because this strategy of lighting myself on fire
to get your attention resulted in varying amounts
of burns all over my body. i theorized that maybe,
if you stared at the sun, then you would go blind
to my deformities. witches like me wouldn't have
to be burned at the stake for your comfort. maybe
instead of me, you would jump head first into the
fire and take a few polaroids of what hell looks like
for me and pin it up on your wall next to the picture
of us. make a collage of things that are dead and use
those few polaroids, and maybe you'll understand.

- kra

you birthed this friendship,
and this is our inevitable destruction.

- kra

somewhere, i heard that there's two days in your life
where you don't get to live twenty four hours, but isn't
that a little biased? what about the days where i had to
remind myself that you weren't coming back? because
i had recited a poem during grief and loss poetry, and
it was more loss of self and grief of self. maybe my body
is still connected to this earth, but my soul is dead. my
muse, or my idea of one, turned to ashes. every picture
of her was still life art, of things living, but that picture
of us is still dead even to this day. and on that note, i hope
you're happy now, you miserable *******.

- kra

i was born in the wrong season because spring
never grew anything of importance out of me.
meeting you, i felt something growing inside
of my chest. it was that gnawing feeling you
get when you're hungry or a complete mess
for someone who won't close the distance.
but it seems to me, we never even reached
spring. nothing ever grew from my palms,
nor did the distance between us close it's
gaps. now i am learning to grow roots that
have no correlation of the composition of your
dna. any territory where i'm prone to being
hooked, line, and sinker shall be detained. my
chest can grow it's own garden, where it is not
interdependent of the soil, of the sun, of the
water, and my god, growing in this shade is
taking it's sweet ******* time, isn't it?

- kra

there was something strange about us because
when we met for the first time, our worlds were
similar, and by the time you left, you were the
sun and i was the moon. you were this game of
weights, where i must have been too dense for
you to keep holding up for me. but what about
my humanity? is it devoid of being considered
validated by anyone? am i pointless to you? or
a shout into a void? by the time you see this, i
hope i hear your answer before then. by the time
you see me, hopefully i'm sobered up enough to
the point where i don't have you misinterpret
something i say or do. whatever i say seems to
feel like i'm playing a game of weights, where
i am concentrating on weighing the odds in your
favor but it says more about me than about you.
is this a test of our friendship because if so, this
has been going on for longer than i imagined it
would. I DON'T EVEN THINK I'M IMPORTANT
TO YOU ANYMORE. AM I JUST A GHOST IN
THE HALLWAY, A SKELETON IN THE CLOSET,
A MONSTER UNDERNEATH THE BED TO YOU?

- kra

being with someone you were once severed
from is like waiting for a wound to heal in a
dust storm. if i could just drown myself, it
would be in an alcoholic daze, because the
hangover was a better cure at getting you
out of my focus. better yet, if i could just
drown all of my worries out at sea, i would
but unfortunately, i would still be able to
taste you on my tongue that way, and the
suspense
                is
                   *******
                                 killing
                                             me
if i'm going to be falling up or falling down
i'm not going to know until the moment we
fall back together, but i will guard myself
from the arrows i'm expecting from you

- kra

Odysseus was washed ashore on this island like a
beached whale, homesick and yearning for hands
that my hands could not fit. he coughs reaching out
for a savior, and water drains from his lungs like he
kept the whole sea – undiscovered - inside him.
sometimes, i have
dreams about drowning.
sometimes, i end up suffocating because
i know Odysseus is not mine to drown in.

“Promise me that this crime of passion doesn’t
find it’s way to Penelope,” I beg for mercy.

“Home is where the heart is – “ Odysseus stubbornly
reminds me, “—But my home does not look like Ogygia.”

It’s always a fever: hungry, insatiable, shameless passion.
when the lion is fed his meat and he cleans the bones,
it is time to move on. the lion can distinguish the elephant
in the room, and swallow the prey until one of us feels
absent and you end up full. what is beyond the veil might
leave us homesick. i take a swallow, and pour the rest
down the drain.

this homecoming seems to bring me sadness
because this is is just a transit point watering
a garden that's been wilted for months. yet,
this heart denies that's the case. time is not
on my side, yet this tragedy seems to always
hover in the quiet stirring between nature's
soft songs. this plague seems to follow me
like a rain cloud, hang on me like a trench
coat, threaten me like a criminal, and my
problem? i'm passive to letting it hover
over every decision i make. to pass this
over to you, this guilt weighing on me,
would mean losing all the chips i threw
into this card game. do me a favor, forget
about me. please forget what i said.

