My heart rose and fell with the tide of your shadow,
I tied a noose around my memories,
wrung every bit of emotion out of their delicate pages,
trying to figure out where I went wrong.

Empty drawers and broken promises,
I ache for a warm body beside me at night

I feel broken and bruised and used and abused
and I still don't know where I am.
I used to look for you for direction but now we are separated by much more than distance.
Everything seems strange and unfamiliar,
and I am so alone

A beautiful boy,
with eyes like emeralds,
and heart full of sadness
deep enough to break boulders.
I wanted to heal his scars,
but I suppose
I should worry about my own first,
because Jameson bottles,
are not the best medication
but god it tastes so fine
and I wanted you to kiss me,
the way I kissed you,
but we don't always get what we want
*no matter how bad I want it

When we talk, collectively, about being
equal
there will be someone who asks,
"What is that? How can you say,
that a women should be entitled to claim this violence as their own,
when men get hit by women, too?"

1 in 4 women in college will be victims of ****** assault,
and too often men will ask,
"but what defines ****** assault?
if a girl gets her
*** grabbed in the club
is she the 1 in 4?"

I haven't yet heard,
a women ask
"but what defines ****** assault?"

Sometimes I feel like I was born knowing,
how to make myself smaller
so that no one could see me,
looking down at crosswalks,
and stoplights,
trying not to make eye contact
with men looking at me.

I know what it means to be sexually assaulted,
and how this comes in many forms,
all of which
are valid.

I have had my shoulder grabbed and shaken violently
by men who claimed to love me,
I have been struck in the face,
by men who told me they wanted me to be their wife.
I have been threatened to keep things men did to me a secret,
or I would be hurt in my sleep.
I have had my cellphone confiscated, and the landline disconnected, so that I could not call for help when my father would drink too much.

My story is not unique,
this 1 in 4,
is so common.
you will look into the eyes,
of women who live with these traumas on their shoulders,
you will not see their weight but they will see
the ignorance in your words, the dismissal of their own
when you ask
"but what defines ****** assault?"

I gave you everything
you said you wanted,
and more
but none of it was enough
because it was all from me
and I am not enough
for someone like you.

It's a normal night,
and I,
got off my 8 hour shift,
feeling nauseous,
and
distant,
and I rode my bike back to my
house
but it's not really my house,
it's his house,
because I got evicted from my apartment,
and he took me in.

And I love him,
and he has never hurt me
the way you did.

I'm sitting in our bed
and the words are
getting caught in my throat,
because
I realize that I have no idea
how to have
a healthy relationship with someone.

Tonight we fought about
leftovers,
because I was going to eat
the food I made for us last night,
and he took it to work,
not thinking I'd mind,
and I was exhausted
and didn't want to cook again.
We fought about leftovers,
and these are
normal, silly fights
that normal, silly couples have,
and I love him,
and we share a bed and a home,
and our leftovers

and I think about how,
I will probably never fight with him
about kissing other girls,
or
making me feel worthless,
or
not putting his hands on me.

I think about how,
I trust him,
and how
he trusts me,
and how
strange that is,
because I have never known a love
that does not
make me want to **** myself
for not being enough
or being too much.

It's Monday night,
and it was a bad day,
in a bad week,
in a bad month,
and I'm waiting for him to come home,
because
he works late,
and when he comes home,
he smiles into my shoulders
and tells me how much he missed me,
when we had woken up next to each other that morning,
and will fall asleep together this evening.

And I think about how I love him,
and how
I have not known a love that is not possessive,
a love that is not abusive,
a love that does not make you feel like,
you want to take out your heart, and
set it on fire.
I have not known a love that does not,
ruin you.
Until him.

And I'm drinking wine,
to recover from my
long day,
but not to blackout,
not to forget who I'm in love with,
not to forget all of my petty
that only alcohol can dissolve.
And it has taken me time to not be
dependent
on poison to ease
my life.

I ate my dinner without wanting to
throw it up,
afterwards,
without thinking about,
the space it could take up in body,
without thinking how,
I will look in the morning.
And it has taken me time to learn how to
re-love
my stomach
and un-feel
all of the guilt that food used to cause me.

And it's days like today,
when it was a
bad day,
and I felt like it's weight
could throw me back in to
bad days,
but I made my dinner,
and I drank my wine,
and I thought about how far I have come in the past year.
in the past two years, three years.

