his scalp
is stitched
with the odor
of shampoo
and
***** secrets
and god
i have never
wanted to wash
my
hair more

i watched the rain.
admired how quickly
i saw the plants
smile with green.
i wondered what
i would like
if i watered
myself in what
i need to grow.

i am two hands
waving at all the passengers
12 bands of colors
melting off my face
spilling over the seconds
archangel symphonies
playing in all the wrong places
at all the right times

my magnificent mind
has always been a gift
i am in a mystic world
filled with
lively green plants
coated with flower petals
it rained today
mother nature was sad
her and i always feel the same
a twisted funnel in our thick vines
of hair
heartache
because our earth was neglected
the wicked oder from the ocean stamps
our noses with the ink of the
red tide
an ocean of fear
the wave caps curl and burry the dead
pure envy
death is not a place
death is other people
a shoreline of psychedelic tragedy
sand castle graves
lathered in sea salt lotion
overstimulated side effects
my mother gave me the buried treasure
a chest filled with another dimension
built by her daughter
secret garden goddess
of dreams and spirituality
she gave me the key to her soul
threw the honor of mother natures
name and plant aroma
a throne of
leafs and seashell gems
skin of the earth
healing hands of garden therapy
i am my mothers daughter
i will kiss her with
cactus goo lips
as she fills my soul
with mother natures
aura
for
amara

full moon,
college kids **** kegs,
wallflowers paint
red ocean baptisms.

i have so much anger
too much to even think about
yet alone deal with
i am rage
firecracker
burning at my fingertips
that cannot stop
shaking
i have never felt so alone
but yet surrounded by people
i feel like i have been swimming
in a tunnel
and i have no idea how to float here
no idea how to
breathe
on this planet
it’s the most natural thing to do
except i don’t know how to
hold my lips together and inhale
i don’t know how to open my mouth
and exhale
i have no clue how to forget
my brain is scared with your
hateful lies and mistakes that happen too often to be called mistakes
madness is a maze in my head
and i don’t think i even wanna complete the puzzle
there will always be too many pieces to put together because there’s so many lies that have been told
too much hope
melting off of my body
too long of a tunnel to swim through

my mama always told me i would be just like her
and for some of you that's an honor
but my mama was different
oh baby you look just like your daddy
cool i look a felon
i see your attitude Niesha
it's just like mine
mama i don't want this rage
i don't want to be called your "white girl"
i didn't mean it like that Niesha
what i meant was you act "white"
mama i didn't know using manners
were the qualifications of a "white girl"
i didn't know 7 year old hands were meant to change diapers
and cook ramen
on the stove
mama what if i burn myself
draining the water
Niesha i don't know who
you're raising your voice at
this isn't your
grandmas house
no mama
i didn't mean it like that
please don't get the belt
don't cry Niesha
ill do it again
betty boop comforters
covering the welts of the
"white girl"
but i knew i needed to cover
my sister
two twin beds pushed together
separated by gray stained sheets
here Charlaye
this blanket is for you baby
Niesha get the kids ready for school
you're gonna be late
Officially Missing You by Tamia
blares in our ebony scented home
she told me never to bring ivory
in the house
mama i can’t help it
can i have braids like the other girls
Niesha you aren’t black
no mama i just want braids
i didn’t know only black girls could have braids
mama i thought i was black
flash forward
9 year old girl
woken by police sirens
man do i love the
colors
red and blue
mama they don’t have a warrant
don’t let them in
flashlights burning me and my sisters eyes
where’s the man that beat your mama
mama are you okay
her front teeth missing
now filled with a golden grill
he will never steal from us again
“white girl”
are you okay mama
Niesha get out of my face
i just wanted to see if you were okay mama
go outside and play with your cousins
no mama i don’t like them
don’t you say no to me Niesha
9 year old body bordered with bruises from boys with my blood
DONT TOUCH ME THERE TIQUECE
i didn’t know your 13 year old
hands were meant to touch
the hidden secrets under
my little pony *******
it’s okay Nie Nie
they do this in the movies
TY I don’t want to be
an actress
in your movie
DONT TOUCH ME THERE
TIQUECE
my mama always told me i would be just like her
mama i don’t wanna have an ultrasound on my swollen belly at age 15
i don’t want to spend my 16th
birthday in a mortant plate hospital room
filled with “it’s a girl” birthday balloons
but guess what mama this
“white girl”
made it past April 8th 2016
and i blew out my own
birthday candles and i wasn’t in
a hospital room.