- kra

in visuals,
your eyes
like green seraphinite
your smile
like the white gates to heaven
your arms
a plastered ivory with constellations of red freckles

my hands
covered in third degree burns
from the last time i was touched
my mouth
saying the wrong things
at the wrong times
my eyes
they're exhausted but
they are always looking
at you.

you are a motion picture &
i never want the story to
come to an end.

be aware of the fist fights in your prison
yard because you will notice that you are
fighting against me. excuse me, but there
is no excuse for dragging me along an long
winding road and abandoning me at your
expense. be aware i am only human like you.

be aware that i have memorized in detail
the wavelengths of your shallow breaths
the difficulty of closing in onto you because
you were my butterfly hiding it's wings.

be aware that some people don't see the
marks on your back that i made, but i
realize how painful it must've been when
you basically handed me a knife and told
me to cut your wings off. i regret that still.

be aware of the love we used to share, like
my heart was a shoebox and you were an
entire store's worth of shoes. figuratively
speaking, you became a worm hole for
every sinking feeling in my chest and i
let myself drop into this wonderland where
even the walls lie to me about happiness.

be aware that somewhere a groundhog is
burrowing a hole to hibernate for winter.

be aware that you are my winter season,
and i am burrowing myself into everything
else to distract me from the thought of you.

- kra

g.a.
swallow the blood of the covenant
between you and the lord, they said,
but the wine tasted too sweet. the wine
tasted like a cancer that i had to wean off.

t.h.
fall out boy should write a song called
"welcome to your own personal hell",
and it should tell our story of betrayal.

t.p.
the silence is a loud house guest. i could
not sleep at night because of it. your hands
felt like i was grabbing onto stones, onto
something hard and unfamiliar.

j.s.
i swallowed my words, which replaced my hunger
aches. while i grew skinnier, you swallowed your
animalistic tendencies through another.

m.t.
do you ever feel afraid of not fitting back
into someone's life like you used to? but
i learned that once something is broken,
the cracks will still remain.

n.d.
a time bomb
t i c k i n g
tick
tock
tick
tock
every time i spoke, it sounded like a threat
but nothing i could do would calm him.
i made sure i was at a safe distance
before the explosions happened.

t.r.
an eye for an eye
an ear for an ear
you ruined me
so in turn
i had to ruin you

c.h.
the words you spoke weren't enough
for the green grass on the other side
to look like a crime scene. kind words
do not bring back dead people. kind
words do not pay off jail bonds. kind
words did not stop depression.

r.m.
there was something so captivating
about taking you off the path of salvation
of maybe being your calypso, but penelope
had other plans for us.

a.a.
i want to build a fire from the ashes
the other lovers left behind. i want the
tragedy to fertilize a garden from your
chest, to crack you open painlessly.

you came into my life like a comet,
like a ball of fire, like something
beautiful that i want to put my faith in
and also perhaps set fires inside me.
and maybe one day, i can stunt your
doubt and block it in it's tracks.

i want to persevere
through the trials
so this yields a fruit
that nobody else could create.

my trauma home looks like
a blighted ecosystem
thriving with atoms that
name themselves anxiety
name themselves self-doubt
name themselves a graveyard
where no hole is big enough to
hide the defecation, the diseased,
the gap between these ribs.
i want to rip myself open
with alcohol,
watch my body coil up like a snake
watch myself come undone
watch myself spill secrets
in *****
like alphabet soup but thicker.
the spiders look enlarged, enraged,
enveloped in their webbed paradise
waiting for me to land on sticky skin.
the sharks find their next prey by blood, but the only way i will draw blood is by biting my tongue too much.

when i think of you, i think of the saw movies
and how someone had to die to save another
person's life. i guess i was the martyr and you
were the last remaining survivor, miraculously
unharmed. i wonder if you ever thought about
being a martyr, but from the looks of it, i'm sure
you were more than happy with throwing me into
the line of fire than helping me escape this place.

