Suicide notes don’t serve their purpose,
just an antiquity of my youth
please don’t promise me your presence-
I know so well,
you must leave with the night’s pin
pricking of stars.
And I,
A child belonging to the sun
hidden-
as twilight’s cloak slips out of my fingers.

Closure and I’s skin never touches,
comfort does not embrace me
and redemption refuses to look me in the eyes.

I’ll never forgive others for dying
But I hope they can forgive my weary spirit
Authenticity in pain
is such a rarity
in this aging process

God it hurts, god it grows old
But I cannot depend on figments any longer;
Too tired of my own silence,
talk ****** talk
instead I substitute ink for
the pool of blood at my feet

Have always known how to plant roses
upon the grave of my sorrow

open my mouth: speak up
make my own choices
life: death

To wake up
against the rallying chains
of the unwilling,
who keep us captive and weak.
Lies become so cheap
you can buy a seat at parliament’s feet

But the price sleeps
In that house of white.

We as the people,
have a right-
to wake up
yet it is not enough,
awakening only works with
ten thousand fists in the air
in protest

Not to stand proud
but for firmness
denying weakness

We as the people,
are not a guest to democracy.

Democracy is a home for all

Those taller,
should use their fingertips
to reach toward the sun
rather than standing in the way  

Let that light no longer be difficult to obtain—
let it reign
over abuse of power
temperature rising on the corrupt

our brightness
   must be a force
to drive out darkness

Humanity standing tall for everyone
no worries of divinity
when the land we live on
wouldn’t be blessed by any god
soil planted by frauds
and the hate spread
grows nothing
from this earth

To rise-
Everyone can survive
Only with the courage
And ending of lost lives

Power depends on the downfall,
for someone to die

but revolution only requires
us
to rise,
to rise,
to rise.

Anesthesiologist places mask on patient,
coaching easier breaths,
stillness.
Finished-
he leaves, leaves
leaves, leaves.

Surgeon enters with shiny tray of metal tools,
Patient’s rib cage rattles,
rapid breathing, sporadic monitor
panic breaks hospital windows
shattered,
everything is shattered.

Patient cries of days lived in uncertainty,
mutters about metaphorical agony.
Surgeon is insecure in performing procedure—
due to patient’s complaints,
“Pain is a parasite inside my ears, laying eggs inside the brain, where maggots squirm through my eye making a home in the skull.”
Patient feels no pain,
but screams of
impalement by life - -

God, what would your diagnosis be?
God claims, “the heart fights for purpose.”
Patient believes there isn’t one.
A suggestion;
reason with patient to make payment or rental of new
blood circulation, chambers, ventricles, valves, atriums.

Patient takes scalpel,
opening own chest
with hand inside
Patient is unable to find source of hurting
but reports numbness.

current status,
human.

—V.H.

How often I’ve heard,
there’s no wealth to be made from words.
Just ink that burns,
pages that rip.
But enrichment of lives takes place,
profiting from human experience, and
Allow abundance in emotion

The beehives of my mind rattle.
Creating words, slowly,
their honeycombs of poetry.
I am as genuine as these stanzas claim.
Trying authenticity, keeping the first jar beside all I’ve concealed.
Words re-colonize all the time,
shaping themselves to make a home,
in the heart & mind.

I. Apply foundation in a tone more perfect than the one you're born with,
doubt that there's anything beautiful in the term "natural"
blot your lips with the cherries you deprive yourself of
and wonder, "What good is difference when it's not appreciated?"

stop reading this.

II. Forget how you were born;
every freckle,
every beauty mark,
every uneven line etched into your face are nothing to be celebrated.
Deprecate yourself, you are unwound and beg this world to shape you in its eyes.

skip this line.

Society speaks subjectively of happiness, but fill your head with lies
that we're all pretty if we can keep up our disguise.
The weight of this world upon your shoulders,
alludes to being big as too much to handle.
Curl into everyone's palm as if you're so fragile,
they have to pinch the skin on your bones with the thumb and index finger.

stop.

III. Draw on the perfectly plump pout, filled with nothing but
expectations of everyone else.
Your beauty is not a privilege for anyone,
but judgment that has defined your worth.

skip.
Emprises that market upon your insecurities,
admire that solemn face in the mirror
as the reflection discourages you
at the acknowledgement of any impurities

Start.

How To Be Beautiful Lifelong


Admire the history that lives within the heartlines of your palms,
how strong you've grown, once cradled in your mother's arms.
Disregard where it is you've come from, but how much further you've journeyed forward.
I. Apply the sincerity in your best friend's voice when
                        she calls the time you've spent together, beautiful.
Do not doubt the splendor that comes from wisdom.

II. Every wrinkle you've earned,
as time gives back to you from lessons learned.
Blot your lips during the release of laughter
as saliva mists through the air,
your joy so vigorous
the ghosts residing in the graves
regret no more.


You are as you should be,
a composite of everything that gives you life
and grants you purpose.
Begging for this world to love you,
there is no fault in this desire.

They speak of happiness as if
it's only a potential-oriented concept,
Do not let your heart surround the gossip
or it's golden armor become bronzed.

III. Draw on the canvas of existence
in the brightest of hues, in the purest of love.
Filled with nothing, but expecations for yourself
say farewell to the darkness
open the curtains to light.

Your beauty is magnificent
as your name will be transcendent.
In each day we decide to be ourselves,
the poise presents itself.


—V.H.

YOU
pronoun | \’yu, yę also yē   \

Believing in god is not enough,
when I can question the universe,
as to why someone so magnificent
is right in front of my eyes?

July 4th, 2018

Where the land of the free has become obscured by the shadow
of oppression,

Its' silhouettes are the monsters

children are afraid of under their beds.

How, fireworks remind so many gunshots

Self-proclaimed nationalists cannot stay loyal enough,
to know what would be good for this land.

This land of the free,
no longer belongs to the home of the brave,
but the cowardly.

Family & children born unto what we deem unattached,
from the roots of this soil,
they are not welcomed for lady liberty's "borrowed" arms to embrace them.

