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?"

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.

**** 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.

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.

I thought about all the wasted words,
the blood on the walls,
and dry skin
from the compulsive ways
I had to wash my hands
after he ****** me.

I thought about old scars,
new scars,
and newer still scars.
Scars that would burn from the inside,
until my skin would crack
and I would come pouring out,
again.

At least I have something to write about.
(again)

I wrote your name in the sand
knowing how the tide works
and knowing how temporary it would stay there,
and yet somehow
I was still crushed
under the waves,
that pulled you away from me.

You can learn a lot
about a butterfly,
by it's cocoon

And you once told me,
that it's okay to take shelter,
and that you would follow me anywhere,
if that's what I wanted.
But that isn't what this is about.

On the topic,
of adolescence,
and maturity
I believe there is little room
for growth,
when things are going well.

Ironic,
that the times
when we want to erase ourselves from the world,
teach us the most
about who we really are.

I used to scribble your name,
and erase it on a page,
over and over
like it would make me forget,
how it felt to feel your hands on my cheek,
but that's not what this is about.

Pushed myself,
to the edge of destruction,
like a test
of how it felt,
to have nothing left.

And in that moment,
I became painfully aware,
that I had everything,
but was too blinded by self-loathing
to see it.

Self-awareness comes
with a lot of pain,
but opens the doors,
to a lot of happiness.
*and that's what this is about

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 never meant to hurt you,
I never wanted to hurt you,
and I'm sorry that I did.

Remember when I told you that people are messy?

I wanted to fall in love with you easy,
but you are not easy,
You are obsessions and rituals and raw skin and apologizes and I tried to keep you floating.
You were an anchor that I wasn't strong enough to lift.

You had soft skin and I loved the way you felt but you hated everything about yourself and couldn't even listen to me when I told you why I loved you.

And if there is one thing that I should know by now it's that you can't fix someone with just kisses.



I wanted to stay by your side but I am trying so hard to get out of my own murky waters and we were drowning each other.

I'm sorry for everything

I have not been pure
since freshman year
when I had awkward *** with my boyfriend
which ended in tears
and both of us feeling weird.
One Sunday in November
I gave head to a boy who said he liked me,
but he just used me, and told everyone about it,
And thats when they first started calling me '****'
They burned that name into my head
until I didn't believe I was anything else
so then it began,
Different boys different nights,
sometimes different boys, same night
only 15 years old.
****,
they yelled out of their cars when I walked home from school,
****,
they whispered while I was still in ear shot
****,
I told myself when I looked in the mirror
Daddy problems,
I want to be loved.
My purity never meant anything to me,
My reputation was shot before I could say anything
And don't get me wrong,
I'm not blaming anyone but myself.
I learned to stop expecting anything from the boy I'd fallen asleep with in the morning
I learned that I was a tool to be used and thrown away when it was over
I learned that the likely hood of someone liking me for more than whats under my clothes were slim.
I learned that I will never be girlfriend material
I learned that my worth is determined by the boys I sleep with
I learned that I am a ****,
and that is all I will ever be

You forgot how sharp your tongue gets
when it's marinated in
cheap wine,
and how fragile your bones can be,
when exposed to the cold.
/
I clawed my name in your back with my fingernails.
your warm blood trickled down
and stained my carpets.
/
I undressed your body and you,
undressed my soul,
and we moved together as though no one could see us,
not even your god.
/
I found you so broken,
you had forgotten your own name under the
weight of hers.
some people make their living searching for diamonds in
side walk cracks.
gems that are ***** and lost
are not always worthless.
/
your songs at night remind me
how to lose my breath,
I fear sometimes
I will not find it again.
/
Your heart is not a white canvas,
but I will stain it
and call it my own.
/
You felt your words peel up,
and crack like
old wallpaper,
but you let them
escape your mouth anyway
and
sobbed into your hands
wondering what you had done.
/
Broken wings will hinder you from
leaving the ground,
but you won't remember your fracture
until you've jumped off a cliff
//

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.

When there's snow on the ground,
you are the ocean
you are too large,
too deep
for frost to move
more than polar parts of you.

You will struggle to swim to the equator,
but once you get there
suns are high,
and you will be warm and cozy;

But, more than once
the tide will drag you to your arctic.
and I will kiss you through your shivers
but nothing I can do
will stop your blood from running cold.
but baby, it will pass.

You are the ocean,
and ships have recked
to kiss your curves
and love has been made
inside your blood
and one day
you will love the way
you shudder without cause
and you will find beauty
in your hurricanes,
even if that day is not today.