I envy the flower of life.
Where bodies and souls become one.
A stem of youth radiates the sour taste of masculinity
And the pulsing touch of femininity.
The burnt orange *** organs
Collide into a bombshell mandrake in full bloom.
His stamen jitters as,
Her petals caress the roots in lullabies.
This is
an explosion of life that meets
at the sacred sun.
Universals become one, at the bottom of their flower.
Her womb is coated in leaves.
They are burning bodies birthing
More flowers that will shed
This addictive energy.
Fiery sparks crackle at the pistil of the bombshell
Planted where the sun shines day and night
The lovers tend to the mandrake.
The flower of life baptized in infinite rebirth.

my body is thick like a tree trunk. the leaves that cling on are the hairs the razor missed last night. the branches are my arms that are becoming weak like sticks every day because i can't bench more than the bar. my body is a home where i  used to leave the door wide open and now it's slammed shut with a padlock but that's not enough to keep the hatred from coming in. my body says you need dresser drawers, bed frames,chairs,couches to keep that door from ever opening again. my body is a sanctuary filled with "likes and ums" because my tounge ran out of locutions a long time ago. my body is an algebra 1 class i've learned to hate. learned like it was something i had to practice perfectly. like it was some sort of equation and i finally solved it. my body is a landfill that can't seem to make it to the home depot to buy soil to cover up the stretch marks, the scars,the bumps from the razor, the cellulite that aligns every inch of my thighs,all of these deficiencies are waste that are crumbling into the dirt. my body is a thrift store that only sells baggy mom jeans and asthetic sweaters but that's never been enough to please my closet. my body is april 8th a birthday full of craziness. my body said try not eating. neglected . deprived from any nutrients. i was pleased when a cool droplet of water  slid down my throat making me feel like antarctica was at my fingertips. i let my cheek bones narrow in. let my hip bones stab every person i embraced. bringing them in just so i could feel accomplished for proving there was something under the fat. letting my lips crinkle and turn a light purple not even chap stick was enough to save them. my body is a broken heart, glass shards skewered like shesh kebabs in my aorta. squirting out the barbarous memories of you. ripping me into pieces and burying me in a place i didn't know existed. my body is an hourglass that's always seems to run out of time but my body isn't skinny in the middle. the sand inside is my weathered down dreams that i've yet to succeed it always seems to get stuck in the middle and i fill it up with more sand that gets stuck in the middle and it all just ends up in my stomach making me want to ***** up everything i ate that day but i don't have the strength to put my finger down my throat. i don't have the strength to put up this fight. i'm using my long nails to gut my mouth open like a cantaloupe **** every taste bud and then i'll never know the difference between celery and candy.

i've always waited for you
i'm still waiting for you
not my eyes but my heart
searches for you in dark hallway's
because you are the only one who makes me feel safe
i've been undercover for a while now
hiding parts of me
that you soon unraveled
just the thought of you
feeds my soul
your language
fuels my brain
your first kiss planted my seed
you are helping me bloom every day
you are sunlight
and
i am rain
we fit hand-in-hand
your voice deep like the ocean
your touch soft like sand
I am your sand
I am the weather down rocks and
minerals crumbling to make your sand
I came to you
arms hanging
legs limp
lips crinkled
eyes puffy
heart broken
you took me in full embrace
you didn't mend me
you melted me
baby I feel warm
you are the best thing in every room
you are poetry I love to write

the old woman
scrambles an egg,
the man at the corner
fries his brain.

it's 1am i shattered
i'm loosing parts of me i didn't know existed
my chest feels empty and bruised
my stomach is no longer a stomach
but a concave hole
filled with catipllars crawling around beginning to form a cocoon of anxiety

you know it's bad when your boyfriend says good job after the rice from the crooked crock *** slips off the silver spoon into your cotton mouth
brushing my teeth over and over
to let the mint overlap the guilt
when you can feel your insides becoming one because they can't stop eating eachother
when cuticles crack
when nails are no longer nails
but nubs
when the once thick curly hair
is now patches lying on the bathroom floor
satisfaction isn't even real to me anymore
i don't the difference between
sweet and savory
because all i can think about is the clanking of silver spoons
leading to acidic
bathroom visits
it's a feeling of relief when
my belly is empty
and the only thing
i can feel is the cool water
slipping into a
well of mistfortune
the panic attacks are real
and at their worse.  
i've never felt this way before
i know i'm depressed that's been
scribbled down on the therapists
paper for years now
but this
this here is a different feeling
this is rage
this is digging my nails
into my carmel skin at 4am
because the razor
is too far away
i cant count the number of times
i've carved a 4 into my legs
it's gotten bad
he's pulling my hands away from my hands so i can't pinch them anymore
but baby i cant stop
i'm just gonna pinch
your hands
this isn’t a panic attack
this is called i can't control myself
this is pulling patches of hair out
because physical pain feels 100 times better than the heaving in my chest

i want to write this poem
except i don't have words
i just have feelings
feelings that i have not
aloud myself to feel