When each artifact
was sculpted from an immigrant's hands,
but we've warranted their tribulations
are greater than stars on our flag.

If those stars stand for detainment,
tragedy, and fascism.
I do not proudly pledge such ideals,
embracing my heritage of greats-
who journeyed over on ships across seas.



They are the stars of America's history.

—V.H.

We have souls that are plunging off this planet,
in hopes they will be swallowed by the cosmos-
fearing the hurt is never ending,
leads to renovations of existence.

To silence the beating
of a heart,
to end a life.

Morality is stuck behind
the gates of purgatory

& society is too scared of
what will happen
if we use our mouths for
meaningful conversation.

Indeed.
A tourniquet can stop the bleeding,
but can’t do justice for spread of infection,
or the scar serving as a reminder.

People are dying from depression-
faulty chemistry in the brain.
As well as suicide.

It is the crying of phantoms,
never to be heard-
wanting change,
a re-birth,
of the contorted humanity
we proudly call ”life”

Ache that’s carried lifelong,
but never resolved.
Truthfully,
those vague questions

don’t save lives.

Death knows this,
of course.
He is an omniscient force
lingering in the scenery.
Possessing the inability
to tolerate the teasing
and the wagers.
Coming to collect early
because, we’ve begun
to shatter
every fragment
of light
life reflected.

Now,
Darkness makes him feel welcome
and entitled.

KRM

I still dream you hold my hand
as we walk across the pond.
but its surface was clean and unharmed by filth.

Your lungs were never deflated
and you would breathe so graciously.
I waited so long, my hair has grown
& your emerald eyes
had a lust for life.

I wish I could conjure your spirit when
they say how much they see you
in me.
But I'm left empty in the midst of all
they could never see,
I've grown up, but I'm never free
of the child you held in your arms.

I don't want to spend my life being haunted by a woman
that never fought her own ghosts.
Cancer is not a demon, it is an illness
and the zodiac you were born as
should be the only thing to touch you.
But still those weakened cells
took your body as their host.

Now I mourn you in the reflection of ponds
and wait for waterlilies to bloom in the place
of your face.

now I wait for your soft hands to hold me in your lap
and place a soft kiss on my forehead.

And when I think of my mother;
her poise and grace,
dresses of lace.
My desire for our souls to meet once more,
or to see your face in front of pearly gates.

—V.H.

I envied the cadavers haunting my nightmares,
watching those before me
spread upon a metal slab
bodies are hand-me-downs of regurgitated poetry,
with wretched closets in which I take their place.

This ventilator called "loved ones"
forcing breath into anguished lungs-
tragedies belonging to these poets meant something,
a desire to save the words written,
but never the one who becomes a eulogy.

Agony burrows inside of me,
conversations with my mother's ghost
still,
the living are possessed by
the dead's shortened tomorrows.

To die by suicide wouldn't give,
authenticity to hurt.

I am learning the autopsy of a soul:
extracting a heart from the chest,
as it's sense of belonging was never there.
An inability to weigh the words bleeding from valves,
aside lungs I'm unable to breathe through.

How ungrateful is it of sorrow to ask for hope?
placed in a pill divider to swallow,
muscles within my throat so tight.
Wondering,
How many times did I diminish my voice?

Inside the brain,
schematics of labyrinths with no end to betterment.
Surgeons reach for a soul,
an iridescence small enough
held in a gloved palm,
watching it writhe.
Placed upon a slide,
but even a microscope
cannot perceive the pain a soul hides.

Once more,
stitched with needle and thread.

Wilting of my own garden,
comes one day-
an incision is made opening me up.
My heart showed the same
blood-red ink, writing apologies
on the marble floor.

They opened my arm,
displaying a noose of veins.
In this moment,
they removed my soul
only to gift it to another
birthed from torment
ripped out of the arm's of their mother
& into the embrace of woe.

—V.H.

Oh, Andy-
speak to me in paints:
red, yellow, blue

When I told you I wouldn't be good at this,
an inability to sketch hands that punched at everything leaving me weak.
Keane's sorrow filled eyes upon oil made more sense to me.

I was never angry or mean, just sad and hopeless.
Lichtenstein was more your speed with obscene images of ******* women
and dialogue of broken hearts.

Van Gogh never made sense, but his attention to detail caught my eye.
To not know what goes on in your own head is identifiable so,
my head is art crafted by Picasso.

they hospitalize you once you've lopped your ear off
when giving a part of themselves to a lover.
I'm not cut out for this- the starving artist,
the tragic sketcher,
or the natural- born painter.

I've calloused my hands,
shed tears on pages of sketchbooks
put paint that looks childlike
and nothing worthwhile,
in all the time spent learning,
I've never learned how to be an artist.

I thought it was the mantra to be pained and miserable,
but you accounted for bold choices and vivid primary shades.
I feel betrayed, that my art alone, isn't enough to be good.

They will never frame my name,
or immortalize flaws in which could never be erased.

Like our conversation in my dream:
"I can't be mean." -Me
"Killing yourself isn't much different" -You

So Andy, what is the color I'm feeling? If it isn't blue?

—V.H.

There's so much wisdom in an oak,
with its' dying breath,
of that tree-
I admired the courage it took to change.
Baring a naked soul after shedding layers,
Reds, golds, and oranges-
Cascading down the streets.
In my moments of mourning
I realized-
We don't hold funerals for trees.

—V.H.

The child mournful,
A single salted tear slides down a cheek,
Holds the secrets of a woman,
Locked within a room,with a door that creaks.
She creates such sadness,
mother to the artwork,
Man who claims to be a father,
Overshadows the button of the girl’s dripping nose.

Etched within walls, a desire to say the truth:
“He’s not the artist”
Look within those big eyes,
the elegance of youth,
Deep inside her true love’s lies-
the choppy strands that show
the instability of growth
within the painter’s eyes.

Man made dark;
Stars within my eyes have burned out.
You- wandering spirit,
I’ve high hopes your’s still shine brightly.
There’s no meteor shower looming over your skies.