I could right a thousand sonnets
about the way it feels
when your blue hands hug my hips
and your salty lips brush my neck.

So when your lost
in your dark blue,
remember that there are those,
dreaming of your turquoise.
and I am wading in your shallows
to brace your raging torrent,
and remind you
that baby, you are the ocean,
and the storms will always pass.

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.

You say
           You don't
                       Know what
                                       Love is.
                         Maybe I don't
                  Either.
     But when
You say my name.
                                               I have an Idea
                                                         of what it means.
                                                                   To care about someone
                                                                          So much, that when you
                                                                                Go to sleep, they are in
                                                                                      your dreams, and when
                                                                                         you wake up, they are
                                                                                      in your head. When you
                                                                                     kiss, you don't see sparks,
                                                                                 You see images of the future
                                                                             You want to have with them.
                                                                          And if that's not love
                                                                       Then I don't want love, because
                                                                    this is best feeling I've ever felt.

Rolling words, like ***** tires
asphalt slabs, wasted hours,
Nights alone, feels like home,
you were never very good to me.

Broken plastic, phony dreams
pipe tabacco, cracking seams,
slower step, promise kept,
you were always my summertime.

Sparks have faded, ashes cold
gates left open, secrets told
too late to talk, let's just walk
things are easier once I get high.

Wait for winter, wait for rain
or fall forever, ease the pain
too many ropes, it's all a joke
you broke my ******* heart though.

Pull together, shrug the want
friends don't know, friends still taunt
you will break me, you won't save me
No one knows how many times I've tried to die.

But it gets better, so they say,
when he held my hand things felt okay
people leave, hearts greave
I've never been so good with changes

Skys are bluer, my heart is sad
you're doing good, and I am glad
but it hurts to know, you're glad to go
*Like you forgot we promised forever

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.

I felt your warmth leave in the setting sun,
and your eyes glow in the darkness.
I watch your shadow walk away,
so heavy,
an anchor in shallow water,
you will not drown yet.

I have felt your finger stroking my cheek,
heard your breath as you hide your face into my shoulder,
I wanted to protect you,
I tried to stand in front you with a sword flaming with good intentions
striking every bad thought and insecurity,
that came bounding at you
but I've always had bad aim.

I tried to keep you from shaking,
but you shook anyways
I tried to keep your from crying
but the tears still came,
I tried to keep you happy
but I myself am weak
and the monster of depression
has left us both crippled in it's cataclysmic wake.

I washed my hands,
and kissed your forehead
and left without a goodbye,
because I wanted more than anything to help you feel better,
but all I do is remind you,
that you are alone
even when I'm right next to you.
I wish this wasn't so

*I will always love you

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.

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 awoke from your burning casket
so abruptly,
I did not even notice
I was no longer chained to your memory.

I sing again, and laugh again
for everyone to hear,
and far more often
than I ever did with you.
I did not even see the cage you put me in,
until you were completely out of my head.

I do not think about you much anymore,
and I cannot even begin to explain
how freeing that is.

And when I think to happiness,
I do not see your stone scarred face,
or your shadowed skinny torso,

Instead I see train track bridges,
and two beautiful blonde boys
strumming a Baby Taylor guitar.
And countless days,
spent beneath the sun
in a river that felt more apart of my heart,
than a part of the landscape.

I think of the way her smoke rings
could hit your face just right,
and how contagious laughter could be,
when you are sharing memories and a bottle of cheap *****.

The good times, have not killed me yet.

In the same bed I shared with you,
I found love that was greater than you ever gave me,
I found the acceptance I never felt from you,
I made memories that mean more to me than you ever did,
and I found an extreme happiness and content
I could not have found until I was rid of you for good.

To others;
Love lost will be replenished,
maybe not in the same way,
but it will be replenished.
It all just takes time.

I liked the way your hands felt on my waist,
and your fingers felt in my hair
and your lips felt on my cheek,
and your breath felt on my neck
and the ***** felt in my stomach
and the smoke felt on my lips
and I liked the way I got to forget about him for a night
if only for just one night.

A thickness in air,
I yearned for
warmth and
sun.
The freeze is not
a friend of mine.
I will mosey my way
to the desert,
where I will bundle
in the hot sand,
from july to june,
that is where
I belong
I am
cold-blooded

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)

What can I say, when I can't say anything? But there's so much I want to say.




Who can I go to, when I can't go to you? But you're the only one I want to go to.






