I remember useless things
Like how your hand fit in mine
Good to know at the time
But reduced
To uselessness now that you’re gone.

I remember useless things
Like our very first date
How right after we ate
We sat in the parking lot
Laughing a lot
At something you said that I can’t quite recall.

I remember useless things
That hurt to think back to
Like how you used to kiss me,
That you used to miss me
When you used to miss me
Yeah, you used to miss me
Unbelievable now
Just like it was at the time.

I remember useless things
That I wish I could forget
Wish I could forget that you cared
That you were ever even there
Because you really weren’t there
No, you were never there
And there’s something about that that stings
But I forget why.

I remember useless things.
And forget all the rest.
The things that don’t matter
Lay heavy in my chest
And I can’t forget.
Because I only remember useless things.

My poetry journals are history books.
Everything I write fades away
I'm too scared for you to do the same
That's why I won't write about you

I know, from your perspective, how it looks
"I'll write about you", I always say
You call out my lies; I'm to blame
But I'll never write about you

Last time I wrote about my best friend
We stopped talking shortly after
I would never want us to follow that fate
That's why I won't write about you

I'm contradicting what I recommend
I guess if our friendship ends in disaster
And there's a hole in my heart, you-shaped,
It's because I wrote about you.

We’re all just chameleons
Blending into the common trends
Nothings truly original anymore
But conforming is too boring
So then we encourage the parrots
Who cut through with their loud colors
And unique patterns
but they’re too different
even though everyone knows
Parrots are much prettier than chameleons
Soon after they arrive they are forced back from where they came
Different is good, but only if it’s the same as everyone else’s different.

Knowing your flaws confused my heart
so I only wrote about the things I liked about you.
And when words on a page are screaming good parts,
you forget the bad, and become a fool.

Knowing you had good qualities made my head throb
so I only wrote the things I hated about you.
And when thinking about how hard you made me sob,
I forgot the good, and rewrote what I knew.

Knowing the truth makes my body hurt
so I only write my versions of the people I know.
And when my poems read as if the roles were reversed,
I forget what really happened, as if the truth was always faux.

How come anger is so strong?
Why won’t it just let me move on?
Instead of forgiveness and understanding,
Anger is still standing in my way.
I say that “it’s okay”,
Because being mad and hurt
Only makes it worse.

If I move on,
If I step aside,
Will anger let me by?
Will it let me fly on my own
Without holding me down and
Suffocating me with tears,
With lies going into my ears
and coming out my pen.
I don’t want to love them again,
but that doesn’t mean I have to remain
dripping in anger, hurt, regret
I really want to change my mindset!
But...
          not quite yet.

Draw me closer
Paint my scalp with your fingertips
Sketch my outline with your palm
Color in my smile with yours
Glitter glue our hands together,
Intertwined forever.
Use your most vibrant shades to shade in our eyes—
Trace the way they look when we gaze at one another—
Wild, excited, loved.

You may not be the artistic type,
But everyone can draw to some extent.

We all have little magics.
Maybe you can lick your elbow
Maybe you’ve never broken a bone
Maybe you can tie a perfect bow
Maybe you’ve never cracked your phone
We all have little magics.
Maybe you have thousands of rocks
Or you manage to collect buttons instead
Maybe you take care of 7 or more dogs
Or look good with no hair on your head

Because we all have little magics
Our own unique bag of tricks
Used to secure our own humanity
Our own unique way of defying gravity.

How can you feel so much loss for something you never had in the first place

Thought you were telling me what you really felt; turns out you were saving face

Sedate me
Medicate me
Feed me pills until you break me

At some point the spinning has to cease
But when it does, who will I be?
When the constant shaking of my leg stops,
Will I be shoved into your box?
Do I exist outside of my habits,
Or does my identity require I have it?
Is there anything left that’s special about me
When I give in to treatment?

you make me want to burn mistletoe
I hope you slip on melted snow
I’d say you’re getting coal for christmas
but you deserve something more worthless.

