Regular people
Don’t feel this way in their minds.
They must be so bored.

i'm learning to take moments
to pause and observe.
to truly live in the moment
and see the beauty around me.
to memorize the way my friends frown
and smile.
to love humans for everything we are.
when you love others with your whole heart
you begin to love yourself.

I wish I could go back
To sitting in my bunk
Listening to girls talk about
All of life's junk

I wish I could sing
We are Standing on Holy Ground
Just to hear the shuffling
Of shoes all around

I want to look up at night
And not see only clouds
And city lights
But feel only joy and peace; no fright

I want to cry with girls
That I hardly know
And have them say they're there for me
After we all have to go

I wish I could have six days
without my phone
Because even though I'm disconnected
I feel the opposite of alone

I wish I could wake up
Before the crack of dawn
To listen to birds sing
While I hang my towel up and yawn

I want to be there
At eleven a.m.
Singing at the top of my lungs
And praising Him

I want to eat
Mashed potatoes made from a box
And never be able to tell time
For the extreme lack of clocks

I wish I could sleep by the river
And sweat at sports
And walk around at free time
Or go to the basketball courts

But I can't have this anywhere else
Except a little piece of land by the Medina
Where God is love and you oughta been there
A little heaven on earth: Camp Bandina

you told me of
your pain and i told
you all about mine.
we held each
other's hearts and
boldly proclaimed
to love one another.
you loved me
through my flaws
and i loved you
through yours.
but when it came
down to it; you left.
and my heart was split
into a million pieces.
i may never understand why you shattered me
like a glass bottle in an empty alley, or how you got
that power to begin with, but i will not let it ruin me.
i'm going to have to live my life and try to trust again.
i won't let this keep me from finding another soul
that will be able to walk to the same rhythm as mine.
i can pick my pieces up and put them together again.
i have spent my whole life falling and getting back up,
so that's what i will have to do again. i can live through
the side glances and small smiles and avoiding eye contact.
i can live through the 'how are you?'s that end with answers
neither of us believe. i can live with the anxiety attacks that
i get before i see you places. i can live without you.
so i am left
with only one question.
and i know this question
has been asked to you before
because you told me
of the other people you broke.
and i know how it haunts you,
but i deserve an answer.
if you loved me...
why did you leave me?

I didn't see the sunset that night.
That's what saved my life - a missed sunset.
Since then
I have craved the way
The sky lights on fire
Every single afternoon.

I have craved
The light and the colors.
My soul has wanted to feel
The way the light feels
As it dances
On the corners of the clouds.
I want that kind of joy.

So I set myself on fire.
I create those colors inside my mind.
My thoughts dance
On the edge of my body
Like the light in the clouds.

I
Feel
Alive

She sees a reflection
in a blank wall.
She feels a memory
through the touch of her toes
to the carpet.
A blank wall of nothing
is showing
a flurry of somethings.
For not even a wall can be blank.
Every nick to the surface,
every dried paint bubble,
every scar on the wall
tells a story.
That is why she sees
herself reflected
in the wall.
Because nothing is blank.
Everything that seems like nothing
is something.
Every person who seems blank
is filled
with life.

there's nothing attractive about a dead body
maybe that's why nobody loved her
she was a walking corpse

can't think straight
a fuzzy brain
over a blacked out memory
...reassurance...

put your hands on my heart
feel it beat

you bring me to life

Look... at these... spaces... between... my...
... ... ... words... ... ...
This is how my brain sounds.
...
...
...

STOP*

you're making things worse.
you act like you know what's happening in me.
you will never, *ever be inside my mind.
nobody knows what's best for me.
i don't even know what's best for me.
so stop acting like you are what's best for me.

I can listen to
The sound of the snow falling
Next to the silence

i was hanging
by the last string i had left.

i jumped

and you laughed.

I don't let people see
I don't let people see inside of me
I don't let them see the anxiety
I don't let them see it killing me

It's killing me from the insides to the outsides
From the outsides to my surroundings
It's killing the people around me
Causing me to lose my grounding

I don't want to go on
I don't want to see
I don't want to see the pain it's causing the people around me

I don't want to stick around
I don't want to see
What it is causing!
This awful anxiety

And if I stay here
It will tear me apart
Torn into pieces and thrown away
Will be all that's left of my croaking heart

And so it seems
That all that's left
Is to fade away
And muffle my screams

But that's not true
That's not what this is
It's horrible I know
But this heart still has some fizz

And it refuses to lose
It will not stop
I will put on my socks
And tie my shoes

I will walk out the door
And not look back
I will keep walking
Until I pass this horrible black

Because that is what
It will take for me
To make it out
Of this anxiety

sometimes i
think that my
mind
brought me to
the brink of
death
just to
show
me that
i can write
really good poetry

i didn't really notice
when the nightmares stopped.
after all, we were fighting too often
for my mind to conjure much worse.
reality was the nightmare.

digging
a grave
wide and deep

soon

we jumped

i was aware
of this... light
about you

but you never shine long enough