This country was founded on the idea of being who you are in liberty, yet there are people stuck in closets because the monsters are on the other side and the darkness has become too comforting at this point. The face of death has become too beautiful to want to turn away. We are hidden, dancing around the idea of being hung as perfectly as that shirt that was “too gay”. We are wondering how to propose to the Grim Reaper because at this point, he is the only man who can “make us straight”, at least in my case. Others would give him a blow in exchange for their soul. The asexuals, though, are finding the words to ask death out on a coffee date. We’re all just thinking and wishing. We’re rolling out our blueprints and studying the structure of surviving instead of accepting that we’re different and actually living. The pride that used to live in us died a long time ago. Maybe around the same time we were in the closets writing our suicide notes. For me it was the day my mother said the idea of me having lesbian friends gave her headaches. Let me not even get into how high her blood pressure would rise if I told her she had a pansexual daughter. “Had”. Now I am but a corpse living among the resurrected by Christ and I constantly ask myself when God is going to baptize me. I ask myself when I am going to stop looking like a zombie from the Walking Dead because, ******* it, I never learned the script or signed up for any of this. I never even wanted to be an actress. I wanted to be a singer. I wanted to sing the songs of my love for her and let the paparazzi spread rumors of how I cheated because I’m that ******* hot. Mother, I wanted to be a singer, but you ripped my tonsils out and told me to smile for the camera and look pretty. But mother, have you ever thought of something? What if she’s the only one I want to look pretty for?

i don't have anything to say. not really. how can i when my own bones feel like strangers that pilfered a body when nobody was looking? when i speak, small echoes of some one else kindly pull at my fingertips, slipping under the nail and past the cuticle where it unfolds like sad gods found to be made of origami swimming in a sea of memes. it hurts like hell. and so, i've come to know silence. it holds me. brand new shell. my process, felt.

A friendship lasts longer than impermanent lovers
Which is why the two often merge
I’d rather a soul mate in intimacy
Than one consisting of passions absurd.

​You open the door and a screech pierces your ears, but they're not coming from the old rusty hinges your father never cared to repair. Those screeches are coming from the Rottweilers inhabiting the room your parents once used to rest. The volume gradually increases with each conscious step you take, and as you do, your mind is capturing the whispers of the demons possessing your parental figures; "*******", "good for nothing", "drunken *******", "***** *****" are the offensive terms you learn to use in "self-defense". But is it really self defense if the spewing venom is poison to your heart? It's as if you were a scorpion stabbing yourself in the chest with your own venomous tail to see your ex-lover suffer. You walk in and see acidic spit coming from their lips, and they're just getting burned from the spit of the other. They're playing a game using their words to see who's acid could burn who to death first - but in this game, who's really losing? Are you the loser if you choose to die by the hurt words of your lover or if you killed the one you loved because you struggled to find the words to say you did? You were hurt and you loved them to death - but then you actually killed them. You killed them and now the person you learned to love is gone forever. Now you're dealt with a bad card; you have to learn to love the monster you've mistakenly created. Learn to love the sound of your skin sizzling at the touch of the acid sent from its lips. Learn to love the way it holds your heart in its meaty hands, and squeezes it too hard from the rage. Learn to love the sensation of the fallout: internal bleeding. Learn to love the pain and spread the joy! Show your kids the true meaning of a family portrait, it will then live on for generations to come.

I couldn't tell you
how many poems I've read
about girls in disguises,
girls hiding in their closets,
girls acting like girls,
wishing they were something more...

This is not a poem about wishing,
but a poem of being.
This is not a cry for help,
but a song of assurance.
I am a girl, but I am no feminist.

You won't find me painting
on makeup each morning
for confident clarity.
{red blemishes flourish}

You won't find me tearing
my feet up each night
to look tall and fancy.
{bruises on the heel}

You won't find me wearing
a red push-up bra
for emotional support.
{endless back pain}

You won't find me shaking
while holding a gun
for protection.
{fear is stupidity}

I couldn't tell you
how many girls I've seen
doing these things,
over and over;
girls wishing they were something more...

This is not a poem about hope,
but a form of being.
This is not a scream of pity,
but an equalist view.
I am a girl, but I am no feminist.

I choose to be myself,
despite the boys who call me odd;
despite the girls with envious eyes.
I choose to play video games at 2am
and eat until I feel sick.
I choose to wear band tees to the bar
and go home alone.
I choose to say what I mean
and suffer the consequences.
I choose to wear less clothes,
and sometimes more,
when I want.

I've found someone
who loves me for who I am.
I've found two people, in fact.

There is a boy
who comes over
and I can call him my love;
I can call him my best friend.
There is a boy
who never judges
the boy in me;
the things I do.
There is a boy
who reminds me
a lot of a girl,
who picked flowers with her mom
when she was little.

And sometimes,
I put on makeup for you,
because I love you,
and I want you to know I'm proud.
Sometimes,
I'm proud of myself,
because I got the eye liner just right.
And sometimes,
I like acting fragile
so I can do less work
and watch as you tire in sweat.
Sometimes,
I even shout my worries to the sky.
But moderation is so important
in a time so rigid
with lust.

There is a girl
who is me,
and that boy
and that girl
both know who I am.

I am sick of complaints;
I am sick of the 1950's attitude;
I am sick of excuses;
I want to see action;
and I don't mean a protest.

And maybe you like
being a girl.
Maybe you dress up
purely for yourself,
and no one else.
But that doesn't explain
the things that you say
in public and in retrospect,
as tears fall down your cheek,
and knives glide off your tongue.

I see more of it every day --
girls just like me.
You are only weak if
you believe that you are.
You are only a girl
if you think that you are.
I am a human being,
and so are you.

I am no feminist.