There are still nights when I feel you ghost hands,
wrap around my throat,
and I still have nightmares,
about how scared I felt when I was with you.
There are still scars on my body,
and my heart,
from the places I've let
other people hurt me,
but I am growing,
and I feel myself getting stronger,
and my heart getting fuller,
and my eyes getting brighter
even on bad days.

Your memory flickered
in my head,
like a candle light.
My heart is bruised,
and my words
have tasted bitter
in my mouth.
Rolled your name
over my tongue,
tasted like tobacco.
I ached for you,
like I ached for a cigarette
but those are two addictions,
which I must quit.
I took your pictures
all down,
tried to forget the soft words,
and sweet nights.
You stained my sheets,
like you stained my heart
with sweat and kisses and words
You will stay in my bones
for as long as I live

120°
burning pavement,
burning heartaches,

too hot for love,
too hot for loss,

close all windows,
all the blinds,
doors locked,
hiding inside,
like unprepared neighbors on
Halloween,
lights off.
Waiting

Waiting for winter to come,
no snow,
but
no heat.

Waiting for
rivers,
and
lemonade

Waiting.

Go to work,
come home,
run the AC,
go to work,
come home,
run the AC

Three hikers died here last week,
just trying to get some fresh air.

Waiting for the fire to stop
Waiting

Wither my bones so narrow,
transparent in the moon light
fall onto old practices,
still preaching the new
I am beginning to walk my fathers broken bottle footpath,
the shadow creeping
just beyond the door.
Look into your casket locked heart,
grief ridden dampened mind
and would you not find a piece of you so murky,
no light could cleanse it?
No, we are all the same.
Me and the father who broke me down bruise by bruise,
beautifully tragic whiskey sip,
until the stomach would burst,
and ribs would crack,
but we are all the same.
You and me and my fathers drinking problem,
and the man who leaves after he ***** his nightly score
and the girl who seeps her feelings onto a page of words like she seeps her blood onto her sleeve
and the mother who coughs up pills because she's too afraid to die tonight
but not tomorrow,
tomorrow she will be brave.
Tomorrow we will all be brave,
and one day I will be brave and I will swallow the pills,
and in them will be the guilt that has lasted me 7 years,
and the anger that has lasted me 8,
and the regret from the boys that left my bed
and the tears that I shed for them
and the self loathing of not waking up someone else,
and bad tendencies of coming on to strong,
when I've always been so weak,
and the frustration of to many broken mirrors,
and cursed photographs,
and how his hand felt so much like yours when they wrapped around my throat,
and the way I couldn't breath felt all to familiar
And when I swig all this back,
and chase it with some gin,
I will be on my way to happiness.
And you will too,
and maybe my father,
but he would probably chase it with whiskey.
because we are all the same.

I grew up in the cabbage patch,
224 rows of deep roots to care for.

You were born on the first boat your father ever owned,
and his father before that.

Two legacies that would never intertwine.
Oil on sea.

I had two sisters and one brother and we were all destined for the same life of dirt and hard work and fresh baked pies.

Your only child complex made you a trophy son to all your fathers drinking buddies. You swore you could almost smell his pride leaking out his mouth when he would talk about the fish you caught together the past weekend.

I walked in narrow steps with hunched shoulders and I was just trying to find the elevator when you turned my whole existence upside down with your shoulders back, head held high wide stride.

I wanted to gather myself and run away, I would have rather been anywhere but in front of you. My feet were glued to the ground and I couldn't tell up from down or day from night all I could see was your soft hair and your soft skin and your round eyes and the way they looked at me like no one had ever looked at me before.

You were the high tide and I was a cesspool. You came and went as you pleased and what you gave to me in passing I would hold on to for years. I lay stagnant and fermenting in my own thoughts and you had the entire ocean in your fingertips.

I watched quietly as you sped through mania and love-stricken grief. I would watch you start to unwind and dismantle and I would hold my breath as you forced yourself to shatter. No other cause than the wind was too cold or you were scared of the way it sounded when you talked about your future.

I would silently crumble and help you pick up the pieces of yourself and watch, amazed, at the speed in which you could put yourself back together.

We shared a bed and a home and, for a time, a name. We spoke without words and made memories that gathered dust on a shelf.

I loved the silence of snow and frozen ground, you missed warm sand and couldn't stand being away from the sea.