I’ve always gravitated to the dark edges of the sky,
It’s friction with the refusal to wear away
Our memories paving the milky way,
That crescent moon reminds me of the crooked smile I’d wear,
And in powder blue day-
The sun is something I’m working towards.
How simple it is to admire the dark for being mysterious,
But day is a fear as i’m all too aware
of what I’ve put my soul through on the brightest of days.
One step behind,


Flowers upon this porch shake,
the cup in my hand shatters,
blood splatters.

The skin I’m in is weathered,
Scars in white lines across the horizon.
Lost my balance on a constellation-

Gathered shards from the night and bled on sheets of white.

A sense of fleeting,
feet planted firmly on the ground,
but my mind is abysmal.
Sometimes-
it's a whisper of my mother's voice,
or one of the five psychiatrists who seemed uninterested.
It was the comfort in darkness,
becoming the lore of my life.

There was comfort in wanting to die,
I tightly grasped onto the concept of survival.
How we became enemies;
never seeing eye to eye.

I love it,
my ability to control the pain I feel-
how little, how less
I can make myself hurt.
Although, I'd refrain from calling myself a *******.

I've gained no pleasure in harming myself,
undeserving, unworthy of all the blood I've lost.
There's no notable war,
when the cause is in my veins.

Gauze I've had around my wrists,
felt comforting,
keeping in the sickness,
I dreamed would drip down my wrist.

Doing this to myself,
I'm no *******.
Allowing myself to be chaotic in how my emotions were expressed.

I know,
it's a cry for help,
but I'm left wondering-
do I want to be helped?

I've become immune to the numbness,
a damaged girl as they all catch up,
comparing scars.

I can be who you want me to be,
carve a smile on my face,
I can be who you want me to be,
I can be happy.

Dear Depression,
I see you. We all see you. You're not very avoidable. Those slivers of light you try to enamor us with. How death seems so delicate when we talk of flowers and restful slumber- for all eternity. What the lights do not show; a grotesque, scaled abomination with a gluttonous appetite for happiness and life. I can't let you gnaw on anymore souls to leave nothing, but sunken eyes and bones. They do not belong to you nor were they yours to take. You're not welcome in the mind's of my friend's and family. Life is welcome in their heart's where joy can still be found. Don't find yourself slithering down our throat's anymore, in the empty stomachs or scars we have. The thoughts we think when you entice us are dangerous. You stole her. You stole him. You stole me. I can't recognize the stoic, numbed faces I gaze upon. You undo any progress ever done.

It's been so long since, I've heard them laugh or flashed a smile I meant. Still, your might looms over as you admire the damage you've caused. Next, feeling the audacity to sneer when we weep. Depression, you're a monster who causes nothing, but suffering. Those tears are not your's to season hopelessness with. You make the covers seem like the most comfortable coffin, you make our skin look as if we've fought thousands of wars. The sun an inconvenience with the days in reverse. We've tried to compromise, you are no friend. Just a foe.
Depression, there are so many things I want to do to you. You break my heart when all your captors don't believe they are worthy of love, but they are the ones I love most. I will break you like, you've broken us. My bare hands would reach into your chest, ripping the lungs out; stomp on them to preventing future sufferers. I would crush your heart in the palms of my hand's- praying for the sickness and terror to end. These innocent people you've robbed of life, love, happiness, opportunity and a soul. Will have their revenge. Your blood covers our skin and we bathe in the warmth of redemption as our thought's belong to us once more. We let the pain held inside escape our sutured lips, begging your soul to ascend back into the abyss never to return. Your bones are mine to assemble a castle for the broken to heal. Your skull resembles a crown honoring those who had given into the temptations of surrendering. We honor them.

Toothpaste residue washes down the drain,
mouthwash follows.
I waste my time cleaning these bones inside my mouth,
to be opalescent with their crooked demeanor.
Wondering what others think of me,
thinking about how today has been endless
and tomorrow will follow suit.

Spending time gazing into the mirror,
trying to change.
& we'd prefer to be found
with alcohol in our blood,
laying somewhere cold in a snowbank.

A bullet inside the glass I'm drinking from,
I bite down as my brain erupts,
splatters the wall.
Ending my ****** writer's block...

the mortician left to inform the world,
of the irony in never including yourself as a character.
Everyone's face is shadowed and misplaced,
like a Picasso painting.
Those faces have haunting features,
an appearance that shouldn't matter,
it's the judgement within those eyes.

Why can't we peel off the skin and lies,
like an age old band aid?
Revealing the shredded bones
beneath the act of aging.
We're all so weak,
with conflicted truths,
signs of emotion are signs of weakness:

Still so many of us fortunate souls are lead to wonder why?


why? why?why?

The desire to be nothing
pertained to me,
trading smeared blue inked letters
written in my woes and goodbyes,
that were premature.

Oh, how the piano with its' keys have broken off,
means the musician lost his will to play,
drowning himself on a west coast beach-
A poet with her repressed memories,
have made themselves a home in her troubled mind.
And we all have;
so many words,
so many truths,
so many secrets,
and these words drown her so.

The need to conceal my inner most demons,
no attention drawn to myself, a paper bag over my head.
Another placed over my head,
a smile scribbled on its surface.

My attempts go unnoticed,
as I'm the only one pointing out my flaws.
The bag has the same tired word scribbled on the inside,
"failure"
and the ink stains my face.
I had never approved of labels,
but there are ones that cannot be removed.
We have these facades,
we orchestrate
at the expense of an existence
we're refusing to live in.

You don't come around anymore,
but I still remember making memories
that never had a place existing anyways—

the say heaven, hell, and purgatory
don't count as long- distance
still I punch in your number,
listening.
To the buzz on the other end,
muting the television,
turn down the lights,
and put candles in the room;

I keep your existence alive by fabrication,
sewing selective memories in the lobes of my brain,
but they manifest
& my dreams--
are the seams of my sanity
being pulled out.

You're always there with a glass of lemonade.
Yet, you never knew what an inside voice was,
as you scream about how wonderful the afterlife is.