do you know what it's like to have a pit in your heart? i can feel it right now i can hear gymnopiede playing in the back ground filling me with a sanity but not enough remember what Rupi said " it was when i stopped searching for home within others and lifted the foundations of home within myself i found there are no roots more intimate than those between a mind and body that have decided to be whole" but instead i fall in love w the little things that i mold into big things to make myself feel important. when people see that i'm stressed and deprived of sleep and love i feel significant to their daily lives.
i want to be the rose in the garden that everyone wants to tend so they can revive the gold medal for the best green thumb. i want to be the bookmark of every bibliophile on the planet but little do they know that rose wants to die that's rose has thorns inside poking her every hope. rose hopes for love but not just any love. rose hopes that a dandelion will come who will be intelligent enough to pull the thorns out and so beautiful she will gasp for another breath just to see their petals. on weekends rose absorbs enough sunlight to get up for work. she tends to the clothing at the retail stop at the local mall and as she folds the endless piles of destroyed denim she admires the many flowers that tend to one another.she can smell the scent of the flickering candles upstairs and she makes her way up to the candle shop on her break she never sets foot inside, she worries the flicker of the flame will catch her petals. rose doesn't want to be alone when it happens she wants a dandelion to come and save her from the flame she wants dandelion to roar as loud as he can and blow the flame out. and be there ready to sweep rose off her stem. rose wants everyone to be happy she try's her hardest to make sure her garden has enough light and water and that everyone's petals aren't frowning. rose has tried too hard she ends up being the loneliness one her garden. she returns to her shop after break she goes back to folding the same endless pile of denim and she admires the buttercup walking with the california poppy looking at the lights hanging from the ceiling. the dutch iris and the crocus intertwining their petals. honesty and honeysuckle are pursing the petals together under the mistletoe. rose gathers her tools and makes her way to her wheel barrow parked by the restrauants she passes the children frolicking in the lot and she catches the heart beat of excitement of the little girl who's eyes are glued to the ipad that is playing alice and wonderland and rose can hear the garden scene and she cringes and feels like she's been swallowed by a world who doesn't know what passion is. rose wonders where the little girls mother is and she catches her mother sitting on the lap of the magnolia and she longs to be a mother but a mother who watches alice in wonderland with her child and frolics with her kids in the parking lot but pays attention to the cars coming just in case her motherly instincts have to kick in.
rose returns to her garden and flips thru the channels hoping to find a romance movie on. rose does this to her self. she absorbs her self into all the love she can get because deep downside she fears she will never find her dandelion. rose finds her self drowning in an ocean of tears. she crys out to the garden are my petals not light enough? is my stem to thick?. rose wants to dig herself a grave and burry herself there with the fake petals of a dandelion so that one day when the walkers in the cemetery hear the clanking of her stem crying out for love they will dig her up and see how much she coveted the love of a dandelion and they will find the real petals and place them next to her.  rose will tear honey because that's the sweetest thing she knows she will wipe her tears and lick the honey off of her petals. rose doesn't want to hide in her sunken city of petals she wants to tell you who she is. hello i am rose.
i've been trying to get rid of the file cabinets in my brain that i have been organized alphabetically. A- aster i love you and i promise your prayers for a new kidney will be granted. B- bleeding heart i want you to know i will drive you in wheel barrow to the hospital so you
can be sewed up. C- carnation please don't fret the world loves you and im so sorry you have a price tag that will eventually be ripped off when the children at the elementary school down the street buy you on february 14th just know that you're so much more to me than a valentine's day gift. D- daffodil you're too precious to feel unwanted your lover will come soon.i can hear the crys of them but please go back to the bed and sleep. i'm able to open my pedals up and hear the weeping of a dandelion "thank you for being there for them and just know i've been hear all along, rose. you're tired i can tell by the wrinkles of your palms please promise me rose that you will baptize yourself into the ocean of love that you keep drowning in. " rose pulls the dead roots that are pinning her down in her grave and gasps for another breath to see dandelion before the roots come back from under and tug her back down she is able to string her broken english together and whisper " dandelion i already have"

i woke up one morning
it was the first morning
i could breathe
i mean really breathe
my lungs open wide
inhaling the aroma
from my petals
lavender sprigs dancing
along my arms and legs
i seized the day
i learned to live and not exist
i created a list
i triple dog dared myself to
do the things i love
every day i worshiped one
thing i loved about myself
i added it to the list
and put that **** to the test
i screamed my name
said universe im here whats next
the stars beamed
shooting fireballs
across the moondust sky
flames ignited energy
pumping through my veins
i am their beacon of light
i closed my eyes
my body and mind became
one
a fountain of youth
in the center of my heart was
born

angry is me
she her hers
yelling
pulling patches of curls out
that i was blessed with
why am i destroying
my blessings
angry is more than an emotion to me
its an action
i grew my nails out
so i could carve
the pain into my skin
my scrapes glisten
like my glitter poetry pens
it’s not a
sin
**** i wish i had that bottle of
gin

i remember the boy
who told me
"wow you look great,
you used to not have a neck"
his words sliced through my throat
like mirror glass
i could not let out a cry
but now i will
let out at roar
that will shake his cruelty
out of his bones.

