he reminds me of thunderstorms,
the way his voice soothes me to sleep,
the way his hands run down my body
like dew drops on a car window.
his humid breath on my neck,
sending chills up my spine.

one minute it's down-pouring,
the next minute there's nothing but the scent of stale rain.
a love that's screaming one moment,
and silent the next.

when the lightning between our body seizes,
the thunder in my mind begins.
i end days drenched in the rain of us,
and i'm catching a cold.

i want a love like sunny days,
all i've ever know is love in the rain.

NJ2015 [all rights reserved]

let's drink water out of wine-glasses
and pretend that airplanes are shooting stars.
let's count each passing minute
as another lucky moment spent together.

extravagance is a state-of-mind.

let me wear my thrift store ****-dress like an elegant ball gown,
and lead me to the grass-ballroom floor.

the grass stains will be proof that the night existed.
let's make dreaming reality, if only for the night.

i'm no cinderella, and the shoe may be the wrong size,
but your hand fits perfectly in mine, and we can still dance
barefoot on the grass floor,

-and that's perfectly alright.

-NJ2015 [all rights reserved]

these four walls know me better than anyone
and have learned how to tear me down
while standing tall.

i wish i could blame my troubles on this concrete prison,
but it's my skin that has held me captive all these years.
My throat aching with screams that have failed to escape,
my lungs heaving from the sobs i've tried to quiet,
and my hands shaking, scarred.

they say life is what you make it,
but they never tell you how to make it reality.
now i'm being torn apart by forces of who i am
and who the world wants me to be.

when i'm wrapped in my seemingly comfortable blankets,
nobody seems to realize that it's devouring me;
there's a tornado raging inside me,
but all they see is fumbled sheets.

i'm in the purgatory of reality and dreams,
and lately, it all just feels like a nightmare.

[N.J.2015] All Rights Reserved.

If it wasn't raining, were we really together?
I remember sitting in the backseat of your dads car with you for hours because I was allergic to cats, and your house was the safe haven for two of them. We drew pictures on the condensed windows and watched them slowly fade, we teased your friends through text messages, you let me into your world, and I was intrigued. It was the first time you ever held me in your arms, and I never wanted to move.

The next time I saw you we walked around town and found ourselves following a little path by the water. Our rumbling stomachs spoke more than we did, and when we decided to get food, the sky decided that we were probably thirsty half-way there. It poured. We ran all the way to the Muscle Maker Grill in a storm only to find that it was closed. I remember laughing, I remember the, 'you've got to be kidding's' I remember settling for the little corner store all the way by your house. You bought me my favourite Italian Cookies, you got yourself a sandwich.. I remember you complaining about having to pick out the bread and give it to them because it was their job. I remember sitting on your front steps eating our "lunch." We talked about the squirrels, and how they do things they don't want to do. How though the squirrel wants the nut, he can't reach it, and he must leave it. We spoke about us in metaphors. You told me you wanted me back, you told me you could never do that. I told you I'd never stop trying.

I also remember the night you walked with me to my aunts house because I was too scared to walk alone. You told me that nothing would happen to me, and if anything were, we would go down together. You never made me feel wrong for being so nervous -you didn't understand, but you never made me feel bad. It rained on my way home that night.

The next time I saw you was a year later. Your house was knocked down and remodeled. Your cat had decided to make a home within your neighbors house during that period. I saw you dad outside, you saw me through the window - I was nervous. Sitting on your couch, I watched you connect the wireless music for your guardians -your aunt kept complimenting you, trying to get any sight reaction out of me to see what we actually were. I've never known what we were.

I remember the first time I went to dinner with you, your father, and your aunt at Green Dragon. I enjoyed it although they found my diet and my lack of appetite a little odd. And they asked me questions about college that I was a little nervous to answer. I remember the bought us gum, and then departed to the 99 cent store. They expected us to kiss. We didn't. I wanted to. I think. By the time they came back, the windows were drenched in raindrops.

Anyway, the day I went over your house was the day you let me leave carelessly. We spent hours together -talking at Strawberry Fields, walking down the little path, watching the ocean, making sandwiches in your kitchen, showing me around your house -visiting your bedroom. I will never forget how we hugged when saying goodbye and I said, "don't be a stranger," and you said "bye."

You told me you were indifferent about me -couldn't care whether or not we kept in touch. So I said goodbye. But I still think about you sometimes. You were the first boy I swore I loved, and maybe I have a different definition now, but by god, I loved you with my whole heart, even though through the years all you did was break it apart. It didn't rain that day.

I still miss you sometimes. Still wonder about you. And wonder if you wonder about me too. How is it that you held my heart and crushed it without even straining a muscle?

It doesn't rain much anymore in the dingy old town.
[NJ2015] All Rights Reserved.

a work in progress.

A year ago, I could’ve sworn that I loved a boy so much I would do anything for him. Today, I’m not sure I have ever loved anyone at all, and if it’s any comfort, to you at all, you’ve helped me with that.

He was the kind of guy who would listen to me speak, or at least pretend to. He would find out what made my eyes brighten. He made me feel like the Northern Star, which was kind of a big deal considering my body was the endless night that I seemed to get lost in time and time again. Today, I realize the problem is that he never knew what stars looked like, sure, he had an idea, but he had never seen one, and to be quite honest, neither had I, or have I for that matter. Living in the city has its perks, but being able to see the stars isn’t one of them. They say the city never sleeps, neither did he, and neither did the polluting lights of the 24 hours casinos and clubs. I may have felt like a star, but looking back, I was only the reflecting glass of a strobe light.

