i don't watch home movies
hate them
reason being because
when i was young
i was looking for a movie
my mother
had recorded for me
and accidentally
put one in the vcr
that i'm not sure
i was supposed to see
i know the obvious response
"uh oh, ****"
sorry to disappoint
they were only marked with dates
  1991
on live television
montel williams asks my father
"how can you just throw
your child away like a piece of trash?"
   1994
i spend so much time
in the emergency room
that my parents stop
penciling in growth marks
on the frame
of my bedroom door
i always thought
it was because they believed
i would never grow out
of this sickness
sometimes i believe
the reason that they
never bought me a dream catcher
was because they never thought
i'd live long enough
to see them come true
   1996
i am eliminated
from a spelling bee
because i didn't know
the 'dad' is silent in 'family'
   2013
before i got into poetry
i used to do standup
none of my jokes were funny
one of the other comics
tells me my skits are dry
sometimes sad
he says "why don't you joke
about something like your family?"
so i say
"i never wore any sunblock
because i didn't want anything
to keep me from my father"
i say "what do you call christmas
without lights or heat?"
before he has a chance
to answer
i say "1997. better yet
why don't you
make like a dad and
leave"
   2014
every time we drive
past the hospital
my mother reminds me
how much it cost to save my life
like she'd rather
have her money back
she doesn't have to say
that sometimes she wishes
it was me who had died
instead of my brother
i can hear it in the way
she says "love you"
sometimes i imagine
that if i were to die
that she
would pick out a casket for a child
because she never loved
the person i became
yesterday i told my father
how close i'd been
to suicide lately
and he said
"that's my boy,
livin on the edge.."
and i can't remember
if i laughed
or cried

I want to be a poet.
To have words
so forthcoming
so forlorn
so foreign
that they strike
your ears perked
and echo
beyond
the white noise
that surrounds us

I want to pour mountains
in to your eyes
so tamed
but so enticing,
and always just a little
bit beyond your reach.

I want to be a generator
and fill you up
when i see your eyes
being to fall below
your depression.

I want to brush my fingers across
the bits of skin
that stick out
and make you squirm
but cause you to smile like
when you see the sun
for the first time
after a rain storm.

I want to be the wind that
runs across your collar
causing you to turn
closer to me.
I want to collect your warmth
in a jar
and carry it in my knapsack
so when I need
a totem
to get me through the day
I can open up
a little bit of you.

I want to capture
that glimmer in your eye
that tells me I am worth
so much more than I imagine.
I want to paint you onto
every blank canvas
though no rendition I
could every re-create
would have not even
half of the life
I found in your heart.
But i could try.

I want to be your first drink of water
After being in the heat.
trickle down your throat
like the tickle of a feather
leaving you wanting more
and yet fulfilled at the same time.
I want to be the glove that
fits around your hand
so that I could hold you
all day long
and hold your
heat inside your palm.

I want to be the cloud
that catches your attention
Finding shapes in me
connecting the lines I
have lost along the way.
I want to be the snowflake
that sits on your eyelashes
as they bat up and down
fluttering the kisses
of a butterfly to every
passerby.

i want to be an island
in the middle of your sea.
isolated but not alone
because I am surrounded by you.
I want to be the wave that breaks
upon your *******,
playful banter
between the ocean and the sand
swirling in all directions
together we twist in the tide.

I want to be something to you
other than just another girl
that caught your eye
that night.
I want to matter
instead of just
be matter.

I want to be a song
That you can never stop singing
because even though you've
heard me one too many times
You are still so caught.

But now I am
the yellow light that turned red
right as you approached the intersection.
We were not made to go
in the same direction.

I want to be yours.

But everyone knows the problem
with star-crossed lovers
is that
they only cross once

right?

You have always been
my favourite
Our minds connect
on a level which I myself cannot comprehend
Our hearts…
I’d rather not speak of such irrationalities
I spent forever trying to find
my media naranja
I never recognised that
You were the North Star to my Cassiopeia

I hope you and I will always be you and I.

It is stunning how quickly
someone so high, great, strong, mighty
can fall ill and weak

Nothing in these lands, seas, and oceans
planets, stars, and galaxies
is more painful than when
I watched you
my caregiver, idol, confidant, and love
writhe in pain
in those deathly white sheets
Helplessness
like a demon
possessed my vulnerable body
and rushed saltwater
to the inner corners of my bloodshot eyes

I’d **** just to heal you.

i wonder if the doors in the house you grew up in
started slamming themselves to save your father the trouble.
i wonder if you can remember the last time you prayed,
and if you had trouble unfolding your hands.
i wonder if your mother knows
about the collection of hearts you hide in your closet,
i wonder if she could tell mine apart from the rest.
i wonder if your shoes know the reason why
you keep them by the back door and not your bedside.
and sometimes, i wonder
if you ever think about that night when i told you,
you wouldn't need to drink so much if you had me.
but it seems like we only speak when you've got body on your brain,
whiskey in your glass,
your judgement is overcast,
and you know i'm too weak to ignore you.
i learned how to translate your texts
from drunken mess back into english.
i am fluent in apology, but i don't ask you for them anymore.
this is just how it is.
it's not enough for either of us
but ******* it we are not above settling.
so i will ignore her name on your breath,
and you will ignore the fact that this means something to me.
i always thought the first time i kissed you,
it would be on your mouth.
i just wanted to be something warm for you to sink into,
something that could convince you to stay a second night.
but i sneak you out in the early morning,
and you take a piece of my pride with you when you go.
i am left to nurse the hangover from a wine i've never tasted,
wondering how this is possible.
waiting for the next drunk call,
for the next time i get to pretend we are lovers,
the next time i get to live out the fantasy i am most ashamed of.
it is the one in my head where you want me when you're sober too.

- m.f.

We danced toward
each other's wounds

with gentle step
and touched inside

and now the bleeding
has resumed

and all this blood
is hard to hide.

I think I loved you most the winter your heating was broken
And we’d stay inside all morning
Pretending to complain that we couldn’t get out of bed
Our clothes becoming little islands on the floor,
Ones that we could not quite find the courage to visit

Your hand stayed glued to my hip,
Your breath warming my shoulder
Like a long drag of whiskey
That kind that had a home so far away,
In a glass bottle on top of your refrigerator.
The one that would not be opened
Until that fateful day in February,
When everything went wrong

And on that unbearable night
When you joked that you’d freeze to death if I left you
There was a long silence
Like it might be true.

Now it’s warm enough
That I show too much skin when sitting in bars
And you avoid me like the plague,
Whispering in any girl’s ear that’s near to you
Every time you see me watching out of the corner of your eye

We should have stayed inside when the ice began to melt
Because I think
When those doors opened and we finally ventured outside
The world had changed,
And so had you and I.