January, with the front and back doors padlocked. This might just be a dead end street. Nobody wants the house with ***** rugs and splintered ceilings and ruined furniture; house for rent, house for sale. Somebody please just knock on my door. I want to float into the clouds like an angel, rising above it all not like a snow-capped mountain, but a green and grassy hill, rolling and free.

nineteen
cigarette burns
keep your chin up
because blood is only temporary
skin on skin
what is within
is butterfly wings
and your wings aren't clipped
like a bird's
they flow like poetic words
and f. scott fitzgerald taught me
how to be desperately in love
with what i can't have
or maybe i taught myself
great gatsby only broke
and probably not so great
smile so bright that you blind them
and the ghettos scream with light
because you might not win
but ****, will you learn

We used to intertwine like vines growing up a tree
Now the only thing that intertwines is this dark and me.
You’re tequila for my bones and braids, the starlet in my smoke,
This trick has got its grip on me; my song’s become a choke.
True love never fails and that’s my failure in the night
Marijuana medicine taken ‘fore twilight
Thoughts resurrect like zombies, grow between my veins,
Even when you’re absent you still keep me insane
Poetic, pathetic, diuretic, drain me of my blood
Mixing spit and hate and love until it becomes mud
Sheets of shame and guilt’s to blame for my empty heart
Foreclosed, alone, this isn’t poetry, this isn’t art
Eighteen and way too broken to be reckless and to care
Pull the trigger, shatter me, pull on my long dead hair
Scar-less little dream-catcher holding onto golden wings
Baby girl with bad dreams drinking up careless flings
I’m an alien with history just looking to get high
I prefer my world ******-up, on the rocks and extra dry.

White wooden frame
on a summer day
and Grandma is giggling
and the world is sitting right
and the axis is like a ballerina
graceful and gloriously smooth
and beautiful.
Your happy tears are a waterfall.
I was crying and praying,
wishing I could just sing
and now I'm smiling in my sleep
because even if things aren't okay
I know they will be;
graceful and gloriously smooth
and beautiful.

We spilled the medicine on the violin,
But it still plays, strings sticky with cherry.
And the bottle shakes in his hands,
"Please don't, please don't."
Teeth like pills digging into my neck.
She sat on the fence chewing bubblegum candy
He cries in ruins and the dog barks in circles.
Dandelion fluff in the sweet summer breeze,
He has her face in his locket smiling all day.
Weight straight on me, lips right on me.
My fingernails aren't painted like hers.
Her handwriting saved in his soul somewhere,
He loves me but he can still smell her in his skin.
"Please don't, please don't."
He pours the pills down the sink, fingers still shaking,
And the medicine spills onto the violin.
"I won't, I won't."
Its strings are sticky with cherry, but it still plays.
It still plays.

Legs on black shingles, sun-soaked black tar,
If I let them burn long enough, they will leave a scar.
Ripping out your handwriting, sewn into my skin,
You are stitches made of salt, you are a poor cheater’s win.
I will drink from the dreamboats , toxicity high,
Get so drunk on lust that I’ll hopefully die.
They say eighteen is cool, I’ve seen proof otherwise;
Seen more ******* and *******, less truth and more lies.
And as this year happens, I feel like I’m throwing up,
Trying to purge out the bad, I guess this is growing up.
Driving in the fog with no headlight on,
At my funeral, I’ll be singing this radio’s song.
Clink martini glasses filled to the brim with blood,
Cheers to unrequited dreams and our eternal love.

The frosted grass sparkles in the light of the night
Like a night you can’t get back.
Really Something with capital letters,
You were Really Something, and you said I was Something Else.
And it’s so stupid to even miss you on a Monday night
When you don’t give a ****, and neither should I.
And it’s absolutely insane for me to pick my brain
When I can’t fall asleep in bed, but I do it.
Singing along to a song we used to love,
Windows open in winter just to feel something that strong again.
The wheel is in my hands and the road is in my eyes,
All these memories and daydreams are crystallized
Into tears thanks to a lover who made me love like I never had before.
It’s sort of funny how one person can totally change your life,
Makes you wonder if it really is yours.

Out the cobweb front door,
She fell holding her baby.
A sweet young thing all wrapped up,
And an infant.
She asked me for a hand,
But I lost both of mine in the war.
So she asked for a foot,
But I am in a wheelchair.
So for a while we both sat and cried
Together, and cried for where we were stuck.
And the baby just smiled and looked at the sky,
While we waited for thunder and cried.

I am beautiful
and nobody
can take that
away from me
except for
myself.

