Slip into the shoes you have
Waiting by the door
Braid your hair
Down your back
Let wisps slip out
Whisper in the doorway
No one else is awake
Slip out the door
Forget your phone
And climb the tree
To where you can feel the silence
You can feel the wind
And watch the moon linger
Let your hair fall out of your braid
And your shoes off your feet
And let yourself fall into the feeling

You see terrible things
Maybe you're a child or a teenager
You talk to a therapist
They give you "medication."
You take drugs
You forget.

You get sick somehow, and it's bad this time
You see some weird doctors with titles you can't pronounce,
Maybe you spend some time in the hospital
You see your therapist again
They make sure you're still on your "medication."
You take drugs
You forget.

You're in school again now and you're taking some sort of exploratory writing class
You always end up writing about the same character and you're not sure why
Every time you try and write something else, it turns out like **** and you throw it away
You're too afraid to show your parents or your friends, so you hide your work, and
You take drugs
You forget.

Maybe you've finished school now, maybe you haven't
Your writing class has been over for months, maybe years now
But you still remember that one character, and you pull out your notebook
Looking back, you wish you had tried harder to learn something new in that class,
Maybe tried to experiment more
You put the notebook on the shelf of books you're done with
You take drugs
You forget.

You've been having nightmares for awhile now,
Sometimes you can't sleep at all
You start to keep a log,
Suddenly, you don't want to forget but
You don't want to be sick, and you don't remember what all of these pills do so
You take drugs
You forget

You've grown up with all of these ticks and habits
It was fine when you lived with your parents, but it annoys your roommate
They say you talk in your sleep and you say you're not surprised
All of your books got shuffled around in the move and you notice your notebook from writing class
You promise yourself that you'll read it sometime soon, until then
You take drugs
You forget

You dig out that old notebook and think a lot of that character you always wrote about
They are exactly what you wanted to be, but you aren't now and that upsets you
The notebook reminds you of the log that you kept and you dig that out, too
You really don't want to forget anymore
You feel like part of your mind has been drowned in this stuff and suddenly you care about all of the blank spots in your memories
You spend all day looking at photo albums and reading about your "medications" one at a time
Your mind and body are suddenly your decision, but
You're tired
It's been a long day trying to fill in all the blanks
You take drugs
Your write yourself a note in the half an hour before you fall asleep
You forget, but not completely
Not this time.

Thank you for getting angry when I didn’t have enough pans to make your eggs
The one thing I didn’t offer for breakfast
I told you over and over again I wouldn’t eat
Still you scowled at my lack of ingredients or kitchen tools
Refused to cook dinner with me
It gave me a reason to leave
Girls stay on bad dates because we’re convinced you’re the good guy
Just misguided
Love will change you, you’ll be better
But you stood in my kitchen and tried to take my roommate’s things and I thought
“I have the right to leave you.”

If independence is my cardinal sin,
I’ll walk right up to Satan and tell him to please leave his shoes by the door
I go to bed early and I shower at night
With time, we can pull him from the bargaining stage of grief
The only hell I could ever be left in is a weekend with man who expects my body as a welcome gift
Into my apartment
Wants me to buy new plates because a table setting for one isn’t good enough for two
As if you live at my kitchen table
Both nights I didn’t eat, was sick to my stomach
Afraid that you might see me settle down and construct an opportunity
I’m not sorry for my lack of dinnerware
You ate off the plate that holds my toast each morning near my diet coke
You participated in the ritualism that constructs me an independent woman
The body you will not lay hands on today, owner of the bed you will not sleep in
I did not let you remove that from me
If I had bought plates for you, you may have come back.

I feel as if I stand on shaking ground
I do not want to say "Good-bye" to you
You do not say good bye
When you run away from a ******
You violated me.
Not my body,
But my mind.
My mind which was my heaven
It was my sandy deserted beach
And my busy city street
Alone protects me,
Not you.
You scare me
And alone is all I have left
On this shaking ground,
I no longer stand.
I am on my knees for you.
I am screaming, but
You cannot hear me
Because you simply do not want to.
And you tell me to say "Good-bye"
As you open the door
But you do not say "Good-bye"
When you run away from a ******.