i used to be afraid of dying
but now i am terrified of living
people are terrifying too
but yet so resilient
i have no idea how to be around people without wanting to run away and hide
forever
i am the most sad and the most content
when i am
alone
my hands repetitively shake almost as repetitively as i write about them shaking
i am a garden who used to be planted with a line of beautiful
fruits and vegetables
but now my plants are rotting
almost like me
i am so hurt and broken
that i don’t think my garden will ever blossom again

why is it that womanhood is so vile? people bash our bodies opening us up like watermelons to see how sweet we are inside. squeezing our dreams and hopes like oranges into a glass cup. i think you are threatened of our bodies sweetness. threatened of our anger. get used to it. we are every fruit you wish you could pick from the tree. when our trees shed leaves you run because god for bid my ovaries drop an egg  and my legs split like a canyon with a sanguine river flowing for a week. you get down on your knees begging for our bodies s so long that when you stand your ankles crack like the noise i make on my way up the stairs from the night shift. i let my spine arch on the bed creating an invisible hill that you will try to climb. we are becoming stronger by learning not to brush off the  cruel cat calls you make when we walk by but instead we lift our middle fingers and tell you to woman up. tell you to grow some ******* ovaries because let's face it your ***** will never mount our courage. no it's not that i don't think you are strong but i know you need to change the way you speak to women. stop calling us a ***** just because we won't send you nudes. not even the pics we found on google of the old wrinkly breast. stop shaming me with my body parts. stop saying that's gay why the **** is something weird gay. do you remember when i said you are threatened of our anger no baby this is rage this is something i don't like to wear its like a heavy winter coat that clings to my sweaty carmel skin during florida winters.  but don't be threatened of our sweetness we are honeycombs. our kisses are golden yellow and thick. we love the feeling of our honey dripping on your lips.  we want  you to covet our thoughts not our thighs. take in our cellulite like oxygen but not until you learn to march with us and fight for our basic human rights and show pride for us when we wear our flowly skirts and tight jeans because don't you dare say my lacy bralette was asking for it. if you understand now hit pause now and take a stroll over to the orange groves and peel back our thick layers of glory and now now baby you can taste our royalty

i wonder
how i can be
both happy and
absolutely petrified
to fall in love

i said i wouldn’t write about
anxiety
told myself that it was over
tucked in the treasure chest
and threw the key
in to outer space
because i just wanted
to make some
******* space
told myself that anxiety belongs on a
planet of pure
vacancy
vast open with a welcome mat that
says
welcome
but its funny
because i never said thank you
in the first place
allowed my tree trunk to split open
and let you water the roots inside me
because i told myself i would grow
when you turned on the water hose
my roots shot up
they were thirsty
this was always the scary part
never wanted my roots to grow leaves
to plant seeds
at least
not for a while
i take daily trips
tripping over the cucumbers and watermelons in the garden
hoping to find someone to tell me
what’s wrong with me
tell me why i keep finding bruises
because she thinks it’s low blood sugar
tells me to stick my arm in the
cylinder of results
glued down in all pharmacies
i tell her this pharmaceutical ******* has got to go
i ask the chrysanthemums
how come when i drive my body shakes
and i can feel my foot on the peddle wobbling
no one in the car feels it but me
the gas peddle keeps jumping under my feet like a jack in a box
told it to chill the **** out
this isn’t a nursery
this is 2am showers to rinse the hate of the world off of my body
or the fake hate for you
fruits of eden dangling like
ornaments
on a burning christmas tree
i am the burning christmas tree
people decorating me with jesus popsicle sticks
hiding all of me with glass shaped memories
my sticky branches and pine scent has never been enough
welcomed you home with aroma
as strong as
your hands during bickering
i lit the mohnagny teakwood candle
watched the hot wax spill
and melt a mount
on the dinner table
figured why not make this a forest fire
of truth
burn all the lies
while my carmel skin clings to
my brittle bones trying to
keep them warm as i
continue to shake
in the timeout corner
but then i remember i said
i wouldn’t write about
anxiety

You dipped your fingers in the honey ***.
Your rose lips dripped thick.
You squirmed with sweetness
You knew this hive was yours.

if you leave,
leave tenderly.
wiggle yourself
out of these roots.
don't say goodbye to
my flowers,
they have already
lost enough petals.

give me your hands
let me lather them with love
plant me in the rich soil
i promise the flowers
want me to grow with them
they told me
they told you?
i closed my eyes
took deep breaths
the gardenias climbed out of the garden
their petals molded
a flower crown around my head
my curls bounced with bliss
frolicking with the flowers in my soul
this is a garden music festival
where else would i want to
spend my saturday morning
my toes twirling
through the meadow
dancing through death
this is a lovely mess
my mother cried when i left the nest
she got a tattoo for her flower child
mama dont stress
im thriving with nature
im blessed

i’ve never been here before
come, i want to show you
this place
there’s one rule,
to believe.