I internally write down my love, compassion and such
stuff it all into a bottle, and unknowingly push in the cork— no, shove
Later, it washes up on a beach but without the message I put in
but rather angry words, scarring words I had always meant to keep in
The words reach everyone that was never intended to hear them
In fact, I never even intended to breath them
But now that all my anger has been expressed
Saltwater tears are all that’s left.

I stand naked in the wake of the mirror,
criticizing everything about the way I appear.
Everything seems just a little off, misplaced maybe,
like a baby did a jigsaw puzzle
shoving pieces that don't belong together.
My small chest superimposed on my thick stomach makes me sick to it
My dimples indented on my cheekbones and not next to my crooked smile are anything but picture perfect
The list goes on and on
I criticize myself about everything under the sun for so long
I run out of things to say.
I wish the ugly parts of me would just go away.
I stare into my own ugly eyes with ugly tears in them and scream internal ugly words until I can't take the ugly hurt, and I cry out:
"I don't want to see my imperfections!"
My wish rattles against the glass.
I blink and gone is my reflection,
then all too quickly I beg for it back.

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.

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.

forcing myself through
poetry as my glue
holding onto you
but you’re in my way.
Move.

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.

My room is a mess and so is my life
The clothes on my floor are a metaphor for the
havoc in my head, weighing me in bed.
An endless supply of sweatshirts on my desk chair
remind me of the stress piling up due to
things to do, stuff to complete,
and quite honestly I’m ready to admit defeat.
Perfume bottles gathered and toppled over
they tempt me to try and disguise my chaos--
but I refuse, and then I lose them
so if I ever wanted to try, I can’t.
And instead of doing anything about it,
all I ever do is rant.

my sister's room is a time machine.
I walk in and she has decorated her walls with the memory of our father
her desks covered in the confetti of his life
her jewelry all gifts from him
she wears three necklaces at once because he gave them all to her
her phone case has a picture of him and her
I walked in on her once sitting on the carpet
a picture, a box of ashes, and something silly her gave her all laying in front of her
in her hands was one of the necklaces, and her thumb vigorously rubbed it like a lamp
begging for a wish
a wish she had planned:
bring him back.
my sister's room is a time machine.
she harbors his spirit in her room
because it doesn't live anywhere else.

namelessly, I am a lighter.
used to ignite, and then ignored.
namelessly, I am a writer.
picking up a pen whenever I’m bored.
namelessly, I am a heater.
warming those around me in their darkest hour.
namelessly, I don’t work well either:
and sooner or later I’ll run out of power.

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.

New year
Fresh start
New someone
To break my heart

New plans
To make
New dreams
That will break

New me
Getting better
New you
By a greater measure

New way
To miss you
New way
To wish you knew

Same wishes
That you were there
Same realization
That you don’t care

It’s NOT FAIR.
YOU get to have one.
Someone who watches football games with you
And tells you you’re his baby girl
And retells the story of when you were born
And watches movies with you
And who you can tell things to that no one else will understand.
You get to have a father.
I don’t.
It’s.
Not.
Fair.

Don’t tell me my anxiety isn’t real
When I’m standing in an empty hallway listening to the same echo, each time with less appeal
Don’t tell me my depression is fake
When the mirror in that empty hallway paints tears on my face
Don’t tell me I’m okay
When I hire painters to splatter the walls with red because it makes the black go away
Don’t tell me I’m exaggerating
When even the red can’t hide that the whole house is contaminated
The poison seeps in
Deeper and deeper
Sunk into a corner
Someone call the coroner.

One call,
I need to last one call without her.
One call without her screaming,
Incessant pleading,
That I’m better by myself.
I bury her deep, distracting her with nonsense about how
They probably won’t pick up anyway,
It won’t work anyway,
It’s hopeless anyway,
While dialing each number as fast as I can,
Before she comprehends what each number means
Each digit like a deep breath I couldn’t take before,
As I countdown the seconds until my freedom.
She looms closer and closer to the surface in the space between each dialing tone,
Itching at my fingertips to end the call once and for all.
When a voice replaces the silence,
She freezes,
Out of reasons to continue.
The voice on the other end cannot hear my triumphant smile,
only my stutter, as I begin to speak,
Every syllable another benchmark towards victory.