What can I do, when I don't even know how to talk to you?

Acid-washed,
sipping in the summer
of your grit eroded
hands,

not a mans hands,
not worn with work
but plastic knobs,

you are a boy still,
with boyish hands
and narrow hips
and a selfishness
I can taste in your kiss.
(It's still just as sweet)

Resurrect me,
time-out,
save game data
pause.

You smell like winter blues,
old-west movies
and soft skin.
You're the only home I've ever known.

Pick-axe,
Zhonya's Hourglass,
Feral Flare,
Level-up

Max-level
let's platinum
I'm not ready
to give you up yet

*(I leave in less than three months and I don't know what I'm going to do without you. I love you so much)

Swimming through  
a                                           Dark
Sea, drowning
within my own                  Thoughts
I need some light
but when                             Will
the happiness flow?
I feel as though I may        Break
underneath the words
no one has even said to      Me.

I wanted you to love me,
so that I could love myself
but that's never the right way
to go about things,
I thought your lips
would wash away my heartache
but now
I am drowning in it.

Your hand in mine,
Security.

But is that, all this should be?

            Once.
I could have.
Would have,


            Loved,
You.
Like you should be loved.

          Once.
Would have loved too,
Needed to,
Love,
And be
          Loved,
In return.

But instead I give you,
my insecurities, deceit, confusion,
B
         r
    o
           k
     e
          n
   n
         e
  s
          s.

And when,
I see,
you can't
F
I
  X
it all,

I              run,

Leaving you,

in my



d u s t.

Confused, and broken.
Because
I
am,
Confused,
       and
          Broken.

And none of it's fair.

I've got some more wine,
to forget the words I'm drowning in.
We can share the next glass,
and talk about the way the world is,
and the way it used to be.
When we were ****** up,
making out on the steps of the old elementary school,
and too tall for monkey bars
and too young for bar stools.

I told you about my fathers past,
and you told me about your biggest regret,
about a girl with emerald eyes
and a night you wish you could forget.

I think about the letters I used to write you in my head,
and I used to tell you about this boy and this boy and this boy
and the boy that never was, they boy that used to be, the boy that I have yet to meet,
and all the boys I used to see.

Like the more I said their names, the more I thought they'd disappear,
but I'm just reliving old traumas, re-opening old scars
in a same-****-different-year.

I don't know how to form words, without pulling up old thoughts
and I breath in smoke and it speaks my words with a tongue I'm not fond of.
I let liquor dizzy my dreams, and those nights I sleep the best
and sometimes I wake in the middle of the night and can feel you breathing on my chest.

You're a phantom now,
and ghost of my goodbyes,
the sin of my God bless,
Your unspoken words to late to speak,
when I wished i'd spoken less.

When the nights are fine, and the days are new,
will I still love you like I do?
If you forget about your demons, do they forget about you too?

And when are you coming home, from the war you never left for?
When will I see you holding your head up high?
I think,
you've made me lose my mind.

It's too late to start something new,
and I wish that I could say these words to you.

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

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

Today you turn 19,
and I often think about how much things have changed in one year.
These concrete 'remember the date' days make it easier to recall,
like how I felt on Christmas and New Years and Valentines day.
How last year we went out to sushi, I got you that Perma t-shirt, you and your brother took all of us bowling, and you wouldn't hold my hand when there were people around.

Today you turn 19,
And I remember feeling like a surrogate for you to **** your emptiness into.
I remember the constant nagging of not feeling good enough,
the self-loathing that plagued me through our entire relationship.
Hating other people who had never done anything to me just because they meant more to you than I ever would.


A lot has changed in a year.

Today, you turn 19
and I woke up in the arms of another,
and I woke up with a sleepy smile that lasted into morning, afternoon, and night.
I woke up with his name in my mouth and his lips on my shoulders
and I woke happy.

Today you turn 19,
and I can look in mirrors again
and I don't wake up wishing I was someone else
and I don't punish myself for things that aren't my fault
and I don't skip meals trying to look the way you wanted me too
and I don't hate myself anymore.

Today you turn 19,
and I didn't wish you a happy birthday.

I'm better now.
I'm healthy,
and happy,
and loved.
It's almost Spring.

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 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.

There's a mostly empty bottle
of Jameson Irish Whiskey
sitting by my bed,
where I wish you were laying next to me,

and I drove here alone,
drunk
when you should have been driving me
sober
just like we used to do,
we were a team
you and I,
I fell apart,
and you would always put me back together
and were always there
to kiss me goodnight.