Your proposal a tempting blade,
the encouraging way
you promise
I'll see you-
meeting the artery in my neck,
or a tendon in my wrist.
You know-
I've done it more than once-
mistake my sickness, for your ghost.
I swear,
I can hear your voice,
all the time now.

I haven't felt this sick in a long time,
can't even recall the last time sleep came to
me in a quiet hush, with a wash of calmness,
asleep with the sky resembling
a blanket of
stars casted
out into the atmosphere.

A constant migraine hammered into my skull,
everyday I burst out randomly and cry
so hard until my knees quake,
my sadness does not end,
it folds me, unfolds me;
creases me, & turns me into a paper airplane-
I float.


There's no tin can tied to string,
I can't set out lawnchairs,
and await
for the Thursday,
you were supposed
to live to see-
never comes,
there's an emptiness in shuffled feet,
and hatred for that surgical green color.

Or when people utter "home"
I think of your paralysis
and the way your word's
fought for meaning, in that slurred tone:

"I'm going home"
I've never been religious
nor do I judge those who are,
but I've been spiritual my whole life-
the spirit knows when it dies.

my skin shudders to think how they carted you off;
to discover the parts of your body
you had not known were betraying you,
your lung's gave up
and soon the breaths in your chest,
had no place left in this world.

Like anyone else;
trying to justify why time rots hope, as it loosens our grip on reality.

Awaiting your chatter as
I shave my legs while,
you do your make up
in the faintly lit bathroom;
I hated that guava pink lipstick
you wore like it was your job.
I loved that mauve colored one
that made cherubs beg for you to
hold them in your maternal arms,
always having open arms for all outcasted,
it was part of your charm.

They say you always know when you're dying:
does that make an illness,
the equivalent to the
heartbreak of your body knowing
it has no regard to live any longer,
and the crisis with mortality,
that if we fend off fears and try to be stronger,
then an unbeknownst curiosity for what happens.

You know, we all know.
We are all going to die someday.

But-
does your mind go
when you die too?
or do memories remain
as something complacent
that even death cannot
strip the soul of?

I’m fine,
thank you.
So talk about your demons…
give my your share,
you asked if I loved anyone,
but you wouldn't understand-
trying to love yourself.

Instead you lied about studying psychology
and asked my bra size;
my eyes were as big as that full moon,
when I watched you and him
skinny dip in that pool.

I never would have been able to predict
what would happen next,
He was ******* and said-
“Don’t have ***”

Drove around in your car,
held hostage
the next day
I never had any idea
as to what I should say-

It was MY body,
but not your dichotomy to know
where those parts were
stripped of my soul,
to reveal what hurt-
& you impregnated me with an omen
that visits my sleep every night.

It has your ******* sapphire eyes
and licks its chops.

“You led me on” It says
(defending a child predator)

Next,
harassing me for gas money,
Didn't I give you enough?
your existence is a heavy
debt in my mind

I lost a friend,
my ****** addicted friend.
They detest me
but defended you-
can't help but wonder
if god's the *******
who makes me bleed.

Was the thievery of purity,
enough to succeed in creating imagery?
I speak of how I lost my dignity & sanity.
But-
your toxicity never strains itself from my veins.

Cicadas hum quietly,
amongst the summer choir.
Locked doors,
birds on their wire's.
Keep from harm's way,
but thorted by desire-
Blinds colored gray
block out humanity.

These dreams speak to me through insanity,
a tv plays white noise,
my mind is in calamity.
As nightmares creep in through my eyelids,
amid the darkness of this quiet house.

This is my Strauss-
wooden floors entirely silent,
the thoughts inside are violent.
Recalling Baptist Hospital.
No cart rhythmically on call,
a nurse alloting me two pearls to swallow.

Making the sea of seretonin flow,
making happiness through my body grow.
Tonight,
I take my trazadone
no longer resembling a pearl,
my toes curl.
At the bitter taste,
following the nightmares that make haste
to follow me to bed,
praying I don't wake up dead.

In the dusk of August we remained separated.
Different lives lived,
wondering has the "best day of our lives" already come.
Riding home in your car;
I remember how full of life you looked in my eyes.
We both laughed about inside jokes & stories from childhood,
I never figured out how to stifle my guffaw that spoke of how lonely I am.
I promised you my honesty, always.
Referred to it as a curse,
but a fate much worse is-
the one where we never belonged to one another.

Sometimes, my head gets so heavy:
I never belonged underneath the sun.
I had stopped writing poetry for weeks because, I didn't feel I had anything worth saying.
Until August 4th.
I cried to you, poured my heart out to the waves.
Where I dreamt they carried us away-
in the mundane life I lived,
my bones could never be content in finding happiness within myself.
Last August we spoke like two children in love.
Becoming the lights that illuminated Gulf Breeze where my residency was.
My heart erupted into
smoke signals across Pensacola
that reach your window.

We spoke effervescently of a future we'd
be a part of together.
We spoke of intimacy and how it'd feel to be enraptured by passion.
I'm a fleeting thing, my love.
Gone.
Like the rotting leaves through Autumn in another state,
I am the present time when-
destiny does not meet with fate.
I'm no longer here,
with a curtained heart outstretched,
loving me is dastardly,
and now it's too late.

—KRM

Spoke with an angel in a nightmare,
her voice out of tune with the weather,
she weeps so pretty,
but when she sings.
Time stops & the bones,
of the waking world shatter.
Forlorn,
eerie,
soprano soundescapes
the windpipes,
an eclipse forms from her wallowed pout.

The pouring of light emphasizes on
sorrowful words spoken,
the world places a sympathetic ear to
the chest of the sky.
The pounding doesn't stop.

Sky is slate,
a skulking cat,
with slit eyes.
The introduction of a silver tressed girl
and her delight
for crimson,
red and sheets of whiteForeign
fables pour from
the wrists,
dripping down the elbow.
A pirouetting figure,
with dandelion wisp limbs,
struts past to sing of her disease.