She's dreaming about mars but she's going to become an accountant
I remember when scales were beautiul
I remember when that parking lot lasted forever
We're supposed to find it stupefying
They call it progress

She hopes she's becoming a good person
I spent all of my time in high school counting down to exams
I wanted to be an art teacher but they taught me physics and laughed at me when I failed
I spent all of my time being not good enough
But here we are

She wanted to become the girl she wrote about in all those stories you didn't read
I remember every single bird I saw that morning
I remember it like I'm still standing there, on the bridge in between the waterfall and the rest of the stream
Maybe I'm still there, imagining the rest of my life
I could have sat with you forever, but I didn't
You left and I left and we aren't there anymore

You said no and she listened
She went to college for math and politics and I don't know why
She would have made a beautiful captain someday
And they would have shipped her off to Mars with the Space X mission
But she just finished somebody else's taxes and went home in a taxi and she is taxed
And they called it "progress."

I'm slowly learning what hurt feels like
I'm slowly learning what broken is
I'm slowly learning what shattered looks like
I'm slowly learning what you look like
I'm slowly learning who Hope is
I'm slowly learning what alone takes
I'm slowly learning when time really runs out
I'm slowly learning how to crumble
I'm slowly learning what repetition does
I'm slowly learning what tired looks like
I'm slowly learning how to forget you
I'm slowly learning how to walk away
I'm slowly learning lessons and making tally marks on the wall
I'm slowly learning that I've wasted all of my seconds counting them
I'm slowly learning how waiting has beaten me
I'm slowly learning how you have drawn the most blood
I'm slowly learning what beauty is
I've finally figured out how the phoenix rose from the ashes
I'm slowly learning that I am not that phoenix
I'm slowly learning that you were not a fire
I figured out months ago that you were not the moon but I haven't figured out how
I'm slowly learning how people build monuments in the sand
I'm slowly learning how those monuments survive earthquakes
I'm slowly learning that I am not those monuments but you weren't an earthquake and I wasn't built in the sand
I'm slowly learning what rebuilding looks like
When I try it myself, there are still cracks
I've learned that I'll never be quite right again
Falling in love becomes a tattoo whether you put it there or not
Perfect people need perfect people
I need someone else who has broken with the right spare parts
I've taught this to myself like the drill I am issued every afternoon
Every repetition sounds more rhythmic and correct
The glue will never harden
I could never paint over all of the cracks
I've lost some of the pieces that have been chiseled away
I'm not entirely
Energy has been lost in collision
And when I find him, I will find it again

You have become completely two dimensional
You live in photographs and in the shadows
In the rings left by a finished cup of tea
You're face is dripping with nostalgia and regret
And it's not your own
We were both bleeding
I couldn't kiss you better
I couldn't stitch up your hand, I couldn't even hold it
I was terrified
Now you live in old journal posts
And those few pictures I can't bring myself to delete
I can't shake you

i stood there in the door frame for the first time
the one that led from your bathroom to your master,
if you could call it that,
the Veneer was chipping where my hand came to rest
i'm pretty sUre that it was the first time i'd seen another body.
i watched you breathe,
sLid my hand down the wall
couNted down, hoping to suddenly feel ready to expose myself
there you werE
you sank into the bed like it was something anyone else could have dRowned it
you couldn't, i observed
you remAined still, watching me as i watched you
slowly curling up into a smile
i matched your Body
moved so achingly sLowly
held on to nothing but night and lEarned to trust you

She didn't leave to leave him,
She left to leave

I would have created an entire planet for you
Out of bleeding hands and coarse stone
Out of melted diamonds and theoretical physics
And entire planet, no more ash and suffering
Just mountains to move and forests to nurse and grow
Love became deeper than anything I could possibly imagine
Love was expansive and automatic
I didn't try to love you
Not to say that it wasn't worth the time or effort
I walked long miles for loving you
Long loops around parks and fields and cities
Loving you was another thread woven through my life like so many others
It was broken, though
Tattered and frayed and mismatched
You probably don't get what I'm saying at this point
I'm saying that I loved you,
And I'm not even sure if the past participle is appropriate in this case
You see, in all of the running away from the fire and the falling buildings
I was still looking for you, dragging all of my broken bones behind me
I was looking for all of the times you were beautiful before the fire started
It was the slowest burn, watching sparks jump to one tree at a time
I had no hold on you when we ran in different directions
Our footsteps held sparks that burnt down so many forests
But I would have built an entire planet for you
I would have built you a house out of concrete that couldn't catch
But you never asked, and you left me in the forest