- kra

there is the first type of quiet we both know: the
comfortable quiet where we are enjoying the
others company, and the only noise in the room
is the faint sounds of us taking turns breathing.

then there's the second type that you experience
when you are on an elevator with a stranger who
peers over at you as the floors rise. it's the most
uncomfortable quiet that fills the air like smoke.

we are only acquaintances to the last type of quiet:
the type where you finally understood the pain that
i've been going through. you saw right through me.

"i don't want to make friends here anymore because
like you said, i need to put my priorities first. i'm
leaving and maybe i won't come back, maybe i will,
but all i care about is your happiness, even if it isn't
with me. you have two amazing people in your life,
keep them close because someday, they will be gone."

- kra

the pink skirt she's wearing
the pink peonys braided into the
curls of
her chestnut hair
the pink on her cheeks
and on her lips as she looks at me,
startle me. there's something in her
eyes when she looks at me, like i'm magical,
but that's her, shimmering in colors
that don't even ******* exist.
there's something magical about her
that brings both chaos and stillness to
my world. she's the still before the
hurricane,
and the hurricane itself.

manifest destiny? i'm trying to.

a myriad of gears perpetually in movement
feeding the wolf with lust-filled eyes
of the ****** desire he yearns for. i recognize
that i am not the only rabbit he has trapped
between his jaws, and fall into the repetitive
cycle again. this time, the wolf does not
recognize that - as a cog in the machine -
i can crank in reverse. the disconnect
has the features of his face faded into
something unrecognizable, yet i feed
the wolf, satiating his hunger for another
day to pause the disonnance of my brain.

you can't break my ******* heart if i
choose the option to not open it at all.

- k.a.

when did the green shrubs
clustered haphazardly in the earth
the flora and fauna
patched in the dirt
the gray croncrete slabs
right beneath my feet
cumulate into violent crimson
tints right before my eyes. when
did i start seeing the bloodshed?
when did the violence of earth
familiarize itself with me?

- k.a.

time builds shutters over the windows of my home
where my neighbors began to form theories of what
happened to that lost girl: “she either has a lot of
skeletons in her closet, or she let herself become one.”

birds can sense the halt of the world,
and the impending destruction. they
began to flock in large hordes as a
whirlwind of catastrophic proportion
made the wood groan and the glass
shatter underneath my hands. my
body looked like i was leaking out
the inside of a fleshy pomegranate
instead of my usual hollow words.
the sky cracked open, revealing the
devil and god having their own war.
was i so narcissistic to believe i could
be like Calypso and detain Odysseus
who already had Penelope?

these damages to my home are meticulously
concealed, as the doctors wire my jaw shut
and sew my tongue to the roof of my mouth.
the autumn sunrise becomes the entrancing
aftermath of a violent storm. the usual gray is
replaces with vibrant hues of glossy orange and
yellow. i am careful not to let my guard down.
autumn looks like a masked intruder who i
would drag into my house, ask them to take
everything i own, and not beg for anything back.
there’s no one quite like autumn.

i would let the seaweed wrap itself around
my ankles at the bottom of the ocean before
i would offer myself the chance to breathe.
however, my lungs begin to get tired.

i have already committed the greatest sin possible,
and i haven’t even grazed the outer skin of it.

he said, "tell me about your history"
because he knew i loved history
and how the chronological events
turned into a collection of memories.
what i wish i was told was that
some parts of history was blacked
out; redacted; forgotten; thrown
aside; history doesn't always tell
you the truth, so who are we to
believe in false prophets?

when i told him about my history, he
believed i would succumb to the past
just like everyone before him.

the past is not the present
the present is not the past
i tried to make him remember
but i forgot my past trying to
make him recall the present and
that's the thing about history.

you can't undo history, which
could be the beauty and curse
of living. history is the ghost
of my past, visiting me before
sleep, showing me how much
more beautiful the world would
be if i joined the nonexistant entity.

i believe in the propaganda of the
ghosts telling me i'm better off
becoming a part of history.

when immobile, the butterfly looks like a fall leaf
like an incoming winter killing the trees,
laying to rest the foliage,
however
when in flight, everyone can distinguish it's
vibrant colors that makes it beautiful.
whenever you're stagnant, you only see
the ugly side of yourself. when in flight,
you see what makes you worthwhile.

suppressing our misgivings,
we grabbed the plump scarlet
fruit out of the hands of the tree
it was a rule: do not fall victim
to the tree in the garden of eve.
however, the snake was a charmer
playing the flute and coaxing me
out into the world of temptation
the apple, the craving
me, the instrument
the snake, the peer with many ways
to pressure. inhaling the enticing
scent, my stomach purred in
anticipation. mouth meets red skin
and yellow tinted flesh, mouth meets
a three headed serpent hiding within
the apple, who told me, "this is your
fate." he took me as his dinner, and
i came out in pocket-sized pieces.