Legs swing in the urge to
jut off a 1,000ft building,
the chilly breeze used to be endearing,
but once you're screaming-
"You are my sunshine,"
in a desolate parking lot.
Wearing happiness
under the eyelids,and a powdered capsule between the lips.

Telephone wires no better than a noose,
choke back everything you want to say.
Weep into the static sound,
nobody's listening.
nobody wants to know-
what's on your mind.

Grabbing at thin air,
mistaking it for potential
or meaning.
Angle the reflection of the mirror properly--
there's a hollowed out torso with;
protruding bones,
that absently cut the days into,
hours, minutes and seconds.
I wanted to break my jaw this week,
I'm not using it for anything.
But chewing my words to never be regurgitated
into anything but rejected suicide notes.
Those letters never fit well,
and the phrases are cliché.
Atleast all those wadded ***** of paper
are weightless in the winds,
like the wings she wore upon her back.
That I desperately wanted
and the red inked margins—
wounds I haven't the courage to make.
So I've cut myself to pieces,
rearranged them more than once,
And just break
and break
and break
and break
and break

You spoke to me in a dream,
voice like honey,
"The angels won't save someone with so much devil in them."

Nights of bumming cigarettes
off men too old, who should know better.
Welcoming the darkest of us with a thin smile,
all opalescent.

Lost yourself in poker chips,
another wager on the poker table.
Some middle aged man's fantasy-
legs spread like Russian roulette,
who would go with you?
Appealing the sin inside of your bones,
you locked your demons in a box.

It's not your fault,
you were murdered.
you were chosen-
this world tends to expire on
a girl with an imbalance of hedonism & an angelic temperament.

Beauty can lead us to truly dangerous places;
those veins belong to you,
but BOB wants to bury himself underneath your skin.

Seashells mixed with bits of sand
clung to your ocean blue skin,
your lips looked apologetic.

"I'm sorry I wasn't myself"
- the town's patron saint

Early morning,
clouds shine down
on your still frame,
like a movie scene-
it's cold,
but you've always been a fan of snow
snowflakes touch your nose
in a light dust of blow.

Did you ever really live?
Or had you already been a ghost?
Of who they all had come to love and adore.

Food is tasteless,
but my bitterness is an aftertaste-
mouthwash can't cleanse.

Fragmented into pieces
in the palm of someone's hand,
the ache in slow-motion that I can't be fixed.

Never worrying about my happiness,
doing what makes everyone else feel good
leaky faucet with not enough to give
but too much to stop.

They're always talking to the next lover
and I plant kisses all on the surface of my suffering.

Live my life through photographs,  
see foreign faces of people as my eyes dialate while,
my brain has taken the picture no matter how many centuries.
Is that the meaning of an old soul? 

My paintings have improved,
mixing the colors has become easier,
irises are a video camera
while, the nerves can rewind the sequence of events
and how the portrait or picture had developed.

Who the people were
and what their lives meant.
I don't live a tragic life,
I'm not trapped in some cryptic looking tower,
Only trapped, by my own personal unhappiness.  

These pictures are a way for me to live vicariously through someone else,
Imagining myself there. 

These pictures are taken to capture a momentous
or joyful time in my life,

television and movies are like that in a way. 
They remind us of the miserable world,
but we have decided to allow our worth
to weigh our subconscience like gold, 
These pictures are memories that trigger another event,
in a vicious cycle. 

I promise,
You don't get pictures taken of the countless empty bottles,
the pills you've choked down,
the tube that's shoved down your throat
when they 'save' your life.

(That left me wondering why I had to stay alive and it's all about contributing-
keeping up with the rent you're due on existing.)


 The happier times are easy to forget,
we didn't run out of film.
Aren't those kinds of things in pictures we see?
The media tells you to cut the corners of your mouth so,
you can smile.. 

 
My mother died some time ago a year and some odd months,
my mind had accidentally snapped a picture of her,
still framed; her statue like chest, no veins flowing, and the urge to wait for her chest to rise again. 

I think,
waiting leaves lesions on the brain,
because, most see waiting as pain without any kind of gain. 
That's where trauma comes from-
waiting,
time changing, embedded in the bellies of women and dripping out of men's mouths.

I've stood in front of an angel teary eyed,
nodding that I was ready for departure.
Spoken to a Heavenly Father,
with a weeping tone caught in my throat
that I didn't have the strength to keep living.

The devil had me in chains,
but Angels spoke to me once
"You are enough" they sang

Static in my mind,
as I hear the shakiness of photos falling off the wall,
the beast has come to feed on my head-
it wants me dead.

There aren't enough prayers to lift me
from what's breaking my spirit,
Spirits wept and spoke inaudibly,
"Let it happen, there's not much to be done"

Ethereal, but they could detect darkness all through my body,
in shades of red, grays, and blacks.
They frame my figure and display it in the gallery
of tortured souls.

Nightmares had predicted such a tragic ending,
when I bled,
the beast could track me down.
His claws are long and sharp, cutting into my skin
Its disease infecting my blood.

It likes the parts of my brain that are seeped in ink,
it loves when I'm alone and all I do is think.

It's stronger than me, coming to life when I write about it.
I hear it's heavy footsteps, deep breaths
and smell my death-
resembling the inside of its foul, jagged mouth

Angels will carry me to a place I might consider home,
they'll admire my suffering because,

I've become a martyr
to the imbalance of chemicals in my brain,
and with every moment my heart was beating,
I made efforts to fight off everyone else's pain.

Perhaps, when I meet heaven
I'll have a cigarette
and not be bothered by everything in white.
When my skin touches its surface much of it will turn gray.
Willing to die, they'll recognize my own lack of willpower
in letting it rip my heart from my chest.

It pounded so loudly in the beast's clutches,
it squeezed it between its palm and erupted--
painting the living in sinner's blood.

Misguided with glazed eyes,
they gleam in an effort to encourage impulsiveness.
I no longer have a desire to be the windows inside of you.

Admiring a lavender sky,
sunsets continue to die,
plagued by the thought of
night creeping in again.

I am vulnerable to the pale moonlight.