I could see you getting on the plane,
But we were dancing.
Sure, we looked pretty stupid
But you were leaving on Monday,
And I could see the clock, counting down.
Days
Hours
Minutes
Seconds
I could see you getting on the plane
You were different from them
You saved me from them
And I promised I'd hug you before you left.
Gosh!
I can't believe you left.
I memorized you.
I knew your favourite colour
Favourite song
Favourite place
And I could see you there,
Far
Far away.
When the days turned to hours,
And the hours turned to minutes,
And the minutes were gone,
I kept my promise
But I could feel you forget me
And I couldn't think
Because the minutes turned to seconds
And the seconds ran out!
And I was alone.
Everybody kept moving
Things kept happening
My world was ending
And you just kept walking away.
Gosh!
I can't believe you walked away!
I couldn't feel and
My mind was blank
Because
I
LOST
YOU.
And I could see you getting on the plane
In that second that you walked away.
I remember your face
In that instant that I let you go.
Gosh!
I can't believe I let you go.

At some point I was so tired it didn't matter
I would have kissed anyone

I am showing you my outstretched hand,
Even if you will not take it.
I am pulling you up
Even if you want to be down
I will not do this anymore
You are not my problem anymore
If you fall or fly,
You're on your own
Your words
Hurt me
And you have to understand that
I am a person!
And I deserve a chance
At independent thought
Without your knowledge
And a life without
Your death
On my conscience.
So,
As of now,
You are not my problem anymore.

I imagine you taking my hand and spinning me
Like my daddy did when I was a little girl
I imagine my dress flaring like it does when I dance around the kitchen
When I remember the night my father showed me how to Waltz
And I kept stepping on his feet,
I remember how for a few seconds, I swore he was you
Somedays, You're just a passing daydream
Somedays, I need you more than I need to breathe
Somedays I can't breathe without you
I understand that the walls came crashing in
And time slowed down
And we let ourselves break
But we're still standing
You're eyes still look like galaxies
And if you were here right now,
You'd still be holding my hand

I kissed fire but still froze

Don't listen to them
When they tell you
To stand down
Or walk away
Everything is worth fighting for
And everyone deserves someone fighting for them
Don't let it go
No matter how feeble the argument
Holding grudges isn't always bad
And not everyone will like you.

I'll probably be asleep when you get this, when you wake up**
I'll probably be starting class when you get out
I'll probably be at lunch while your at dinner
You'll probably be asleep when I am,
Getting ready for bed when I get out of class

Do you hear that?
It's the sound of thoughts, leaking out of my head.
I want to tell you everything, but I've run out of ink
And time
A single bomb can only do so much damage
I wish you could just see inside my head-
It's never empty,
Almost always filled with you

I am asking very nicely
And sitting very pretty
I am sitting in my palace made of words
And thoughts.
It is here my mind is at rest
Except that it's not.
It is here that I am free to think on my own accord
Until somone shatters the windows
Made of restful harmony
My mind is in sync
With my body
My feet know the ground
I can see no obstacles in the distance
And the distance is bright
But when someone sends for me,
My walls shatter
As if glass.
But who am I
To equate words to glass?
Words are so frail
So easily pulled apart
As I am pulled out of my world
Of free speech and free opinions
I am now clouded
With empathy
And the judgement of others.
The verdict is never in my favour.
I have learned to hold together
When my comrades cannot
So that I can hold them together, too.
Because I know
I can watch the stars from my window.
Whatever it is,
It is alright.
I will soon be back in my palace
Made of words
And thoughts
And this time,
I will lock the door.

I don't want to show my shoulders
In the silky dress
I bought months ago
It was so surreal then
And now,
It's just a few hours away
I can feel their eyes on me
It's tonight

I've never looked pretty
I bit my nails to the stub
I don't cover
My sun burnt face
With makeup
Until last week I only owned two pairs of shoes
Tennis shoes
And slightly nicer tennis shoes
I always wear my hair up
So people can't see it.