water swirls in the bottom of my belly. my words grow legs and dance on my tongue and begin spilling out of my mouth only leaving an echo because you didn't respond. i let you take pieces of me i didnt know i had.  i am a dice you role every morning on a game board. wether the number is 1,2,3,4,5,6 they all still stand for "hurt her". rip her heart out and throw it on the ground. pick it up. drop it again. kick it. and she'll pick it up the next morning. and ill hurt her again. ill hurt again. ill do it again. if you leave. hold me tight one more time. stamp your kisses on every inch of me. ill leave the music on to swallow the silence. ill leave the door open wide. just in case you come back. just in case i can't open the door again. my limbs are limp. my head is swarming with bumble bees. their buzz sounds just like your ring when you text me. i let the bees in because lets face it my heart still jumps out of its cage and walks around looking for you. i hear the creek on the 4th step of the staircase and my speakers blare "wait" by M83, praying you turn around. i begin to go places that remind me of you. this is the type of pain that feels nice. this is the type of pain that i'm already feeling and you haven't even left yet. you're my daily dose of psuedo happy pills. you're 4am thoughts that itch at my scalp, begging to be written down. i am kitchen utensils. used daily. but left in the sink until someone else comes to wash me off. until someone else comes to ask if i am okay. until i come and throw the dice away. ill still be a game you'll always want to play because you have me figured out. you know all the corners to cut. all the cards to take from the pile and hide until the very end. until then i'm just a list of untils. and that will be the end of me. until.

a healthy relationship is not feeling like an ingredient you're not an add on into the measuring cup you're the final meal. the what he should've been waiting for the whole time. you're the scent from the oven that is so warm you feel like you're the sun. you're the sun. you're an endless glow a radiance burning every ounce of negativity. love is when you don't want to go places without them. it's seeing the world together. it's the pain you feel when you aren't together. it's the heaving in your chest when you leave their house at night because god walking out of the green door of apartment 16 feels like you're sloshing through the misty graveyard filled with forgotten skeletons rattling their fingers in the unfertilized soil praying the ghost of harmony shovels them out of the polluted flowered dirt. it's because i love you that my journal is filled with endless metaphors for you. it's no sleep without a goodnight kiss. it's going to our favorite diner every friday. it's filling your bedroom with tye dye balloons as a pre birthday surprise. it's the feeling of worth when you tell me that i'm going to change the world. that my poetry will take me out of this forsaken city. don't you get it? you are all i have. you're the soil that my flower stem dances on. you're the sun and without photosynthesis my flowers would never grow. i've buried myself in you. i gave you my days that i cannot take back. i gave you time that cannot be rest. i gave you red lipped kisses that cannot be unstained. i gave you my poetry that cannot be unwritten. god i would never wish for your brown sugar skin to be unwritten. i keep giving and giving and realizing that i will never ask for anything back. and when the earth has decided it's my time to go and the roots are dragged from underneath me i want you to write to my eulogy. because i love you, i could never imagine writing yours.

the universe never promised
your journey would be easy
but it gave you life because
it believes you are strong enough to live it.
so take a deep breath and listen
to all the answers you have been searching for
they are all waiting within you.
you just have to listen...

i’ve been shuffling through
the flowers and sand
almost like he shuffled through my body
almost like she shuffled through my journal
the suns been beating on my skin
filling me with soul
men ripping away my self respect
violating my body
forcing the imprint of other woman in me
i feel absolutely ******* disgusting
a concoction of distrust and rage and
pure
confusion
and no i don’t think it’s wrong that the only time i feel like the woman i truly am is when i’m overstimulated
my mind is fully open with a vibrant view of mother nature’s world
built on stilts of the sea of trees
plants open wide with laughter as the sun blankets them with warmth

a mapquest
of stretch of marks
across my belly.
i am connecting the dots
until i learn to
love this destination,
all the way home.