You once told me, 'There's a cracked home that you carry inside of you.'
No longer am I the thoughts filling your head,
that I'm the cure to your sickness.

Isolated myself in heavy sheets of sadness,
suffocating-
in an uninvited guest room,
just some extra space.
A breeze persistently tugging,
the tattered curtains.

Someday, you'll understand-
I was never your home.
Never becoming a garden,
never a lonesome white gate.

Paint chips from my decaying bones,
from years of damage.
Been here before
a ghost to these creaking stairs.
Fixing everyone else's homes,
a loose floorboard bares secrets,
but I continue to keep things just to have something to hold.

Stairs cave,
with each step I take.

I end
as it begins;
your body becomes an earthquake,
the house crumbles,
words evolve into raspy whispers

Damage has been done,
marks are on the wall,
as demons claw.
They're ripping through your veins
as I feel the foundation in my fingertips.

The walls won't be here tomorrow,
no longer holding everyone's hands,
or breathe through these polluted lungs.

I've begun to feel a need to repent
and with every move I make,
my happiness is spent.

There must be something more;
lillypads and ponds seen in past lives
Heaven once lived inside my home,
but the polluting of lungs that comes with us as we age--
invites purgatory.

Well, each time my father smokes there must be an entire  section of clouds reserved for him.
Desperate for faith,
I've been turning the key points from farewell letters into psalms.

There might not be much left,
when I'm writing my own version of the Bible in blood.

I won't drink all of the lemonade: take down my artwork,
My shoes won't litter the welcome mat:
I promise not to haunt you.
I won't scare you when all the lights are off: I won't take up space or bother you.
I won't scare you by turning all the lights on: no more wrinkled sheets,

My voice won't be in your head: no more unmade beds.
I won't give you chills: the tv won't flicker.
My favorite songs won't burden you: you won't have to worry about me never leaving the house.

My journals won't appear to you randomly begging to be read:
that ink will follow me in my death

We listen to the same murmur of;
the chanting of an honest city skyline,
echoes of a symphony on balcony roofs.

Pearlescent eyes,
yearning for a ripened peck upon
the curving of plum lips
an infectious smile, light reflecting
off the lunar eclipse--
Curve of your back arched into
the half of you, that makes me whole.

Fiery embers,
muted colors,
that spark into pinks and red
in a moment of present energy.

Could the journey be embarked?
To search for the one that loves me,
what realm did you come from,
& how does one begin to find you?


An elixir made from lilac,
can be smelt upon her breath-
dandelion wisps of hair,
tucked behind her ear—
so honest, so fair.

Precious lotus petal,
that lives,
intoxicate me with your lips--
belonging to rose water,
I've heard your stories of selflessness,
with so much to give you-

& admire the heroic ways you've written yourself
out of every fable,
to become the moral.

Adoration has grasped the ability to carve these bones,
into a monument;

I've a ribcage with room for the both of us,
lay upon my chest,
sleep safely,
dream blissfully,
& love unapologetically

The sun,
the moon
and wind
had been the only elements of nature on my side.

Faniliar smell of autumn that reminded me
just of who you were-
when you were by my side,
your face made the heartache better.

My secrets were once birds that hadn't taken flight,
you caged them.

Photos of you glisten,
Resting in an undiscovered refinery 
months worth of "I love you's"
wasted by lies

How nice,
I'm losing my mind.

I've called you "my love" everywhere in writing.
Nobody knows, nobody hears 
what I was witness to.

A bird had once spread its wings
from my heart to your's.

Nobody sees,
Nobody can stop.

I loved the words you'd sew together just for me,
Turing "hello" into a song 
embroidered by sharp wit and
cutting edge promises.

My friends heard me talk like,
some girl in love-
when we belonged to one another..

Hair fell down my shoulders in light brown streaks, eyes were too bulbuous,
and an obnoxious shade of blue.


I'm aware,
she had pewter locks and silky eyes.
told better jokes rather, she laughed at
all your fruitless attempts to tell punchlines.

For her,
I hope you don't hurt the one you love now,


A bird creates a nest for my heart,
inspires me to take better care of it the next time around.

Nobody sees,
how I try to avoid the heartbreak,
but misfortune snaps off in pieces
and lands in my arms
expecting someone to raise it.

The loneliness when you left
made me ill,
would have done better opening the blinds,
and slipping out of the covers.

But I laid there and wept
as if I was a spoiled child,
with a new toy that was taken away.

I suppose,
this is where I mention I was one of many dolls
upon your shelf,
you'd let gather dust.

Began to develop a sense of paralysis,
just from mention or sight of you.

You said to take care of myself,
but I don't think you meant it.
Because the ones such as;
my brain,
my heart

are always being neglected.

Dawn is a good friend of mine
While, day is just an acquaintance.
A respite from my mind seems ideal,
but that comes from setting my head ablaze.

I wore the brightest shade of Hell on my lips,
with a desire for Heaven under the eyes.

Had the desire to be a good person
so, from a young age-
I began to hurt myself instead of other's.

Mother once told me--
I'd put bandaids on the wounds of friends,
but I'd let scrapes bleed,
and drip down my ankle.

Father told me I was a hard worker,
I felt ten again.
Meeting his compliment with a blush;
he doesn't commend just anyone,
but my fingertips in that instant- burned.

Loved the sun as a girl,
spent hours under it-
now I can't stand the heat.
Even when I had to make appointments
for my father's love
those days seemed longer,
my skin younger.

Found a way to love the sky I'm underneath;
sky blue pill sertraline,
and white cloud- abilify
allow my brain to absorb sunlight once more.

& they tell me of a God who loves me so,
but my cheeks burn,
as skin melts off the bone.

And I was euphoric—
a star that burns incessantly,
taking up too much mass.

Red giant that encompasses all,
suffocating in the process,
exploding.

I want to be a good person,
but I don't feel human at all.
I'm rediscovering how to love living,
just the same.
Burning brightly,
unapologetically,
as a flawed being.
With passion that makes
smoke rise from my mind,
and flames in my hair.

