I want to look at you
but I find myself
with closed eyes, staples
sewn against eyelids
and crimson stains
this dialect of innocence.

I am tired of crying pretty for people,
as if my sadness manifested through poetry
is only acceptable because I transform
life into art, paintbrush to verses,
transparency to kaleidoscope
and all the waterfalls in the world
could never drown
dead bodies as if
rose petals camouflage graveyards.

I want to be alone.
Alone with someone, as if
my mouth remains wide open
filling with rainfalls of hypocrisy,
and if someone were to
steal my soul
I'd hide myself inside their
treasure chest.

I don't know what to do -
when my name falls off lips
and into my million mile stare.
Clouded with the distance
and even so, I am so tired of running
from their kisses against my neck,
gold chains against my flesh,
and if the sky could
water our grave, I still wonder
whether roses could grow again.

Let me crawl inside your skin,
as I do not see beauty in people
rather muscle and bone, always
draining the marrow as if
I could continue finding pulses of summer
within this heartless winter.
I always build walls
and given a ball and chain
I will hold you like a hostage -
you're my Stockholm,
I am the syndrome,
and this is us between the distance
and a one time message
because Mercury is falling
through my bedroom ceiling,
and the stars above remind me
that despite the darkness,
we are still here through the distance.