Tonight
I have silver sandals
And hard
Fake nails
I bought a strapless dress
That I would never wear

Tonight
People will take pictures
Of the ball gowns
And the suits
Will guys be wearing suits?
I feel so,
So,
Not ready

Tonight
I guess I'm not myself
Because I only wear sneakers
And I don't wear makeup
I certainly do not wear flowy pink dresses
But

Tonight
I want to be a
Princess

And when I looked up from my homework, you weren't reading on the couch
Not that I expected you to be, I'm just used to you
Day dreaming all the time, you always seem to be around

Now, no one has done the dishes in three days. I
Only use paper plates because I can't be bothered to do the cleaning, and I feel like a
Waste of space and oxygen.

You must have, too
Only I'm still here. Someone has to let the dog out every day. I
Understand why you did it, but I worry that you

Don't understand the damage you've caused. You
Only need pebbles to make tidal waves, and you were much more than a pebble. I remember you
Napping in my car,
'
Trip after trip that we took into the mountains

Have you made the right decision? I'm worried that if you could see me, you'd regret what you've done.
And you've done so much in one small motion. You were
Very broken. I know and I'm sorry. I remember that
Every time I wish you were still here.

Tomorrow, I would go to class without you
Only, they cancelled it. We're all going to the funeral instead

Because of you.
Everything was not lost, but you were

Pretty much all I've done since then is cry
Ever time I think about how you've gone, I
Remember. I remember all of time we spent together and every day that I wish I could repeat. I'm afraid you might be
Forgotten, like a statistic, like dogwood leaves in the rain or cherry blossoms in the summer before the leaves come
Even that guy who sits in the back of our physics class
Came to your funeral
Today, I'm learning to live with your decisions, even if you don't have to anymore.

You need minds like me
I've bent over backwards to sculpt a vision of a human being
Some 3D model of a stained glass church window
I see that you've turned me into numbers
How thick and how tall?
How much time did I spend in the library?
But you missed the golden numbers
The ratio of the bones in my fingers which I have so carefully crafted for you
You overlooked the seventy hour work weeks (I was a first responder at a climbing site)
And I'm sure you failed to notice the pictures of my therapy dog on the website I built for you
I keep asking myself what went wrong
What about this wasn't good enough?
You.

Face my writer's wrath
Metaphorically,
The windows will shatter
You've shot me in the heart
But I grabbed the gun
And I'm shooting right back
Metaphorically,
I always win the battle
My writer's wrath is stronger
Than your teenage arrogance
And desire to crush dreams.

I'm so sick of the crashing cars and the ambulance sirens
God, the traffic light was on fire
God, my heart stopped when the brakes didn't
My body is decaying
With all of who I was on display for somebody else to clean up
God, put me back into time
I don't want to wander back to the intersection
I've sat on the curb for what must have been hours, but only stared at that one second
I'm still dying

God, I regret every day I spent on my couch
I wasted so much time licking my scars and praying for sleep
Wanting to rest because the world was so heavy and I carried my part
I've learned patience since the then, but here we are
You and I
And the stop light, halfway between yellow and red
I didn't understand while my foot was on the acceleration
I didn't understand speeding until I stopped

God, I was running away from everything
I was looking for something beautiful and I found a fuse
It could've been fireworks or a forest fire and I didn't know until I lit the match
Either way, that car is burning
I can feel the heat from the still flames
Smell the hexane leaking out, seeking ignition
But I can't pull the woman from her car
I can't continue her life for her
That's her decision, or God, maybe it's yours
It was my decision to get into the car this morning

God, I didn't choose death
I chose to ride my bike without a helmet
And to swim all alone at night
But I didn't choose to die
I should have paid more attention in driving school,
Or even just the road that day
It has my complete focus now, my unceasing fascination with this one moment
God, please put me back into time
Let me go with her to the hospital
Let me die there, knowing that she lived

I'll bet she was responsible,
Turned in her homework on time and went to bed at ten
I'll bet she looked both ways and couldn't see me coming on too fast
I'll bet she has a little brother waving her off to college in the fall
And her parents are very proud
God, she has a story
As many hours as I do, an entire life I may have just ended in seconds
She built herself, she wants to be something
She is so beautiful right before the airbag goes off
I died before the airbag could go off
God, I will not give up
I won't leave her,
I'll stay right here in case this second finally bleeds into the next one