- kra

my job was to purify the zones, full of spectres and creatures
grotesque in appearance. it was my goal to stabilize the rocky
ambience and translate the cuneiform inscriptions scratched
into the walls to maybe understand how to get this situation
into a chokehold. once walls full of color, i came back to a black
and white slate. loving someone - i realized - shouldn't have
been a purification process. but as the first of four elements,
it's an important element. because without love, people could
lose their will to exist and self-terminate.

once, i told you i was scared of the dark,
and you promised me, for now on,
there would be no more darkness.

it all went wrong. i must forget about it and dream sweet dreams.
it was what you would have wanted for me. you wanted me to
see the world in color, but all i could see was the bloodshed.
hence nothing remains except for my regrets.

you began shaking the snakes out of
the trees in the garden of Eden, i did
not realize it until i noticed the
whispers in my ears grow quiet. the
river underneath the bridge still runs
red from the blood spilled the day you
passed. i remember the sincerity you
spoke of - a false prophet. i didn't care,
i just wanted to find some sort of peace.
i wanted the rivers to run dry, i wanted
a drought, i didn't want to see the blood
shed, but i stared death in the face.

it stares back sometimes.

she must be the perfect 1950's housewife,
wearing her rogue lipstick upon her chalky
foundation. every weekend, your wife cleans
out the closets filled with the skeletons you
bring back home. i wonder if her motherly
instinct kicks in, if the warning sirens ever
go off in her head when you come home
smelling like a one night stand. i wonder
if she ever sleeps in the same bed as you,
and i wonder how much the kids gather of
your relationship with him from arguments
behind closed bedroom doors.

i wonder how much of her smile is false
advertisement. i wonder when she will
finally have enough of his white lies.

to own up to your crimes,
first, you must admit to the jury of
the candles lit that burned bridges,
let's have a drink for your children,
innocent, untainted, left in the dark,
unable to see the fires their father
left behind. how do you not smell
the burning embers on him? how
do you not smell the offal?

in the absence of hope,
there was women,
and that's how i will begin my revolution;
i'll create waves so strong, ridges form in
concrete stone with power-hungry women.
i will bring my strongest army, all the artillery
i can wield, if only to feel safe again in my skin.

the mountains, covered in salt, recede
over time from the acidity of the rain
it's a gradual decline, eventually the
mountains will shrink due to erosion
the tree branches are like arms:
reaching towards the mountains
wanting to scale the giant
wanting the same power
the trees are depression
the trees are getting in the way
all i see are the branches, and
i don't have a scythe. no longer
can i see the brilliant skyline. the
sun doesn't peek through the trees
anymore, and i am afraid of the dark.

using a blade as a writing utensil
and your skin as the parchment
you wrote my name in scarlet,
a permanent reminder of what
could have been, what should
have been. it's like carvings
etched into a tree, but if it was
axe wounds. it's like the tree falling
in a forest metaphor: it makes a
sound. you make a sound.

i hope someone finds your fallen
tree. from your trunk decay, i hope
they can grow a garden inside of you.
i hope their thumbs are green so they
can cultivate art from the wounds i
will do nothing but open. i hope you
can see the flowers bloom inside you
one day. i may never get to see that
day. that's okay. i need to bury the
hatchet before i swallow the bullet.

self-servient & absorbed like mercury
in your own skin must feel exhausting.
trapped under your eagle-like gaze
like a bird - caged & provoked, becoming
familiar with the poking and prodding as
if i am a science experiment, and you want
to test out multiple hypothesizes on me
must be exhausting to others also.

i became a wounded animal, where these
wounds become an after thought. the
memory of you is a disturbing humming
in my head now, distributing parts to trauma
that you contributed towards. at the end of it, i
wondered if you were the coward, unable to
reform and recognize the damage you created.