Some people are born with Heaven in their souls,
And their eyes feel like God is smiling on your skin,
And their smile is like Sunday morning.
Their arms aren’t closed like the church doors,
And their fingers hum and harmonize with yours when they touch.
And each word they say zings up your spine,
And your breath quivers and your hands shake,
And your brain can’t calculate, can’t compute,
What you thought wonderful was before.
And sometimes they’ll be just like you and you can’t stop laughing,
And you wonder for a moment if anybody has ever thought you were so beautiful.
Their toenails are seashells and their minds are the ocean,
And you wish you could spend everyday at the beach.
And when you see them just living like everybody else,
You notice they aren’t like them at all.
Hallelujah.

We are the planet of flowers,
Kissing sunlight and eating up love,
Maybe this summer is what life is about,
Because everything could change.
The sky is pink and there is sand all over my toes,
My friend and I laughing with marijuana in our eyes.
Growing up to nineteen, praying it's better than eighteen,
You and I are just kids with too much art in our hearts
In a world where intelligence is only counted in test scores,
But **** them; we're smart. I'm bright as a star.
He's so coy and he makes me want to be more
Than I ever imagined I could be.
A brain turned me into a bitter pill, and now I take one to be happy.
Like a cell to a simple organism, I will unfold.
Freckled like my skin, dense as a bone,
Mountain-top shivers will guide me home.
I loved you, but now I love me more.

An orange glow and bright red teeth,
Oh, darling, won’t you sing me to sleep?
She drank her morning breakfast, Percocet and tea.
She played piano with bitten fingers, feet shaking underneath.
Her daddy taught her years ago, his bitten fingers touched those keys.
I should have beat him at his game, should’ve made them know this name.
She twinkled like a little star, lonely diamond in the sky,
Beautiful and woozy, not perfect like that Lucy.
She’s nothing special, **** sure not pure,
Thought she’d finally found her cure.
She wears those star-shaped sunglasses, knows she’s nothing good,
Smokes cigarettes and Mary-Jane, what are your demons, baby?
I’ll be your demon, baby.
Roof over her head is burning, eyes inside are ice,
She’s glacial and she’s tree bark, she’s a set of loaded dice.
I’ll finally beat him at his game; make that ****** know my name.
He’s gambling with danger, daddy dearest why’d you go?
Hung flowers across her bedroom walls, wilting brown and old.
She likes the smell of rotting, the sly slickness of mold.
Before she was glowing amber, now she’s those fading flowers.
Her lips are blue like the empty bottle on the table.
The TV’s on but only for static, she doesn’t believe in cable.
She didn’t believe in cable.
Just play the piano and please don’t call my mother,
The only friend I ever had besides you was my brother.
He ended up in prison, Father left years ago.
I should have beat him years go.
I should have done this years ago.
I loved you.

I might be a ghost and I don’t know myself anymore
But I’m pulling up the anchor that traps me
Because I refuse to let the scissors cut the finish line
It will be all me, my sweat and happy tears
Flying through that moment because I’ve won
And I won’t be a ghost anymore
I will love myself like I deserve
I will love you like you deserve
My heart will be humming like a beehive
I will be alive

I need my heels to be suspended overhead,
Someone to haunt my dreams, and hug me in my bed.
Let me go crazy for you, make me go cloudy-eyed,
For love ain’t deaf and it ain’t dumb, but it **** makes you blind.
I’m tired of the *******, show me someone real,
Who’s magical inside and out and reminds me how to feel.

I think there’s something beautiful in sobriety,
In the sense of sincerity, in the rawness of reality.
I believe in drunken bruises, I believe in drugged thoughts,
But I believe in this world more than either of those two.
If our reality is perception, than there must be more than one.
I believe in the influence of motivation,
And the intoxication of being in love, true love.
For kisses mean nothing when the why? isn’t solid,
And thoughts are nonsensical when the how? is cloudy.
I will sip my wine and I will smoke my blunt,
But, to me, awareness will always be greater than numbness,
And authenticity of the human heart and soul
Will always be more important than temporary happiness.

If you are down
on yourself
and all you see is flaws
and bad things
and you wonder why you are you
just remember that
all that glitters is not gold
and that stained glass is actually beautiful.

Do old trees cry
when widowed wives
finally leave?
Do they shiver
in their trunks and quake
in their leaves?
Do old trees cry
when old lovers
touch lips?
Do tears of sticky sap
roll down their bark
from their tips?
I swear I’ve seen an old tree
smile in the sun
and under the moonlight, sing.
Cracked in the middle, down the bark,
Broken-hearted, I swear I’ve seen
a tree dancing in the rolling wind.
I’m a weeping willow,
Rooted in my tears,
Watching life go by.
I would **** for wings,
but I wouldn’t have the courage,
to actually fly.