Turn the channel but it’s still static
So far away that you can’t hear the panic
And maybe I am a touch dramatic
But that doesn’t mean that I’m not problematic.
Not saying that my whole life is tragic
But having you in it was a little traumatic.
Despite all the times it felt like magic
Looking back now pushes me into a havoc.

I know, I know, I know,
We both made mistakes, and
I know, I know, I know,
We never meant for it to be this way.
I wish, I wish, I wish,
We had told more truths and not buried them,
I wish, I wish, I wish,
we would’ve had more of a grey area.

Extra, extra
Read all about it!
Your daily dose of depression on the front cover—
Or maybe some celebrities just become lovers—
But whatever it is, you know you want to know about it.
All publishers as my witness,
All news is good business.

She wanted to love her
but didn’t know how.
The static in her head was too loud,
crowded commotion that could crack open her cranium countless times,
but when the clocks count soundless in your mind,
What’s the difference?
The clocks turn carnivorous,
and break down the barriers you bound around them,
destroying your defenses and leaving you defenseless as they detonate the little love you keep for yourself.
Then, there’s nothing left.

When I was fourteen, I learned “no” doesn’t mean anything to certain people.
They take that word and twist it, carve it, shape it and play with it until it mushes into “yes”. They do the same with
“Not today.”
“I want to wait.”
“We’re too young.”
“This isn’t fun.”
All they need to do is drag you to a point along the road that you give up, and then “I guess” is what they run with.
“No” is just a sign to try harder, right?
If you can’t get them to “I guess” or “yes”, you haven’t tried hard enough.
And once you’ve done it, you think it’s okay to do it again and again,
On multiple occasions,
Without so much as even asking.
It only takes 1 “I guess”,
Then all the hear is “yes”.

It’s for real this time,
I say.
But if it’s for real this time,
Why do I have to convince myself of that every day?
If it’s for real this time,
Why do I get pushed away?
If it’s for real this time,
Why do they never stay?

You used to eat all the blue M&Ms in the package last.
Now I eat all the blue ones first to convince myself I’m over you,
Yet every time I do
I only think of you.

I'm the poet.
You're the puppet. I
    control
                       where
                                                       your
                                                      eyes
l­ead,
when and where you

                                  read my words
with my spaces and p
                                      auses,
drive you crazy with nonsense clauses
that don't always rhyme.
But they do some of the time.
Or I use alliteration around absently,
leaving you wondering what my next word will be.
And by making it to the end of this poem,
you have proven how poets manipulate your thinking through the use of poetry puppetry.

I’m a hoarder
I keep letters of sorrow and happiness,
Getting high off of borrowed moments from the past that I know won’t last.
My tolerance will grow,
And I won’t get the same high that I now know.
But I keep them anyway, all the momentos from my childhood that cling on to the last hope I carry in my heart from times that were better.
Letter by letter I read them and try not to realize what I’ve lost,
But instead realize what I had.
And even though it’s not the same as it was before the memories bring a smile to my face that I try to keep as long as I can before it melts into a much more depressed state.
Because you can’t think about what you’ve had before without realizing what you lost as well, they’re hand in hand.
I don’t want to be a hoarder anymore.

Poetry is my check of reality,
Where I put my past in front of me
And analyze for hours, using all my power to discover what it was that went wrong.
I wish it didn’t have to be that way,
Because all my scrutinizing does is lead me astray from the path I was meant to take,
accumulating more mistakes,
and in the end I only end up with more heartbreak.
Last time my heart was this broken,
Nothing I felt went unspoken.
Now that the same part of me is missing,
Nothing I feel goes unwritten.

my habits have been away as long as you have
i don't pick or bite my nails in half
seeing as you've been a goner
i don't bounce my leg any longer
ever since you beat it
i stopped stress eating
because you shattered my heart in my chest
i'm on my phone much less

and you claimed it was all for the best
at the time, i never would have guessed.

why would you settle for anything less
than passion
why would you want anything other
than madness
why would you desire anything except what you
can't fathom
wouldn't you be intrigued by something you
can't imagine?

I want to wake up.
So I try to sleep.
Counting sheep,
one two,
what more can I do?
Three four,
please don't fight anymore.
Five six,
I'm going to be sick.
Seven eight,
I start to hyperventilate, screaming the only way I know how
without making any sound.
I breathe in and out, crying out,
'I don't want to hear it anymore
don't make me listen to it anymore
why are you making me listen to it more?'
I pray to a God I'm not sure exists,
I ask for forgiveness,
I beg and plead Him to take my family on a leash
and lead us to victory.
I can't afford to lose my family.