I've got a nasty habit,
of leaving
when I should just
stay.

What's so awful,
about all of this
is that at the bottom of it,
I am happier without you.
It would be easier to just miss you,
and think that the only way
I will be happy again
is to be with you forever,
but we both know
that is far from the truth.

I am no good with changes,
and it's been months
but I still can't believe
our forever fell
so short.

I am counting down the days
'till empty bottles
make me think about someone else
besides you
because god,
it's ******* killing me.

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

I tried to long,
and to hard,
to stand out.
For a while,
maybe I did.
I like to think,
I was colorful
and excited,
but everything
fades with
time and
the dark words
that have eroded
my heart
did not help
slow the dulling.
I like to think,
that once I was neon
but now,
I am only gray.

I look at this blank page.
And wonder where to start.
It wasn't just a stage.
It wasn't just an art.
Before I was a child.
Before I didn't care.
The side effects are mild.
Like aching bones, and new found hair.
I take my place, my rightful place.
The place that I have earned.
My taller shoes, my made up face.
Trying to remember all the things that I learned.
I fell from grace, of course I did.
It happens to all they say.
I ran the wrong, I cried and hid.
I looked the other way.

I look at this filled page.
And wonder where to end.
It was just a stage.
It was just a bend.
I am still a child.
And I still don't care.
I will still get riled.
When at my heart you tear.
I never claimed perfection.
I just claimed human life.
I desired your affection.
But living will suffice

I don't know,
how to turn on my heels
and leave you lonely,
even if it would be better for us both.

And I don't know
how to use the arms
that hold you close at night
to push you away
even though I know I need too.

I am beginning to find too much comfort
in your scars
too much laughter by your side,
too much sweetness in your kisses
and I do not want to be that close to someone again.

Because today I received a letter
thick and important,
giving me my freedom
to leave this town I have lived in my whole life,
and you.
I will leave you too.

I am going to go
788 miles away from your sleepy eyes
and messy hair.

I want to,
I want to fall into a world
where no one knows me,
and I will be cleansed
by the blanket
of anonymity.

I am still figuring out,
how to fold my fingers into yours
without holding on too tightly,
but I will keep your name in my pocket,
your words beneath my tongue,
and I will leave.
I will leave.

I think that you are beautiful
and you deserve
everything on this earth
but I can't give you the world,
because you already are
all I can do is float on your oceans,
and sleep in the shade of your pines,
and lay with you watching the stars
and pray that I am enough

How do I tell,
exactly where my love stopped?

A river pools into the sea,
there are still parts of it there
but most of it got lost,
in something vaster.

Your name still feels like home sometimes.

I will undress your scars,
I want to open you up like the top of a tank,
climb inside your rib cage,
and drive over all of the things that have hurt you.

Climb over,
the peaks that make you feel small,
crawl under,
the barbed wire back streets,
taking shortcuts,
because I don't want to wait, I need you now

You've got flowers growing out of you fingers that only I can see.

The clock in the kitchen is going to tick like it always has,
and the fan is rotating dust in the same half-circle,
and your arms are sometimes around me,
and sometimes they're not,
and the clock and the fan and you don't know
what it's like in my chest when your gone

I shattered glass just to see where it cracks,
I shattered glass just to watch something die.

There's books that I've read that talk about the savior,
they say that his eyes look like running water,
and his voice makes you feel softer,
but I don't think that the blue in someones eyes would make me feel much different than the green in yours.
And I've never cared much for being saved.

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

I woke up to find you still lingered on my tongue,
even though you left so long ago,
I felt your kiss every time I puffed on a black american spirit
and I felt your hands every time the river waters embraced my waist.

I would have gone anywhere with you,
if you wanted to trek the biggest, coldest, mosquito eater infested mountain
I swear to God I would have followed you.

I wanted to trace the cupids bow of your upper lip every night
before I went to sleep.
I wanted to take your hand and put it against my cheek
and kiss every single one of your fingertips
because they create magic
because everything you do is magic.

The feel of your soft hands ghosted on the small of my back
as I tried to push your face out of my mind
through empty bottles that make me miss you even more.

I've loved before and I'll love again,
but what would I give to love you and only you for the rest of my life
and I'll wish on every shooting star
and every fallen eyelash
that some way some how,
I'll kiss you goodnight
and help you fight your nightmares that I know come so often.
I'd never want to see you unhappy,
and I swear if you let me hold you,
I'd never let you go.