How wonderful you are for waiting
How strong your grip
Upon the ground
Must be
The terrors that I've seen you face
Upon your lonesome
How hard you try to understand
My efforts
An my failures
My terrors you attempt to remedy
While fighting your own demons
How hard you try to understand
And even when you can't
How hard you try to help
How wonderful you are for waiting
How strong you must be
How much I love you

Funny how today was just a distant dream
Two years ago
I thought would never come
And here I am
Today was so impossible
Time can not pass
It is not judged in inches or meters
Or lines of a sonnet
Time as we perceive it is completely false
And impossible
You can not move in space with moving in time so
Today is my time
To fight or fly
Stand alone or together
Live in every second
Or throw them all away
Every instant is a decision to live your life right
Every instant you make a decision
To move in a direction and
**This direction is mine!

Tired
It comes in waves I do not wish to fight
Unfocused
Uncaring
Unwilling to think anymore
My troubles will not melt,
But dull
And I will sleep tonight,
Tired

There's this sort of peaceful dream
I'm not allowed to have anymore
Life is too calm
I'm in too much control
Everything is too perfect

I'm not allowed to think like that.

All of my paint has to have chips in it,
There's always a light burnt out,
Half bright, half beautiful
The shadows are always in the wrong places
The windows have to be closed

I don't get to dream of precious waves or hour glasses
I have to dream of crashing ships on jagged rocks,
My mermaids have claws,
The lighthouse keeper has been shot dead.

No one is there to hold me at two am
All of the people shove me back in the chaos
Take my ground away
I am always the one to tell myself,
"It'll be alright."
And
"It was just a dream."
But usually,
It sounds more like crying.


If someday you should chose to love me
It will be easy for me, but not for you
I want to love and love and love until I drown in it
But that's too deep for some, for me, apparently
I am not allowed to love with my whole person
To love unconditionally would be a peaceful dream
*A rose garden, a delicate dress and a fragile girl

I wanted my body back
It seemed impossible
It seemed like I left my body at the hospital when I was seven
Back when I was friends with the ER nurses
I gave it to them as a gift
The only offering I had at the time-
Probably the only offering I have now-
I was just a little kid
But I'm not anymore
I somehow grew up without my body
As if my body were a metaphor not important to the story
But that's not how this story ends

I woke up a few weeks ago and ran before classes
It took me twelve minutes to run a mile, I was dripping sweat and I couldn't breathe
But for the first time, I trusted my feet to hit the ground
I trusted myself to make it home with my own legs
I wanted my body back, so I took it,
Just a few feet at a time

I woke up on the couch with a blanket I didn't get for myself
He sat on the chair opposite of me, still in his army uniform
Like a brother I never had
"I got your letters. After all that, I wasn't going to wake you up."
Twelve weeks later and he still worried about me
I laughed before I even picked my head up
He sat on the coffee table in front of me and kissed my forehead
I almost fell asleep again, I felt safe
I wrapped my arms around his neck and he pulled me up so we could hug
He stayed till midnight
He could have stayed forever, I wouldn't mind
We could have gone out for Italian ice.
But he had pt in the morning and I had lab and
I can't wait to see how he turns out

I played counting games as a child
Two people wearing blue, one old man wearing red, a little girl in white
My seconds were always faster than the seconds on the clock but the minutes matched up
I was so afraid of running out of batteries
You can only see time if you watch it
I will never forget that old man

I was the only one in the room with a calculator
The only one who wrote several pages instead of half of one
I wore pencils in my hair
And all because it was easier to face the world
Through measured steps
And calculated movements
Ready for anything that didn't involve leaving the house
Fearless,
Unless you're talking about something that could cause harm
Creative as long as it doesn't involve artistic ability
We're not depressed
We're scared
And we're not cynics
We take things as they are
We're not cynics
We're geniuses.

I don't like it when pretty songs fill rooms
I prefer they fill my head
I'm not a creative person
But I am very passionate
And I like pretty songs
People hear a pretty song and expect miracles
I hear a pretty song and expect
To be bathed in simple beauty
For two and a half minutes
You see,
Miracles only happen when you make them
So why don't we make them?