When I hang up the phone, it is not because she told me so.
It is because I won the battle I fought for so long.

Overdramatic
Overshown
Can’t donate or share
Something I own

Overused
Overdiagnosed
But I know I have it
Looms over; my personal ghost

Overrated
Oversimplified
Not “feeling worried”,
Feeling like you’ll die

Overemotional
Oversensative
People complain
Even when I’ve got a sedative

Understand it’s not an
Understatement
When I say
Anxiety’s complicated.

I hate past tense.
It means that it’s already happened, it’s done, and most of the time it won’t happen again.
Most of all I hate that I’m going to have to learn how to use past tense to describe you.
You deserve to be in present tense.
You deserve to be funny, to be smart, to be passionate.
Instead,
You were funny, you were smart, you were passionate.
So I’m going to keep using present tense to describe the things you did until I can come to terms with past tense.
I do know one thing, though:
You never past-tense ‘loved’ me,
You present-tense ‘love’ me.
And that will never change.

The moon has phases
In and out of the same cycle
Always orchestrating a reprisal
Over a number of days

I have phases, too
Yet they seem more like mazes, who
Don’t know where they lead to.
Unlike the moon,
Who is settled in his ways,
I bounce back and forth in this pinball machine,
Forwards, backwards, sideways,
Through different replays with the same ending: heartbreak.

I never know when or where they’ll start,
But I’m always the one with the broken heart.
The phases come and go as they please,
And always end up blaming me.

Even when the moon is new
And absent from our vision
Fear not; it is merely hidden
Please don’t be misconstrued

We have phases, too—
Maybe good, maybe bad— who
Eventually will end when the universe decides to do so.
Whether happy or sad,
Your cycle will renew
and you will be ****** into a better place,
At the hands of fate,
Towards your ultimate destiny.
You’re right where you’re supposed to be.

Wherever you are, everything happens for a reason
Even if right now you’re feeling defeated
The phases will come and go as they please
But ultimate happiness is the guarantee.

I see you
a preview
of a perfect blight
summer nights
with windows down
and I try not to drown
in acid rain
again

Stop trying to make other people like you.
Because the only people that deserve to be around you are those who liked you before you started trying.
They like you for your raw self, when you weren’t pretending or acting like someone you aren’t.
If you have to pretend for someone, they’re going to fall for the part you’re playing, and not really you.
You can’t keep up your act forever.

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.

How do you think it feels to be held hostage in your own mind?
A cage made of DNA
impossible to escape
being force-fed situations I never want to relive,
or little annoyances shoved down my throat
and repeatedly trigger my gag reflex.
There is no escape
closing my eyes only projects my suffering on the inside of my eyelids,
screaming for help is drowned out by excess noise over the loudspeakers.

I'm not sure which voice is the rational one anymore,
mine or my own.

You used to love the beach, just like you used to love me.
Well, I mean you probably still love the beach.
When you told me you loved the ocean and the waves and how you wanted your little riptide tattoo
I vowed to you that I would take you sometime.
Even though I never got the chance to, I still imagine what our trip would have been like to this day.
I picture us building a sandcastle.
We shape it with our hands because we we’re to lazy to buy buckets.
As we build the base we talk about the dining room where our king and queen eat gluten free pizza and chocolate,
We sculpt their bedroom where they will lay and watch cheesy movies complaining about the bad acting,
We picture the bathroom where they will make bad makeup looks on one another and dance in the mirror
And when we’re done, we’ve built a castle made for the most imperfect of kings and queens.
A castle with empty hallways but lively rooms,
Except the queen’s study where she hides her insecurities in the folds of old notebooks,
Or the king’s bedside table where an old box lives covered in dust except for a few fresh fingerprints, holding faded Polaroids tucked away
In a slightly more careful fashion than the way he tucks his wife into bed.
But us building, we claim not to see the secrets
They’re too hidden in plain sight for us to notice
So we focus on the chocolate and bad acting and dancing.
And then
You complain you’re tired, even though your eyes are wide open
I say I’m hungry, even though I ate an hour ago
And as we walk away
neither of us notice the waves crash over our already flawed creation.