I scream for it to stop.
Everything. Anything.
Can't it all just stop?
The madness, the confusion,
the pursing of my already declining mental state,
which only makes me more irate.
I need the noise, the pain, the way the thought of you used to burn happily in my chest--
I need it to rest.
I'd rather be drowning in the feeling of emotionless internal bleeding than burning from the inside out on your account.
You hurt me once before, and it kills me to let you do it anymore.
Save me or slay me,
but don't just sit, savoring the torture I'm in currently.

If you ask my about my feelings for him,
I'd reply, "non-existent."
If he ever even asked for me back,
I'd reply, "keep wishing."

But if you asked me where we met,
I'd reply "in Washington D.C."
If you wondered where he asked me out,
I'd describe it to a T.
If you inquired what he got me for Christmas,
I'd recite each and every detail.
And if you questioned where we first kissed,
I'd explain the bench and the park all to scale.

And even though I know it's all over, and all for the best,
It's difficult to let go of what we had, and to put it all to rest.

If time and distance tear us apart,
I have to know if it was me or your heart.
If the sand in your toes filled you with some kind of satisfaction I can't match,
If the salty sea left you with an itch I can't scratch,
If the California girls prove me completely unworthy,
If I'm not enough adventure for you; if it's not enough to just hold me
Maybe Cali changed you.
...then I don't know what to do.
   And maybe you're not new.
   Maybe you needed some kind
   of wake up call,
   something that had it all,
   to validate that I am nothing.

Please come back.

Guilt:
The powerful emotion that encourages us to rethink everything. We’re never sure who it belongs to, because sometimes everyone harbors it inside, and other times, no one does.
Acceptance:
Ambiguous, in the aspect that sometimes we convince ourselves we’re accepted something when we really haven’t— and that instance actually aids the acceptance process.
Love:
Melds our hearts together, melts them, and crushes them in the end, in a cruel twist.
Crush:
Someone we almost/maybe love, that has the potential of breaking you, fixing you, or straight up crushing you.

You put words in my mouth through thoughts in your head—
Thoughts that deserve to be head.
Why, just why the hell would you believe your mind rather than mine?
I did everything for you.
Rearranged my priorities,
Took control of some of these
wild thoughts in my brain.
Make time for you.
Kinda upset that time is wasted now
But you wasted your time too,
Arranging a script for me out of your distortions. Go on, take a bow!
You did such a great job at flipping and folding and molding my words into something new.
Anyway,
It’ll be fun to see what I can do
now that I know I don’t need you.

When I was 15, I learned promises can be empty.
They’ll open the door,
Lead you inside.
Look you right in the eyes and lie.
They’ll promise you, “I’ll be back.”
Then they slam the door and all will go black,
Leaving you waiting, yearning for their light.
After a while you’ll learn that they’ve left you for good, and wonder:
“who gave you the right?”
Then whisper:
“who gave you the right?”
Then cry:
“Who gave you the right?”
Then scream:
“WHO GAVE YOU THE RIGHT?”
While your voice and heart crack,
But the simple fact is,
It doesn’t matter now.
Now, it’s not about them. It’s about you.
They left. They’re through.
Pick yourself up, put yourself back together.
Forget about them, throw away the control they had over you before, find the key, twist off the padlock and step through that **** door,
And promise yourself not to go back there anymore.

Your yellow post-its used to sprinkle my possessions with good messages,
assurances,
support.
They brought a smile to my face and a skip to my heartbeat.
But now,
Your handwriting haunts my head and I can’t escape.
Everywhere I look, all I see is your cursive letters and your initial at the bottom of the message.
I crumpled them up after I’ve ripped them off of their page,
I burn them,
I tear them,
I try to forget them.
And the more I try to forget them the more I remember how much it hurt when I destroyed them in the first place.

It comes in waves, but waves no one else feels; not water waves.
I am hearing frequencies no one else can hear, and they are so powerful that they knock me down, face flat on the ground.
When I try to explain,
They all claim they understand but then how are they still standing?
The particles compressing and stretching are stressing my mind, yet my body cannot muster to fight.
I have almost given up flight.
The air isn’t clear enough,
not quiet enough,
I lost hope and I can find it
It’s been rough but no ones buying it
And that’s when I find myself drowning in the sound no one else can hear.

If want was water,
I would be drowning, my head under completely
and my oxygen quickly depleting.
If confusion was cold,
My fingers would be numb and I wouldn't even
have a coat to ward off the freezing.
If youth was you,
It would be slipping away by the second,
And I can't get a hold to stop it.
Now,
my air is gone,
I'm shivering to the bone,
and can't keep a hold on.
But, this is only a poem:
I know I'm not suffocating, subzero, or slipping.
But I can't help but feel like the more I write,
the farther I get from reality
and the closer I get to metaphor mortality.