i've let the empty hallow of trust scream with lies confronting the empty side of my bed but for some reason we are always in your bed. self worth isn't even real to me i loss that back in 9th grade, it starts when someone recognizes you when they tuck forgotten secrets behind your ears because they want to make you feel good for a moment they want you to feel special they what you to give them something special. and when you get off of your knees and wipe the leftovers of carpet duss out of the ridged burn in your legs the once charming soul drops you and you fall like a loose beaded friendship bracelet and the pinks yellows greens blue oranges and purples are scattered on the floor lying in salty stained puddles from last night that's when it leaves you. that's when self respect creeps it's way out of the back door and tosses the key into a forest of death. i've searched for it. but i can't find it i don't want to find it shouldn't i want to find it. when hands caress your scalp and lips whisper i love you more and phones buzz filled with emoticon script and it's not from you. you walk out the back door. you leave it open and tear down doors of time.  picking up dewy leaves hoping that there shine is really the silver key to green door of apartment 16. i'm ready to find my self worth. i'm ready to pull the lump out of my throat and kiss this bruise goodnight i'm ready to dive into my poetry the way you dived into me like a four course meal. there will be no forks at this party, no napkins to wipe the leftovers off your lips, no drink to wash away the taste of emptiness. you need to feel it you need to know what it's like to sit at the diner on main street alone and drink two mugs of hot chocolate while checking find my friends. no i'm not crazy but you've given me ever right to be. i've buried myself in you. i gave you days that i cannot take back i gave you time that cannot be reset  i gave you red lipped kisses that cannot be unstained, i gave you my poetry, your new wrestling shoes valued at the price of $180, i gave you my nights and i gave you my goodmornings. all i did was give and you kept taking and didn't even realize i was giving. it didn't take me long to notice but i stayed **** it i stayed because you and me were supposed to be something we are supposed to go places and the only place i see myself going is to the psychiatric because the pill bottle keeps rattling in my hands and i'm finally strong enough to pop the lid off. i'm strong enough to let 57 capsules slide down my pink tough in strong enough to swallow the pain and once i swallow there will be no more pain. there will be no more lonely dinner visits, no poetry, no wrestling shoes, no goodmorning texts, no more chattering teeth, no studering knee claps, no clanking of silver forks, no paper cuts from clean napkins  because i've lossed everything. i can't give no more. and you can't take nothing from me except the wooden chair who's legs dig in to the green grass where my casket lies.

She has looked over balconies,
Her glossy eyes-catching
Glimpses of all the daddy’s girls.
She has watched men plaster
Supermodels on billboards.
Their skin and bones smell of ivory.
I have seen her in the mirror.

She has ripped the ebony off her skin
Like her ancestors did not die for this.
The media has placed price tags
On her body as if the scale did not
Tell her, her worth this morning.
He gutted her out like a grapefruit, left her with nothing.
I have seen her in the mirror.

She crawled to the bathroom,
Turned on the water.
Sinking into the dark pool of self-hate.
Killed her with chemical criticism.
Her skin and bones taste of honey.
I have seen her in the mirror.

i quite literally am
fatigued
falling in love with him is exhausting
he is soft skin
my cheeks foaming into his neck
i know it sounds pleasant
i mean we both love ranch
ranch lovers
bent over backwards
you are breaking my spine
i hate living here
the air does not tase as good
the plants are beautiful
but i want a new energy source
a nature i haven’t fully explored
you make it hard
loving you is not hard
the crying
breaking
fighting
breathing
is difficult
i know nothing in life is easy
but living here in this city
is ******
we don’t work here
everything clashes
nothing molds
i just want to move and
unfold
my soul is unbelievably
bold
i wish i could stop this lifestyle
and put it on
hold
fly away to a new place and lay in the
soil
plant a garden of passion
baby this is my everyday
fashion

Clearly, I am a woman.
I smell of honey and oats.
I am curly hair laced with laughter.
I am a little black dress.
I am curvy,
Legs thick as a tree trunk.
Skin of the earth.

When they fear my heritage
I chuckle at their ignorance.

I am active brain.
I am lips of language.
My mother’s tongue spiced with sass.
I am mother natures song.
Radiating melanin at the cheekbones.

I taste of Sunday soul food.
I smile like them but for different reasons.
I shout like them but,

Clearly, you will never understand what it means
To be an angry black woman.

in a day
you gave me
a story
by night
you gave me
my favorite book

My room is the universe.
Big and bright.
The door wide open to all the possibilities.
Music blaring as loud as The Big Bang.
I lose myself in this vast space.
When I jump on my bed I can reach the stars.
Grasping on to all the positive energy dancing in the air.
The clock ticking through 1:11 reminding me,
to welcome abundance into my life.
The window open, blowing in the strong breeze.
I can hear the animals sing love songs to the sunrise.
Astrologers footprints on the welcome mat.
They traveled through this galaxy before.
Warm compliments bouncing off the solar systems,
painted on the walls.
The moon's glow beams off the mirror
inspiring us to look for shooting stars every night.
We lye down on the soft milky way carpet.
Where we share our wishes in between passes
of a trip to outer space.
Astrologers footprints on the exit mat.
They traveled galaxies to get home.
And I stayed a constellation in my room.