We were unfolding and our shaky foundation had holes that were now too large for me to patch.

We used to sit and talk for hours about nothing at all. Now it's four in the morning and I haven't heard your voice in over three years.

You once told me that we were blight. We tore away at each other until we were empty stalks on a poisoned field.

When you finally left I sat on our front porch steps for almost the rest of the night. I never cried or fell apart, just stared down the dirt road trying to figure out where we went wrong, or if we ever did anything right.

I think some older part of me now believes that we were always in this kind of delusional state. Kidding ourselves with promises to each other about  a future that was built on ash.

I missed my sisters and I sold the house and when I went back to my family's farm the dirt just reminded me of you.

I spent the first night in my old room crying and shaking the bed frame until my chest felt tight and hallow and I heaved from my stomach a kind of sadness I didn't know someone could have. My mouth tasted like ***** and lavender and your shoulders and I threw up until I could only ******* own decay.

I knew the sound of your footsteps, your tossing and turning, your starting to spiral down voice, your hurried walk, your fingers in my hair. It took me so long to try and unlearn these things but even gin couldn't drown you out of my head.

In spring things got better, because my sister had a baby with fat cheeks and small hands and she named her Anna and when she would cry at night I would sometimes go in there and cry with her.

I think about the boy with the ocean in his fingertips, and my silence on his tongue and I whisper to Anna that people are messy and I'm sorry she has to learn this someday.

I look down a different dirt road and wonder if I'll ever see your soft curls again. I wonder if you've found another person in this world, and if she is as plain compared to you as I was. She probably is. I wonder if you're running your fathers fishing business like you said you were going to, like you always knew you were meant too. I wonder if the sea smells exactly like you remember. I wonder if you're happy. If your fits of self-destruction have stopped, if you're still scared of being alone.

You were the whole ocean and I was just a girl. I didn't know how to be with you anymore than you knew how to be with me. I watched you in awe and I think I always knew we were never meant to last.

We were cracking from the start, but man, the way we shattered was beautiful.

Oceans ebb and flow,
as do I

Sometimes I think that I will drown here.

There are falling cliffs on the coast of California,
and I still don't know if there is a difference between sand and stone.

I used to say his name out loud when I was alone just to see if it still tasted the same.
It did.

There's things beneath tons of water that no one has ever seen.
There is no light to see them, anyways.

I'm the only one who has ever thought my eyes look like the ocean before a storm.

I don't own a record player but I have four records and I can't use your turntable anymore.

Candle light,
oh love
it burns within us,
roaring fires
heated from the core,
always.
Timber plenty
in our woods
hearth
worn and black,
but strong enough
to endure
many more winters.
Oh love,
our fire,
will not go out
anytime soon

That home is not a place it's a feeling. It's a feeling that wraps you in warmth and when you get there you know, because how could you ever feel like you feel when you're home?

2. That home will change. Home will adapt. You will come to the house you were raised in after being away for a while and you will your hand will shake as you open the door. The bed where you lost your virginity will feel stiff and old and you will realize that this doesn't feel like home anymore, that home is 800 miles away and sits with your stuff in boxes and with a girl with brown eyes and your favorite smile.

3. That time changes people, and time will change you. You will kiss the boy you swore you loved with all your heart a few years ago, just for the hell of it, and you will find that time has changed you both and you can't remember why his lips used to taste so sweet.

4. You will grow apart from people you don't want to grow apart from.   And that's okay. There will always be memories shared, and things you will miss. You will move on and talk infrequently and wish them the best.

5. You will hate how quickly things have changed. You will look back and you will think about high school and the excitement of leaving and wonder why you never fully appreciated where you were in this moment. You will feel pangs of regret, but they will pass.

6. You will bring to your home town habits you picked up while in school. You will take tequila shots in your kitchen at midnight because you're bored and you will shotgun a beer because it reminds you of home, and you miss your dorm room more than you would like to admit.

7. You are not invincible. When you leave school, you no longer have exams and work and parties to hide behind. Life moves slower here. You have to look at yourself each day with a new kind of acceptance, and that acceptance might seem harder here.