I never thought I’d be strong enough to let him go, but after five years, I did. I have you to thank for that. There’s only so many times you can look at an airplane and convince yourself that it’s a shooting star. Like the Big Apple, I can say I’ve moved on.

You’re the first boy I’ve ever touched, kissed, embraced. You’re the sun that rose after a long night of me screaming into my pillow that it was the end, and that I would never wake up from a certain reoccurring nightmare. I never thought I would see light sprinkle through my curtains, never thought I would emotionally attach myself to another airplane embodiment again.

People are inconsistent; nothing ever remains the same, nor does it ever stay in one place, and I had sworn the moment I left the city that I would never again settle. I guess I didn’t realize that boarding endless airplanes had strapped me to the sky. I was still tied down, just differently.

The moment I met you, I had a feeling it wouldn’t be the last time. The way your blonde hair fell over half of your forehead, how you walked into the gymnasium with a sort of ‘i can care less’ attitude. I don’t know what it was, but I knew you were an adventure I just had to attempt.

Each adventure is different; you’re far different from the amateur astrologer I had left in the next state. He spent time making maps; trying to figure out my thought process; how to understand my constellations, and how to tear them apart. You were a painter; an artist; more interested in the curves and lines of my body, the hue of my eyes, the colour of my laughter amongst the rest of the crowd. You taught me how to use my tongue as a paintbrush, and my hands as blending tools; you placed your hand in mine and make me think that you and I were a blank canvas that we would construct together.

Months have taught me that art is never really finished. Our canvas is a mess of us; my distinctive colour against yours. I was always carving straight lines, while you were painting crooked lines. You and I are following different strokes, but your edges and my surface seem to create a picture unlike any other. They say art is something that can not be defined, and I am torn between trying to decide whether we’ve built a masterpiece or something that will end up hung on a parents refrigerator. But then again, what’s wrong with that?

He was an astronomer, you’re a painter, and I’m unsure. I’m not quite sure who I am; sometimes I feel like laying in the grass and taking a ride on Camelopardalis or sitting in the hammock of the Great Dipper; other days I feel like painting pink on lover’s cheeks, and digging my nails in the bare canvas. And some days, I want to do nothing but lay in my room and dream of a future that nobody seems to understand; what am I supposed to do when I see myself sitting under a countryside sky on a wooden porch holding the stained hands of a boy who I swore could never love me.

Maybe I’m not really the Northern Star. Maybe I’m not the Mona Lisa. But more than often it’s blind leading the blind, and I’m sorry. I’m not sure where my mind is anymore. I’m not sure of anything, except that my eyes are painted with your reflection. Maybe that’s art. Maybe, it’s not.

© NJ  2015, all rights reserved

every-time we're in his room i forget to take my water-bottles along with me. if water-bottles were of any value, he would have a million dollar collection. he's the first boy i've ever made direct eye-contact with intentionally - i'm not sure if he's noticed, but it's become more of a synonym for 'kiss me please' than anything else. sometimes he catches the hint.

if i want his attention, all i have to do is pick up my phone -he seems to notice that even when his ears are deafened by the media on his laptop screen. i speak more with my eyes than my mouth - often my eyes will be closed if i'm disinterested; i'd rather create my own little world and enjoy it than destroy what he's enjoying at the moment. so i stay quiet. so i close my eyes. he thinks i fall asleep a lot.

when i want him to hold me i inch away, he always seems to pull me back in, and i never really say what i mean to, i just slow down my pronunciation. i run my fingers down his spine when i'm thinking about making out with him, and sometimes, i say 'i love you,' but like i said, i don't tend to speak much. i say it with my eyes. he never notices. i think i like it that way.


[NJ2015] [All Rights Reserved]

Don't you understand? I'm the careful girl who sets her alarm three hours early to guarantee she won't be late. I'm the girl who's scared to use boxed hair dye because there's that one percent chance of a fatal reaction. I'm the girl who gets sick every morning because anxiety tells me that I "might mess up something today." I'm the girl who reads the fine print, the terms and conditions, because one time I didn't, and I got hurt.

You're the boy who see's terms and conditions as guidelines. The boy who drinks every-night because though it's drowning your liver, it's also helping to haze your vision to the flipping pages of the calendar. The day's won't slow down, but your comprehension of it can -and you can live each-night like it's endless. It's harmful comfort has you addicted. A lazy Sunday night is a day wasted; responsibility and real life has never left you feeling as triumphant as that seventh shot of *****. You welcome chaos because it keeps your mind from straying.

Recklessness has a fault, and it's love. Your heart is a liquor bottle that was indulged and tossed to the side by girls too drunk to understand that glass breaks. And glass cuts.

I always read ingredients before I consume, but my tired eyes skimmed, and my heavy heart begged, and so I downed a glass of you. So now here I am, the careful girl, and here you are, the reckless boy, caught in one world that's both hazy and precise.

I'm trying to handle you with care. but you're screaming that there may not be a tomorrow. I've read your terms and conditions. but experience and knowledge are two separate things my naive brain hadn't yet learned at the time. There's more to words than bold letters -there's more to you than bottles and messy hair.

There's a careful girl holding a full bottle of fine wine deciding whether or not to open and down it, or place it in a cabinet to gain value. Thinking that maybe a few sips wouldn't hurt. And who knows if they did? She can't remember.

[NJ2016] All Rights Reserved.