ive been told i'm naive. i have this problem of letting go i like to cling on tight to memories and most of all people. as soon as i meet someone i put all of my faith in them right away. they always end up hurting me and i feel this heaving in my chest and the pit of my stomach wants to grow legs and crawl it's way but i'm addicted to hurting. i don't know how to get rid of the memories i wish i could be like a snake who sheds but for some reason i like the layers to build up with sadness. i like the way music can make my soul break even more,but still give me a bit hope for someone new. why do i depend on others? i know how to be happy but i want someone to share it with. i want someone that feels like home. i live in this city in mind where the lights shine only at night the mornings scare me because it's a new day where something could go wrong but at night i like to travel to my city. the lights shine thru my bones its being lit up like a christmas tree when you're getting an MRI. on the bad days i try to hang the lights but not from the ceiling i want them to turn off. my bones beg to be brittle the fat that hangs on is suffocating them. my ilium believes the fat is the reason why she doesn't receive love. but ilium is wrong. ischium try's to remind her about the men who pinned those hips down before placing their hands on her mind give me your hands and feel my city. we could build our on world. our city will be for us and you can help me appreciate mornings and i can show you the night and i'll hang the lights where they belong. my heart is racing and this city has drowned me in nostalgia and now i don't know if i have someone to share my city with and then you never realize how lonely you are until you shut the lights off and the light music plays and it's like you remember having someone to share the tranquility with but yet you never really did. you never shared the way music is what's flowing thru your veins and what's pumping your heart. and i can see the look in his eyes and he doesn't get it. he doesn't understand that at night when i lye down i don't hear my heartbeat like he does i hear banana pancakes,cry baby, miss mirage, big jet plane,wait for me, only love, i hear music baby i hear the voices of artist that have constructed notes that soothe my mind their pieces have become co workers who are trading shifts because their not sure if there tunes have what it takes to pump oxygen today

when you find someone,
who can love you
like you love you,
thank the universe,
for true love is
sensational.

a note for you
written by
me
when i talked to you i wasn’t
trying to hurt you
i was trying to tell you that i’m hurting so bad
i forget that lying in a grave is sad

nostalgia has become my best friend
the smallest things will make me relive this memory that i never really had. like when i hear the vibrations of no one ever loved, i have this aching in my bones and my heart feels like spears are flying in at every direction and i cry out for someone i never really lost or the way pictures of places make me yearn to go back to countries i've never seen. i've been homesick for the place we never had and longed for someone i could never have. home the scent that lingers to the bedroom i can smell the  batter of the aunt jamima. syrup is expanding on the kids plates, sticking like the glue they will soon discover their first day of preschool. and as i stand here in front of you now i can't fathom if this is another one of my vivid dreams. i've been in a mental daze for years now my mind is scattered like a meadow of sunflowers who can't seem to shine through my orbit nerves. the painting of the paris that dangles like saucepans behind my bed is yet another country i've tried to crawl into, but it's painful my knees are developing carpet burn and my elbows are full of red mountain ridges. and i can't seem to reach the summit of this mountain. honey do you remember the glue sticks we have hidden until the kids first day of school? give the glue to them. let them learn how to unscrew the cap, pop it off like the corks of the first champaign bottle they will open on december 31st. give them ropes that will leave a ribbon of red on their palms by the time they reach the clift that their mother dangles from. tell the kids to use their little muscles they've been strengthening with their daily glass of milk, to push mommy to the top and glue my feet there and make me promise i  will never jump. home the first place the kids got to use glue, the new place where whey will build a foundation of trust with their father on a mountain where glue wasn't enough to hold their mother down. mom. yes sorry, i was just washing the dishes, go color a picture for your father. soap drips from my prunny palms leaving ***** dish water memories. when i see the steel sink, i hear the garbage disposal weathering the rocks down of a mountain i've been struggling climb. breaking down every memory i've ever had. slicing them like apples except there's no juice. but there is aunt jamima batter, enough batter to linger scents to my room every morning. enough syrup to stick to the cheap paper plates, from the corner store. corners i will turn until i reach the summit of this  mountain.

i watched a movie. i felt empty. no i feel empty. i am empty. i'm not going to say there's a hole in my heart or pit in my stomach. because my heart isn't my heart and my stomach isn't my stomach. i think it's someone else's. have you ever seen a confused a dream with life? or stolen something when you had the cash? have you ever been blue? or thought your train moving while sitting still?  i was interrupted with the voice and emotions of someone i don't want to be. i lost myself in the emptiness of the own little world i tried to create. i couldn't keep it up. the wood of my so called home was soaked, but not from the rain. the salty water wasn't a good combination and my home began to weary down. there would be no drying. there  was no sun where i lived. my home collapsed. but my home wasn't my home it was my heart. no it was someone else heart.  a heart i tried to mend with some classic jack johnson tunes. the heart pounded the sounds of "this **** isn't going to work" these vibrations of music you want me to feel isn't enough you have to start over