8. And you will be more alone, and this is a part of growing up. You went a year without regularly talking to your friends. It will hurt that you are not as a part of their group anymore. It will feel odd that you no longer have people to hang out with everyday. That your best friend is across the country and no longer shares a room with you. That you can't go to the guys down the hall's room to see what they are doing. That you will have days where no one texts you, no one talks to you, and this is all okay. You will learn about solitude and moving on and loving yourself. And of course, you will be okay, you've always been okay.

R-
It was fun,
and I knew you were too good to be true,
and you proved that
when you stopped calling,
with no explanation
or goodbye
and I was confused
and disappointed,
until I saw you around town with another girl,
and then I was just disappointed.

S-
Your face was all to familiar,
because you look exactly like
the first boy I really loved,
so maybe thats why
from the first time I saw you
I knew I wanted to kiss you,
and then I did,
a bunch
and later you acted like
it never happened.
So I pretended like,
it didn't mean a lot to me.

C-
Damaged boy,
I want to kiss your scars
and kiss your face
if only you would let me in.





*Kinda lame but I'm feeling down and this was just some stuff I needed to get off my chest.

I wanted you to need me,
so I slipped into your arms,
and sighed my name in your mouth,
until you did.

I tried to hold onto you,
but my manipulations are sharp
and you shattered.

I was never sad,
only
disappointed
in myself.

I am not
as good
as I thought.
and I might
have needed you
a little bit
too.

To the boys who never loved me,
but pretended they did,
if only for a night.
To the boys who never loved me,
and used my body as a surrogate for the voids in their heart
left by others
or by themselves,
I am sorry.

To the boys who never loved me,
but our nights of passion left memories so sweet,
not in your heart or in the palm of your hand
but right on the tip of your ****
where you remember the way it felt
with your fingers in my hair
and my breath on your thigh.
I am sorry.

To the boys who never loved me,
but claimed they did
or told me lies
to get beneath my fabric,
where disappointed they found,
that I was not the long term answer to their insecurities,
only a nighttime siren,
plagued with sadness
that made you slowly back away
when you got deeper than skin,
I am sorry.

To the boys who never loved me,
I am sorry.
I am sorry that I could not be her,
the one you thought you had forgotten,
I am sorry that I could not fix you,
and I'm sorry that you could not fix me.
I am sorry for the nights of *******
where we tried so hard to make love,
and instead we drowned in our own self pity,
and made resentment instead,
I am sorry.

I am sorry for the promises I broke to you,
and the promises you broke to me
all stemming from the fact that too often
we think intimacy will bring us together
when it has only ripped us apart,
I am sorry.
I am sorry you could not find yourself in me,
or that you found too much of yourself in me,
I am sorry that I was not enough,
I'm sorry for the things I have done to you,
and the things you have done to me.


To the boys who never loved me,
I am sorry.

Wrote and rewrote
six separate drafts
trying to describe
how much I enjoy your freckles,
as well as your company
but I'm scared
because when summer ends,
like the gorgeous spots on your shoulders
you will fade,
but I don't want to let go

You used to ask me why I never wrote about you,
or for you.
I wrote about him,
poem after poem,
about his mouth
his hands,
his solitude.

I never wrote about you,
because I didn't have to,
you were there beside me,
held my hand when I felt
underground.
I notice,
words come easier
when no one is around.

So here's your poem,
thank you,
for staying by me,
thank you
for not giving me
words to write about.

But I've already
spoken word poems
to you sleepy head
every morning
when I tell you,
I love you
I really do.

My mouth is scarred
and my gums
are bleeding out.

My captive words
are decaying me.

The tears of heaven.
That pass my window.
Without a care.
The just fall to the ground.
From great heights
Of invinity.

As the Caffine spreads through my blood.
And the music from the radio,
Continues to rattle on.
About lost love.
And the faith of humanity.

And I hum myself a sad tune.
And look past the window glass.
To the stop signs and streetlights.
That make the ***** city polished looking

And as a single tear traces my hallow cheeks.
That havn't smiled in years.
I wonder.
What this place must look like from heaven.

Puffs of powder.
There is chalkboard lines scraping the counter.
Blood stains lining my mouth.
Long legs mostly showing.
This is not even high enough to be a blouse.
I forget why im here.
Side effects, I need no vice.
My ankles are cracking
But its all worth the fair price.
Thank you for wonder bras.
And the men who need help unbuttoning there pants.
Take me away, this is not me.
I promise this is not me.
I hope this is not me,

Sometimes I wish I could be a seed.
I'd be warm in the ground until I decide to grow up.
I'd spread my wings, and push through the dirt.
I'd grow, I'd be tall an beautiful.
I'd touch the sky.
I'd be taken care of.
And everyone who saw me, would stare.
And I'd be happy.
And even as I wilted, I'd be happy.
Because I still had the memories of the days when I was tall and beautiful.
And everyone who saw me, just had to stare.