Let's keep this short
This is my body
My legs and arms, and my hair
That one is yours
This is not some Neapolitan ice cream, where you may not like strawberry, but you’re going to get a little strawberry
We are different candies made in different factories
And it is our choice to take off the wrappers

I turn off all the lights
And lock all the doors
By myself now
It no longer makes me jump
When every footstep in the dark is my own
And I know that
I braid my own hair
And make my own bed
In the blackness
Pierced by hopeful glows
Of charging lights
Or connected to Wi-Fi notifications
I don't want to go to sleep
Because I will wake up soon
Some nights I should wake up screaming
But I know what nightmares feel like

The day I forget to say it...
It's the day you get hit by a car
You decide life isn't worth living anymore,
And walk out into the street
The busy highway
I think of the headlines;
"Teenager Accidentally Wanders into Busy Street"
Or
"High School Student Dead after Collision with Speeding Driver"
Or the one they would never print;
"Teenager Gave Up, Threw Themself onto Highway"
The day I forget to hold you is the day you forget what it feels like to be held

And I won't give up,
Even if you become a puddle in my hands
I'll find a way to save you.
I won't give up on thinking that we can save everyone
I remember kicking and screaming when he told me over and over that I couldn't save everyone

It will always be my job to pull them out of the street before the car comes
Hush them and whisper in their ears like children,
Like children who have seen their whole world dying
Like children who were faced with life and death and chose death
And no matter how hard it hurts me, I will never choose death
No one ever has to choose death!
But someone else has to choose love,
And quiet, understated understanding
Someone has to choose to stay

Every time I chose to stay, I imagined one less person on the highway that night
Every time I chose to tell someone that it really will be alright,
I imagined one less headline they had to censor
Everyday, I try to imagine saving someone
Imagine one less driver who feels the impact before they could see the kid,
One less kid in an emergency room
One less family that has to choose life or death for their child, now
We like to pretend that we're so grown up
But when I imagine being too late,
I imagine myself next to the hospital bed, clutching a teddy bear

Sometimes, that family is mine.
Sometimes, that child is me and I will not give up on her.
I wouldn't let her family pull the plug and I wouldn't let you pull yours, either, because
I don't want to wake up tomorrow to another headline trying to cover up another second too late.

I hold out pens like cigarettes.

I sent an old friend a "Happy Birthday" text and then deleted her number.
I like to think that she never replied because I blocked her number,
But I don't remember

I want to know if she wanted to forget me.

I never want to forget again.

I've drawn your face with words
I've drawn her's with tally marks,
Counting all of the of the times that I thought back to that mistake

Words are forever,
And I hope you are, too,
But in case you aren't,
I never want to forget

I am holding on to every second I saw your face
People try to take that from me
That's one reason I have no friends:
Your memory is a better friend than they could ever be
So I hold on to you, instead.

I need to hold your hand
And let go of her's
But yours is just out of reach
And her's faded years ago.
I have fallen in love with holding on to nothing
To no one's hand
No one can be my best friend when they have to be
I wish I didn't have to be alone

I hold out pens like cigarettes
Because I hope that my words can leave permanent marks.

I want to love you like midnight-
Deep and beautiful
Familiar
I want to love you like the gardens I grew up in
Expansive and forever
As if we grew up together
Maybe we still will
I want to love you like warm blankets in the air conditioning
Cuddly and together
I want to love you as if glitter makes me more attractive
I want you to love me like a puppy dog
I want to be sweet for you
I want to be the perfect little girl
I want to be your sweetheart
I want to be everything for you

You are everything to me :)

I've never been very articulate
I talk a lot,
But I say very little
But it doesn't mean I'm hiding

Tell her to sleep
Because or else,
She won't.
She's afraid of the nightmares,
And she wants to stay awake to fight the monsters

Tell her that there's hope for tomorrow
Because she's probably lost faith in today
And she needs something to fight for

Tell her that nothing is over until she's finished trying
Because she really doesn't want to try anymore
She'***** the ground a few times already
And she's afraid to fall again

Tell her that she doesn't have to be okay all the time
Because she is tired of standing up straight and tall
She's ready to fall apart
Without breaking down

Tell her that she's not the only who's broken
We're all just made of spare parts
Borrowed from each other
Because none of us are perfect

Tell her you love her.