this is not insomnia
this is something much worse
it is the one day in a blue moon where it hurts to sleep
sweat coats your skin and hair
you have a lot to do but you do not seem to care
a thirst that can never be quenched
an inclination to walk outside but the door is locked
the one breeze that brings you solace halts
the friends drift away without a sound
i am inevitably alone tonight
i will not make it until six o'clock

they tell me to get out
see the world
make new friends
take some photos

but it is hard when it is
one in the morning
and you're stuck in slumber
and you can't stop crying

i feel too hard with movies and books
i continue to let things control me
people tell me to be positive
but i listen to the night only

sharp daggers cut across my body,
ruthlessly with no relent,
although it leaves no mark.
body heat kicks into overdrive,
ripping me of the numbness that
everybody else suffers.
a cold blooded fish dives into shallow water
while humans around her surf
the icebox is her home and she knows it
it may be where she wants to die

eyelids encrusted in black
body bound by bags
everything worn was dark
a motif waiting to plunge apart

pining over a seventeen year old ******* addict
tediously torn by therapy
until the tears shed caused the blackness to die
to completely shed
begotten by the beauty of spring

but it is believed that you
were the true cause
of this baptism

that is what the girl says

rims of golden curls
hover above your head
while chesnut spaghetti strands
coat mine instead

underwater your eyes are crystalline
like a true blue green i've never seen
but mine fade from brown to black
never once emitting a gleam

your shirts smell like fabric softener and cigarettes
which i often smell outside
and everything we've ever done
crashes into my mind like a riptide

do you see what i see when i look at you?

my nerves peak at the height of airplanes
hands become imprinted with the mask of sweat
the disgusting feeling that you just want to rip off your skin and cast it into a trash bin
has now arrived again
is this my soul saying it is time to shed?
but I've worked so hard to grow the skin I'm in.
i fear that once reborn i will not posess
the qualities of being strong, poised, and compassionate
i fear i will wilt and drag myself out of bed with the newness whereas others may describe the feeling of being reborn as classic, refreshing
but I just see it as a waste
all of these bricks i have stacked will be demolished
and another start begins again.

once upon a time their words flooded his petals
and sparked a waterfall
cascading solely down

the stem that was his mind
had been picked
ripped, torn from the roots
cutting the circulation between his thoughts

just before it rushes over the edge
a human picks it up and carries it ashore,
putting him in a cup of tap water
without knowing the method was temporary

the deep sighs of time cut into his petals
like ravines and trenches
the stem has inevitably grown less immune to tear
but no one told the humans to be careful

do not let your landscape change you

you are a flower
you have fallen into ravines and waterfalls
and torrents of rain
and down steep hills

but you started stable
i know you did
and you will come full circle.

i am in an electric swimming pool
with the water dancing and bursting
into turquoise sparks of turmoil

although
it is nighttime, humid, hot
times like these i overthink
and minds like these go into overdrive

they dart around like tadpoles
in the shallow grass of the yard
except they are figments, fragments
of my anxietes and fears

one of them catches me staring
they are insidious
he attacks my nerves
leaving me defenseless against my fear

i am afraid i cannot sleep
for one of them will beckon me
they want me to accompany them
on their routes through the unseen world

i feel like dying so this is a gift
but i would rather die on my own terms
than be forced to by something that does not exist