If you find yourself wanting a sign
So you don’t go on by yourself
Don’t you think that wanting a sign
is proof that you should within itself?

selfless until I want you to be
always thinking of me
until you realize you can be selfish by slowly killing yourself
"nicotine is nicotine is nicotine" :
words from my own mother
holding me to a standard she won't follow.

I think sometimes I miss you.
Rarely, on occasion, because
It’s hard to admit,
But once in a while I miss you a little bit of a whole lot.
When I hear your name in conversation it’s easy to brush off
But harder to bury when I’m alone.
Sometimes I’m prepared to miss you.
But I can’t.
For some reason the timing’s not right,
I can’t will myself to cry,
So I choke it down and switch to internal bleeding for a while.
When I’m ready, I miss you.
When I’m not, I miss missing you.

Sometimes things look better blurry
At least that’s what my mirror told me
When I took my glasses off today.
Sometimes things look better fuzzy
Like right after crying, eyes puffy
Because you didn’t really mean it anyway.
sometimes things look better hazy
The truth becomes a little less weighty
And easier to escape.

Sticks and stones
May break my bones
But words will never hurt me

And if they do
You’d have no clue
They leave no scars in reality

Yet in my head
The words they said
Are spreading like wildfire

When I explain
All my pain
They brush it off as satire

Just to prove
What they do
I paint my arms with scarlet

They say it’s me
But in reality
It’s them that are the artists.

Cheesecake only strawberry
Ice cream never sugar free
Candy canes growing on trees
A sweet tooth with endless reprise
We will celebrate your life now as you did each day,
Taking each difficult moment with a pinch of a sweet memory
to make it easier to swallow.
Your glistening smile will be thought of in sorrow,
but also in sugary rememberance of how sweet you were.

you are sunshine
in human form.
i never thought looking at something so bright
could make me feel the delight that you do
when you walk into a room.
usually, staring at the sun would hurt my eyes,
but you are a safe sunshine;
rather than hurt my eyes you manage to widen them as i'm in awe of you,
which,
in my opinion,
is better than the sun could ever do
when my dark clouds roll through and even the sun casts a shadow on me,
you somehow manage to pull me
under your safe-sunshine umbrella,
because no matter the weather,
yours is always up and welcoming
you leave everyone else questioning
how you outshine the sun.

Thought we were on the same schedule
I guess your watch was a little ahead of mine
Overwise you wouldn’t have left so early.

pity drips like warm syrup
reluctant— almost,
sweet to sender,
onto unwelcoming pancakes
flat, absorbing all they can
always leaving extra around
(they can’t possibly hold all there is to offer.)

The girl in the mirror likes to scream at me.
She shouts:
"Your acne is gross!"
"Your muffin top needs to go!"
"Your ***** are too small!"
"God, look at your nose!"
in my old mirror, I could hear her.
but now the glass is thicker.
I like to smirk back at her appalled expression
and say:
"yell all you want: I'm not listening."

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.

Have you ever felt sad?
You’re depressed!
Have you ever been worried?
You have anxiety!
Is your room clean?
You have OCD!
Do you feel like yourself?
You have DID!
Have you ever talked to yourself?
You have schizophrenia!
Are you happy, then sad?
You’re bipolar!
Do you eat enough?
You’re anorexic!
Do you think about death?
You’re suicidal!

Hearing theses scenarios on television
Causes severe, even lethal, tunnel vision.

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.
Then the clocks start counting
unconsciously unnoticed
no one can tell:
not her, not her.
The warning there but under the radar,
Simple to see and quickly discard,
Unexplored feelings left burned, charred
Piles on piles of invisible scars.
After her head has had enough--
Almost as if it was obvious--
The clocks turn carnivorous,
and break down the barriers she bound around them,
destroying her defenses and leaving her defenseless as they detonate the little love she keeps for herself.
Then, there’s nothing left.

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.

If time heals all wounds,
why does each day without you
hurt worse than the last?