I will warp my soul
to conform into your
mouse trap
heart.
And I will only feel
a little
of it's
snap.
I am not the bait,
I am not the mouse
I am just a meer
window shopper,
and I am not sure how
to feel about that

Black circles traced upon my hand,
mind wandering off into space shuttles plunging into the ocean,
and radiation heat waves crumpling our hearts.
Walk away, don't look back.
Wipe away your doubts and drown your regret and keep looking forward,
because at some point the past won't matter
and we'll be single cells again
and we'll find our way back to this same exact place,
so perhaps we should be leaving breadcrumbs
to help the others along on their way.
Paranoia creeping up your spine as you turn around
to face the devil of your mistakes.
Turn around and don't look back. If you don't fuel them they can't touch you.

I saw your truck today,
in the Safeway parking lot
where I was dropping off another boy
with hair like yours
who reminds me a lot of you.
I wished I was coming home to you,
I wanted to feel your arms around me
your lips to comfort mine.
I wish I hadn't hurt you,
I wish you hadn't hurt me,
I went to our creek today,
and sat in the same spot that we had
and smoked a cigarette there,
with a boy with hair like yours
who reminds me a lot of you.
And I couldn't shake the feeling
of longing for your touch.
I would be more than happy,
to wake to your face again
each and every morning
like I did
for two years
but I've really ****** things up this time
haven't I?

Red dirt has a stain,
that goes deeper,
than cotton.
Cactus needles,
have pricked
more than just
my skin.
Dry, Hot air,
has warmed me
in places,
not touched by the sun.
I feel so at home
in the desert

Tonight my anxiety is too bad to sleep
so I am repainting the walls of my heart,
so long over-due
and I have already decorated pink
over the scars you left,
and blue
on the fresh wounds
he cut me with tonight
and I've put both your names in the shredder,
because I just tidied up the living space
and I'm through
with all this ******* chaos.

You collected old coins,
and I collect my mother's Polaroids,
and we both think the other has an unhealthy relationship with holding on to the past.

I have shelves of old journals in my garage,
because I like to remember what 13 year old me was so upset about.
You have a box of Pogs under your bed that you won at recess in 4th grade.

My collections collect dust, and the dust collects dead skin from my inability to stop picking my lips when I'm anxious.

I collect your old words, bottle them up and put them on shelves in long rows.
There's two whole jars just filled with the different ways you told me I looked nice today, and three for all the ways you told me you loved me.

You have your old matchbox cars, and you gave me one on my birthday because it was my favorite.

In my closet back home is my mothers prom dress, and my grandmothers wedding gown, and they both smell only like old clothes and nothing of the sweet scented women who once wore them.

My drawers are filled with make-up and I have three or more of every shade of lipstick there is,
and you told me that was excessive and I told you
that there is a difference between
cool-toned red
and warm -toned red
and it all depends on how I'm feeling that day,
and you told me I was crazy.

I still remember
secret handshakes
and I haven't got myself
to throw out the letter you wrote me the day before I left for college.

I am bad at letting things go,
I collect memories
good and bad
and keep them in my mind just close enough to bring into frame when things get too sweet.

My collections collect dust,
like family photos and knick-knacks on a shelf,
only my mother isn't here to dust them off during spring cleaning.

(someday I will learn how to throw you)

I do not fear sharks,
my claws are sharper than your words,

I will rip out your jugular
and let your blood drip from my teeth

You where the light that went out,
when the wind blew too hard,

the drapes that fly up
when you open the door,

the key that fits in the lock
but won't turn

The reason to breath
the reason to yearn

the steps that lead up
to an empty wall

the undelivered card
with no return address

the baby that got
dropped on it's head

you're the embrace,
that feels ******* pointless

a walk on the beach,
that ends at a cliff

I only miss you,
when I'm full of dread

maybe I'll miss you
when I'm dead.