Brain doesn't work the way i want it,
and I can't figure out how to loosen my grip on those broken parts,
I've collected.
Nor let love "heal" me.

Those parts are no good when I can't build
anything worthwhile that makes this easier.
The thought to resort back to rubies dripping down my skin,
opened back up
& it lets the sickness have breathing room.

The wounds not needing sutures,
but time-
for scars to remain.
Another way demons flow in through my veins.

Slits on the surface of my body,
distress the canvas that is my skin,
I'm trying to be okay again,
trying to not let the darkness in.

But each time I destroy myself,
in attempt to reinvent the brokenness.
I show everyone I hurt,
but I can't recall what the reason was.

Used to imagine dying was so simple,
but you don't become a ghost with suicide.
There's no need to hold onto it;
let the pain go,
You don't haunt the walls,
or sob for the living to hear.

There's no cure for what ails me,
but I'm trying to remember how to survive
and have a heart that beats happily.

When wisps of dandelions lay still in the blanket of your hair,
and your eyes can no longer say I love you,
without your lips moving.
I know my world has ended.
We stood on the porch
with the wind chimes blowing songs through my ears.

There's still something there through this Armageddon. I recollect the curve of your smile or the shape of your face
in every single pool of water I come across.
Your eyes had a haunting quality about them,
as they look through my hollowed out frame,
and see what wars I've fought.

It was your time darling,
your time I bought.

I know,
my world is ending.

The skin of strangers bone's looks dimmer,
and your heart looks darker.
When it's revealed in the quiet of our room.
That distorted haziness your voice gets when you're tired, is there all the time.
I can never help but wonder what I did wrong.

Asteroids come hurling towards me
at a thousand miles an hour,
The world is ending.
Just as predicted.

Where are you now?
Clairvoyant and always knew just what to do.
What happens now that I've been left behind.
What happens now that I can't pick up the pieces?

Your promises never looked more beautiful,
than when you couldn't keep them.
Lies never seemed more eloquent
than when you couldn't stop telling them.



Your face it haunts me.
Your words they weaken me.
Your hours we devoted to one another- cut through me.

I'm not afraid anymore,
to do this alone.
Let the flames engulf me,
let my skin hang loosely from the bone.
Let me drown.
Let me fade.
Let me waste away.
Let me be reborn.
Let me live again.
Let me find a way back to earth.
Let my soul go on.

There was a time I thought of adoration
when mention of you,
but it's now replaced with bitter resentment.

In the miscalculated performance,
you couldn't be faithful.

And now I see-
dandelions are just weeds.

And now I see-
I see everything.
The honesty your spirit lacked,
the lies you spoke from cracked lips.

And the venemous kisses you placed upon my skin,
I was poisoned- to think I saw everything from your perception
and ignored my own crumbling world.

Now, we are nothing.

There's something honest in hurting enough to display your brokenness like an archive.
There's a wooden fence in the backyard that leads to a small pond; frogs croak, the southern sun pulverizes our skin. I used to imagine sneaking down to that pond late at night, slitting my wrists. I was suicidal, I'm not sure if I am anymore. It played out so beautiful in my mind- almost how Ophelia drowned.
      Water lilies cover my dying face, metaphorical really. Water is dyed a maroon color and my skin has the life drawn from it. This was the summer my family welcomed a new child and all I could do was devote time to my demise.

Hallunicuated hearing my mother's dissapointed words scold me.
She's a ghost and I still  wanted to trade places. My father got re-married, I lost even more of my mind. Hysterical tears and maniacal nights with the same songs on repeat. I tore through my skin like a dying garden, hoped for death like someone with nothing. I have so much; my father, my home, my sisters. I felt I didn't have anyone.

Found solace on my skin-
writing novels, not stories.
Brick surface, room on the right where I built walls with no desire to fight. Large window with the vast world outside, but I never participated. I'd weep until, the sun awoke. I'd swear the moon warned me to quiet down.

Bled so much,
I could have saved several lives
instead, of trying to take my own.

Living near the ocean should inspire happiness,
remaining caged in my bedroom,
I hear the ocean call my name.

A siren draped in golden satin with red lips,
she combs my hair for awhile.
Moves her hips to an old crooner's song,
that plays in my mind-
the sun is so full of ****, so full of lies.

Telling me, "I'm gonna be fine."
Why's it always in my eyes?
Everything’s just "fine" for the sun,
loved by everyone.

She is mocked by its presence,
she does what you wanna do.
Sings a solid hymn with the understanding
in life,
nobody wins.

The siren kissed my hand while,
taking pins out of her hair.
She unfurls the waves of an ocean-
revealing a black case with red felt
in her arms.

And she sang,
"The sun will come,
I will melt."

Red felt held
two ethereal stones.

"Sweet sadness cannot be escaped,
you are not fine,
this was only ever fate"

I've tied the  stones around my ankles,
the brush is in my hand.
I feel the coolness of her hair in my palms,
my hands wince from the pressure upon
my face.


The sun is just a lesson never learned.
Feel the sadness lift,
before I can rush ashore,
it's too late.

"Come
sweet sadness cannot be helped,
you are not fine,
this was only ever fate."

To love you,
meant seeing your reflection in pools.
Who does love have?
A sunset doesn't even remain,
and stars die nightly.
North of here,
love has nothing.
Autumn is on it's own,
winter sits upon a cold lonely throne.

Only love is left to plant seeds,
in the hearts of spring.
Metaphors burrowed in chest,
it's a relief to smell long- distance.

It's a similar burning sensation,
just like that familiar place hell-
that you put me through.
Prisoners with their chains are always breathing like
they're living
but they're only surviving;
inhaling smoke into their lungs.

We've all come to find,
peace on Earth,
is only in our mind's.
And I've come to realize-
I'm chained to you,
forever in binds.