i think i’m addicted to pain
almost like i’m addicted to mint
an inhale of nicotine
is an exhale of anxiety
it gets rid of that **** quick
but nicotine doesn’t get rid of
you
it makes you stay
it makes me stay
i know i shouldn’t ******* stay
you haven’t changed
you’re cruel
you’re manipulative
you’re hungry
for the meat on another girls bones
i think you already started eating her
you ate me forever ago
no meal etiquette
just your filthy hands
but i guess you don’t need meal etiquette
when you only want a quick snack
before we go out for recess
i’m on the swing
swinging away my slippery beginnings
there is absolutely no ending
you run out to the playground
ready to play with
me
you just forgot to wipe the snack crumbs from the last girl off your face
he kicks the mahogany mulch
like an angry uniform school boy
i kick my life away
like an abandoned woman
i’m the only one who should be angry but i’m not
i don’t know what emotion it is when
when i collapsed a long time ago
and yet i’m still collapsing
a cold cheating collision
you are always
the instigator of the collisions
he says he loves me but i know that he’s lying
he just loves the *** and he knows i supply him
now supply me with the truth
and you’ll tell me half of it
while holding me down on the couch
so i don’t run out of apartment 16
it’s like a sleeping cycle
you just don’t sleep
we scream
i get up and throw stuff
and keep hitting you
you’ll wrap your hands around my throat
to tame me but
ill just carve my fingernails into my legs
i just drew a maze
i shake profusely
while you yell about how
crazy
i am
we finally come to end
i inhale nicotine
i exhale anxiety
while you breathe normally
and wait to see if i come back this time
i think i’m addicted to pain

mother natures whimsical winds
brushing yesterday off your shoulders.
she takes your palms
lathers them in lavender
singing lullabies
until your night light in the sky turns on.
stars laced through clouds
wishing to hold on to the moons hand
a little longer.

the moment we are born
we are dying.
mortality forcing metamorphosis.
a road-trip of adolescence.
slipping into cali oceans,
baptizing bodies in
*** and drugs.
aren't we all sinners?
the bed creeks with
sounds of passion,
gasps of breath.
zippers unzip, shirts are peeled
off skin, like bananas.
a monkeys favorite treat.
lips meet neck.
tongues weave through organs.
the pulsing addiction for the
forbidden fruit.
the garden of Eden is now swirls of
vanilla and caramel,
intertwining fingers
between passes of a j.
time feeds the day with
sunshine and fear.
while sinners accept mortality.

lately at night i have
felt so close to the moon
but not close meaning distance
but close meaning
the moon is sending me on a mission
of ceasing mourning it’s taking me
to a universe i always
begged to live on
i mean the moon has me under its
spell
an aura of another soul
they feel incredibly heavy
their emotions melting into my skin
a teenage heart can only hold so much
pain
the moon is sending me on a mission
to test the winds strength
to blow my mind to a far away place
more unique than outer space
i am astronaut
locked and vacant
this place is forever sacred
this is where the memories were vacuumed into a black hole
i can finally feel my refreshed soul
my mouth open
my lips a small canal
ready for mother nature’s
water to slither through and set sail
a body of hope
eager for coconut oils to smooth the edges of the broken fold
the moon is sending me on a mission
and maybe it’s not for me to rebuild my world
but
i do want to start over
allow the atmosphere of outer space be my admirer
make it my safe place
the moon
circumference wide like the opportunities
filling cylinders with mace
sun glazin on my skin
this mission
was so
zen

why are you here?
because im afraid of myself.
rage swoons through my soul echoing like my heartbeat.
why am i so angry?
red knuckles disturb the peace.
salty blood stained slices through my fingers is just one way
to clam the anxiety.
what the **** is trust?
i can't find it
all i see
is fuzzy clouds filled with names of girls i don't want to know
shouldn't i want to know
my mind is filled with vines of sickening vibes
patricia told me to go to my happy place
but it's too hard to get there
i feel like i'm running an eternal race
making me hate eternity
i try to travel back to citadel childhood nostalgia
but even that's scary when all you remember is being alone
i'm still alone
and you're here
and i'm there
and i want to be here  
but not like a flickering candle
lightening and unlighting the room
i want to be constant
i want to be the sun and the moon
because then ill be with you every moment of the day
and all of my hopes and dream will spark in the sky
with the glistening stars
exploding glitter fairytales
the wishes of a dead girl
in a grave with the too many forgotten bodies
i want to feel alive again
to pull my soul out from under the roots of this acidic sunken city
i don't want to feel this pain
and that's when i saw her
i didn't even think twice about pressing the gas
to see her bleach hair come out of her roots
and the glow from her highlight that's she thinks is foundation melt off her skin
to just watch someone feel the nightmares i have every night
to just say
**** it

the sun peaks thru
my window blinds.
the birds hum
their offerings.
the wind brushes
weight off my shoulders
in between puffs of tree.
Erykah Badu
vibrates my solar plexus.
mornings like this
remind me why
i am alive,
there is work to contrive.

when i met you
clocks stopped.
infinity relapsed
like dragon tales in 2002.
wave caps bury blurry nights.
we resurrected with the tide.
mother nature created two constellations
that puzzled,
purposefully together.
i always felt like a choice.
i never felt like an option.