Virginities, well
we could have waited longer
guess we were just bored

2. Loving you softly,
Two years seems awful short now
Gave it all away

3. Wine coolers and shots
drunk kisses and some *******
needy rebounding

4. Told each other secrets,
friendship turned to more, quickly,
then back to sadness

I swim.
I race, down the ice cold river.
My numb feet scrape the rocks as they hit.
The water trys to consume me.
To pull me down, to love me forever.
I fight.
I gasp for air, only to find there is none.
Im in trouble.
Im going down further.
Into blackness.
The light is so high.
I wonder if I can reach it.
I push up.
I reach the surface, gasp a breath of air, and get ****** down again.
This time I dont struggle.
I am so out of breath from struggleing.
I actually feel my cheeks smiling.
The light from the surface is dissappearing.
But the further down I go, I see a new light at the bottom.
I hit the sand.
And suddenly, I am consumed by a light.
A bright light.
That says its hear to save me.
And I can breath again.
And it feels nice.

Every person in this world has probably danced at some point in their life. They moved their feet and closed their eyes and felt the wind rush around them. Lucky few, have clasped hands with another and twirled and dipped across polished wood, holding someone close. Dancing doesn't have to be with your feet, I've danced a thousand dances in my mind, in my sleep, in my heart.


Now, this isn't about ballet slippers or perfectly timed movements. This is about small moments that touch you somewhere beyond your consciousness. When you're in your kitchen making coffee and you find yourself singing a song in your head that you haven't heard in years, and you shuffle about your morning remembering what it was like to be 9 or 16 or 32 again, and you feel your old steps and your old heartaches and fears and joys. And wishing you could go back for one last song, one last kiss, one last goodbye, one last dance.


This world is all going to end someday. For you and for me, for this planet, for this race. And we can go to work, and go to school, and eat the best we can, and fall in love and fall out of love, we can mourn and remember and follow and lead. We can dance everyday, you just have to know how. And you do know how.

I'd like to love you, I'd really like too.
I'd like for you to hold me, and have me feel like thats where I belong.
I'd like it to be a fairytale. I'd like to want you to save me.
I wish I could dream of you, every night. Have you always in my thoughts.
I wish I wouldn't feel right 'till I was with you. And we were together.
I wish I only had eyes for you, and never thought about that paper boy, or the Man on the moon.
I wish it were that simple because, I do love you. But not even close to enough.
Because It feels awkward when you hold me, and I have never wanted you to save me. I don't dream about you, and when I think of you I get sad. I don't feel right when I'm with you, And I can't look at you without seeing someone elses eyes. I wish I could, I really do. And I wish it didn't have to end this way but it does, and i'm sorry for that.
Please don't think that i'm mean. I never wanted to trick you. Because, I think your a great human being. I really hope you find her, and I hope she finds you too. And you guys will be in love, and I will be a tiny dust particle in the littlest part of your brain.
Because in all honesty, I am just not cut out for love or to be happy

I am going to watch Fellowship of the Ring
and recite every line,
just like I always do,
and instead of feeling like a sad loser,
I will remind myself
that someday I will watch it with another,
who shares my passion,
and like Celeborn and Galadriel,
we will rule over Lorien,
together.

**** rips,
smokey stars,
Three bottles of jack,
one big tent full of sad hearts,
turned warm and glad
through 40% alcohol
and some good hash.
I wished I could stay
as happy as I was
with all those smiling faces
around me,
in the middle of nowhere
with all our separate struggles,
pushed away
by good music,
good ****
and good company.

There is tar in my lungs,
and ***** in my blood,
and if I had some money,
I'd probably be pretty high too.
And I stopped eating,
because I liked the way the hunger felt
and I stopped sleeping,
because I only have nightmares anyways.
It hurts a lot to think about you,
so I replay every single song
that reminds me of you.
And if I had any guts,
mine would be splattered across the floor.
And if I had any brains,
mine would be be smeared on a wall.
But I'm a dumb coward,
so I'll just write a ****** poem about it instead

Just as thoughts can eject the mind
And propel the mouth.
That takes the feelings
out of your heart
Where the roads come to a T
Your sure to meet.
Your fate.
That drops its life at your feet
And you hearts blisters
Will turn to scars
And you'll walk away
From the steamy room.
With the least of the knowings.
Because you are a fool.
Heads hate the hearts
Every box breaks your heart.
Even more.
Shattering.
Until the scars hurt much worse than the blisters.