Fingers shake clasping a camera between them,
there's no film in it,
just an urge to capture fragments of time
before they decompose
into a grave of forgotten moments

Inadvertently,
I speak of my own funeral
in the present tense.
My frame resembles a cadaver
in the summer months,
limp from depression
but encouraged by mania

Fingers shake,
causing an earthquake between the fault lines of my palms
close my eyes and I've become a paperboat
floating on a pond,
cattails brush my edges
where incisions were made
they dazzle with coats of glitter
and star stickers

Like madness pirouettes through flames,
the wet edges of pages
are destroyed and what I was made of
could not remain.

such a gentle color,
maroon is under the starlit night
I am fragile,
but not enough to crumple in your grasp.

Sickly creature found
clawing up the rocks
with hell below,
there isn't a sound.

She is a girl,
but resembles a ghoul.

How sad it is
that she couldn't smile,
she never found living worthwhile.

You-
as a human being,
have morality to make her feel loved
even if you never meant it.
You- as a human being,
benevolently take advantage of vulnerability
and see it as doing a favor.

You're the patron saint,
savior for suicidal girls everywhere.

Her frame looked beautiful stretched out,
skin was the perfect canvas
to plant unmeant kisses,
matching the color of her underwear
you'd never see.

The bones fashioned into a bed
you lay in,
again, it isn't a sin
when she's barely breathing.

Seething with melancholy,
tasting the despair on pouted lips.
You had *** with her misery,
and ****** when she had unmoving hips;
Saw the lines up and down her thighs
so he cuts the ****-
and became a decent person by “loving”
a girl who didn't believe she could be.




Just the distance between a ceiling fan
and chair held her back,
from being free.

She’ll make up another one like you,
or assume the worst of everyone for the rest of
the days she decides to see.
Rests in her own bed
re-living the grip of your hands
reaching for her pants

She’ll bare a toothy grin in your direction,
make a joke about suicide or hoping to be dead
and you'll never know what to say-
just that you can find blame in everything,
but what's inside her head

But even with you there-
she's always alone.


No need to be held and caressed
as if it will subdue the demons that rest inside,
or that she'll wake up the next day no longer depressed.

Put that sad music to rest,
dressing her sorrow in lace,
paints her face,
and collapses farthest from grace.

See you in the twilight,
every night that my eyes are closed.
Your skin glows,
hands as soft as I recall.
Hair is still the same garnet shade-
you look beautiful.

Please, don't go.

I know, it's selfish-
you give life to greenery,
and flowers grow from the ashes.

Sickness no longer ravages your body,
I want you to come back to me-
the stars don't shine the same way,
every cloud remains looking gray-
they took my sunshine away.

Breaths shouldn't run out so young,
my soul wants to speak with your’s.
Where we divide the vicinities of  Heaven and Hell,
love of mother and child lasts an infinity.

Met with blue skies above our heads,
greenest grass under our feet.
there's no race in the sands of time,
your heart still beats
& you smile.

This moment ends
and the time spent together transcends
into the unknown,
when the sun glows through my blinds--
I'm left with just the ghost of you.

Mother, I want this sorrow to leave
if you can't come back, please stay in my dreams,
your spirit gleams among the horizon.

Change
Frightened
Silenced

Dear Death,

She was not ready. Though, born with overcast under her eyes and frosted lips. Once, lotus petals in early spring. They have now cracked and begin to wilt. There was much more to speak of; rigor mortis sets in as they begin trying to find me. As this body was a vessel- I inch away from the scalpel.
We are unrequited lovers. I weaken them while, you sweep them off their feet. They're always infatuated with the scent of your cloak. But grow resentful towards the sterile scent of hospitals. She is your mistress now. You will take her, leave me with the ashes.

And I'll hold nothing, but they blame me for what you've done. You're the thief, I'm the devil's advocate for disease. I loathe yet, love you for all your ruthlessness. Teach me how to be that powerful. They've come so close to finding me and I must fade, but we'll meet again.

Cancer

Autumn Of A Broken Heart



You spoke like a true gentlemen:
“Hate me for breaking your heart”
Anger held itself stable in my clenched fists.

I've a heart,
I keep on display,
the one with many sutures in it.
I've begun to aclimate to this idea of survival-
woodldand creatures tear into my ribs.
Taking what they must to survive
those trees have more of a right to live than I.
They've been here before, hearing a young girl weep
and a man of his word promise to never come back.

I've eyes,
displayed in a case.
The shade of reality is so bleak,
that I've sewn on my own eyelashes
to fan away any realism.

Imagination is my friend, yet a forlorn enemy
all at once,
the calls end along with the saturation of happiness worn
as a ring around my mouth-
but I taste passion fruit upon my lips.

It began to rot
and so does the flesh of every good man I’d known,
he lays in my arms,
a pile of bones.

There's a singing wound upon my hand,
obtained from a skirmish with rose bushes.
A row of sopranos upon my right arm
await their turn,
altos sing melody this time.

I've always admired blood’s crimson shade
if that makes me a sinner,
so be it.

If writing my sincerest feelings upon sheets
then wrapping myself in them
inspires me to be a ghoul, so be it.

Had wanting happiness splashed across my face,
like freckles kissed on the flesh from strobes of the sun-
makes me naive, so be it.

God thinks all suicidal individuals have an
impeccable sense of humor,
so be it.
Satan is bound to believe he's the one to drive
someone to commit suicide,
“he becomes more powerful”

So be it.

Roses In Spring

His voice has the same qualities as a locomotive
words engorge my jugular to be so easily cut across.
The girl who is caretaker of this soul, she fails.
She doesn't light cigarettes or catch the residue of smoke in lemony stains upon the walls.
Why poison your lungs?
When oak lives in the backyard that kills your kneecaps.

Standing in a powder blue dress
matching the sky, matching the call I'm making.

He never responds in prose,
just in the growth of roses.
Handfuls of amanita phalloides in my palms
trade pulling my own roots
for mother nature's.

Knowing he sees me as I pirouette towards my own demise.
Never responding,
dusting myself off,
gave an earth shattering grin.

As a younger girl I believed in me,
and he existed as well as honeybees did.
Cherry blossom lips became mine as I grew older,
and my eyelids painted like a hummingbird's feathers
pretty boys and girls asked about the weather
and I awaited your response, but it never comes.

Just in the vague appearance of the sun.