I love you.
I loved you when we were kids chasing each other around the ranch.
I loved you when I had my first kiss and called you on the bus to tell you about it.
I loved you when we were learning how to do make-up together (you were always better than me).
I loved you with skinned knees and bad eyeliner
and I love you now.

Your mom died yesterday.
I love her and I love you and I have considered you family since we were 8 years old, making gingerbread houses in your old kitchen.

And we have been friends for over 10 years and I have only seen you cry a handful of times and today when we were boxing up your mothers things I didn't see you stop crying.

I love you and this hurts.
And I was at your house for almost six hours today and I don't think we said more than 20 words to each other.
Because all I could say is "I love you and this *****"
and all you could say was "I know."

And I love you, and this *****.
And I can't find any words to say to you, because the truth is that there is very little comfort in something like this. But I don't want you to know that, because I hate seeing you hurting. I don't want you to hurt and there is nothing in the world I or anyone else can do to keep you from hurting.


I love you so much, and this *****.

Words can save,
be saved
stuck in little glass jars,
keep-sake of last winters blues.

Whispered into a pillow,
swallowed after June.
Words follow like a shadow,
box them up,
dust collectors on your top shelf,
they will fall on you
when you reach for something too high.

Words are water, air, earth
drowning in I'm sorry
floating on I love you
buried by goodbye.

Words on post cards
spoke here
kissed onto pages
stamped
it never took a step
lost in translation

Words will keep you safe,
tuck you in at night
kiss you on the forehead
you're all alone.

Words are falling
rain,
rivers,
I am swimming
in the way you told me
how my skin felt

words save,
put your seat belt on
can be saved
I love you from here to here
Little glass jars
I don't want to die any more
Last winters blues
*You've started smiling again

Cinnamon rolling hills passing out my glass confining piece of hell.
Wake me only if your telling me death is closer than 80 years.
Oh dear heavens, give me a taste of beauty, give me a sniff of glory, give me a whisper of love. Give me a sign that things will get better.
The dimly lit candle we ignited last summer, we shoved under our beds with outgrown clothes and dust.
Crinkled wrappers and checker tables and postcards and magnifying glasses.
I remember when I still looked forward to waking up.
Snowball effect of water trickling down my face, gallons and gallons and I still don't feel better.
At this point your words echo off my skin like a canyon of crystal glass.
Hold my icy hands, and hold them close to your heart, in hopes of warming up my cold head. My gears haven't been working right since the freeze.
They say thats what it does to you, but it's all in your head. And the pills are made of sugar, and the monsters are just a bad dream.
I fantasize of a place where there's no floors or solid ground, and your always falling, and matter isn't real. The only thing real is the wind in your hair and the air in  your lungs and the beating of your heart and you are alive.
I'm running out of answers. I'm running out of questions.
My voice is scratchy and I can't scream anymore, my eyes are dry and my heart is raw and my head is numb. I wonder if I've finally just faded into the wallpaper and I can finally go to sleep and not wake up.
Oh dear heavens please, just give me a sign that things will get better.
Give me something to hold on too.

Stepping stone,
so low
I will behold your worth
as no one else does,
I will kiss your bruises,
so delicate
so insecure
brim your gaps,
make you strong again
*I like broken things

When exactly will you stop drawing
in the margins
of your notebook?
When you are 35 and sorting through your taxes,
and it occurs to you
that you haven't written anything but your name
on real paper
in the last 8 years.
and, my god, when is the last time
you used
a pencil?
*Why did you stop drawing flowers?

I ******* love you,
I ******* love you, and I don't know what to do.
When I hold you in my arms, it scares me.
It scares me too care about someone like that.
And when you tell me that you love me too,
It scares me even more.
Because either you're lying,
In which case, you'll hurt me worse than anyone ever has.
Or could.
Or if there's a small chance you're telling the truth?
Then I'm never going to be able to let you go.

Sometimes I just want to run.
I want to run away from it all,
From you,
Just to see if you'd follow me.
If I mean that much to you,
that maybe you don't want to let me go either.

When I look at you,
All I can think is how perfect you are.
And it scares me,
because I think,
what does he see, when he looks at me?

I want you to hurt, the same way I did,
I want someone who means everything to you,
to destroy everything you have,
burn down everything you've worked for
like you did to me.

And at the same time,

I never want you to hurt a day in your life.