i always find you in the strangest places.
i find you in song lyrics, dog toys, and timber old spice.
i find you in chicken flavored ramen noodles, every shade of blue and purple, and horror movies.
i find you in rainbow coloring books, permanent markers, and colored pencils.
i find you in the grass at memorial park, folded slips of paper in my back pocket, and gourmet lollipops.
i find you in hot fudge sundaes, too-big tshirts, and icp snapbacks.
i find you in chik-fil-a receipts, gumball machines, and arcade games.
i find you in white roses, blue ribbons, animal crackers, and sour gummy worms.
i always find you in the strangest places.
but these strange places are everywhere.

I find myself on a winding trail
with passing thoughts of years past
and where I was at that point in time.

It's there I realize that, like a tattoo,
trauma never really leaves you. I
seem to remember the snap of my
knee, the despair of lost friends but
then I see the sun.

I see its shine on the snow...rays
glazing themselves over a season
come and gone. Another quarter
year past, but I see more change than
that of the seasons.

Something, indeed, has changed in
me.

superstar of the lowest level of the food chain
they marvel at my wondrous acts
i am enticing, raucous, too loud
the prima donna of the freakshow ballet
they would pay
to be seen with me
the perpetrator of chaos

hoodies with spikes on them
batman tshirts
and too tight
skinny jeans
tired pink sneaks
from my wandering days
i am the queen of misfits

It’s funny how despite different tastes
we all have a taste for music
my life has never felt complete
with a soundtrack. A beat
as a kid I was told not to fidget
told to just sit still
but my person was anything but chill
I have always had a thing for rhythm
I felt it in the way people speak
the way a husband sneaks around
keeping his wife trapped and meak
whether it is weak or strong
I could always hear that drumming song
It started with a rap song I heard
Hi My Name Is by eminem
but then again it had always been with me
it’s the reason time scares me
because in the beating tick of those two drum sticks
I could see the sound of life wasted
and it made me want to get wasted
black out drunk at fatal altitudes
when I was in middle school
we were angry
and disrespectfully spiteful
so we rocked long socks and listened to punk rock
then It was about being a bad guy
a real force not to be reckoned with
so we wore black Tshirts depicting violent scenes
and joined the screaming heavy metal mosh pit
a place to fit for all the kids who didn’t anywhere else
as I got older I put the heavy metal on the shelf
if I’m being honest it was all just a little silly
angsty teens with lofty dreams which they told us
were unattainable so we went out looking for cheap thrills
rather than develop any marketable skills
The first time I felt marketable
it gave me chills
The National in Richmond Virginia
an old theatre
converted into a sanctuary for the sanctimonious masses
to forget everything they learned in their classes
a place where kicked *****
wasn’t always a bad thing
I remember I was there
in the tenth grade
to see the Atmosphere show
because the lead singer - Slug
was my hero
his words enveloped me in a bear hug
which said you’re doing just fine kid
and in that crowd of tattoos and hipsters
and the ghetto kids wearing chips on their shoulders
I was high
but not on drugs
I was high on expressionism and the loftiness of ideas
The men behind the microphone
wearing a costume of stage lighting and swaggering egos
made me feel at home
for the first time in a while
they said things like God Loves Ugly
and Every Day Can’t be the Best Day
and the DJ’s worked the turntables
like a good lover brings their partner to ******
I didn’t know anybody else at the show
but don’t think for a minute that I was alone
we were all connected as brothers by bond and spilled blood
of our heros who were cut short before they could say the things
which we all needed to hear
We respect the story tellers
because it is how we come to terms with tougher aspects of life
and I was flying high on the dreams of kids just like me
saluting the scarred, worn, souls who had made it
who were making the path that we would one day walk
with the cut of their jive and the strength of their talk
***** of the walk
chalked outlines of the end of loneliness
They called us hop heads
and we’d reply
you’re ******* right we are
hip hop didn’t save my life
it just stopped me from taking me
for granted

how is it
this small town girl
backwoods
redneck
white trash
lives in a trailer
kind of girl
can get a man like you?

my socks don't match
I have sailors mouth
I drink beer from a can
shop at goodwill

yet you look at me like i'm an angel

motorcycle gangs
hillbilly roughnecks
hang in a bar that has a wood stove for heat

and I make YOUR heart beat?
faster?
louder?

the day I met you
I thought "yeah right"
"im so not his type"
"he likes blond girls, who wear pearls and skirts"
things like "LOVE PINK" on their Tshirts

but no....
it's me....?
seriously??
me?

in his shoes, that match his shirt, that match his hat
he said
"I fell in love with you the day I met you"

and our two worlds collide

its like winning the love lottery
and I am the ******* jackpot winner
MEGA MILLIONS FOR LIFE *******!!!
I won a man who makes me richer

******* hell
there's sore spots all over my body
scabs forming over torn flesh
i scratched until i was bleeding and then kept scratching
i just want them to go away, god why are there so many bumps
i'm trying some self surgery here let me know how it turns out
actually, don't
please don't talk to me about my skin don't mention the dried blood on my shoulder please don't say anything about how i'm going to cause scars
i'd rather have scars than bumps because the scars are mine i made them and if i can't perfect my skin then i'm going to claim it
(that doesn't mean i'll let anyone see them though, it's still ruined it's been ruined from the beginning)
i don't know what you see in me (or what you say you see in me. i still find myself doubting)
i'm too lumpy and bumpy and chubby and there's acne in all the wrong places and blood under my nails
i feel like i'm wearing an old jacket but the jacket is my skin and i need to find something better under this
god i'm going to peel all my ******* skin off
if i lick my lips they still taste like blood from tearing the skin off of them with my teeth
(teeth aren't bumpy. i like my teeth.)
my teeth are sharp enough i just need to stop feeling, if i stopped noticing the pain i could tear it all off god i'm gonna tear it all off
i don't wear tshirts anymore i don't want you to see my arms i don't want anyone to see my skin i don't want to see my skin
make it go away i don't want it anymore i just want to feel nice why is this this so hard
you'd think i'd be able to stop when i make it worse than it was and when i'm hiding all my failures under long sleeves, long pants, hands
no,  no i need to scratch until it's gone it's going to stop i need it to stop but god the pain is killing me (but so is having this skin)
digging out part of your leg hurts like hell, who knew?
i'm going to claw myself out of this skin prison or die trying
i'm going to get out i need to get out let me out **** someone help let me out i'm buried in flesh i'm suffocating in my own skin
hello 911 come quick i need you to cut off my skin I feel like i'm drowning i can't breathe god i can't breathe get it off of me
i've scratched my scabs open again and there's blood trickling down my arm and i'm squeezing it out

to be honest i never knew how to write about a boy i'd never met
and i also didn't know how to write about meetings
and i didn't know how to write about boys
but i remember seventeen years ago today, in a past i wasn't a part of and that i could never imagine, a boy I'd never met was born

but he grew up and up and up and his sandpaper heart was replaced by pints of lukewarm whiskey in the red cup left on the steps that morning and his threaded thoughts pieced together not-so-carefully were replaced by cigarette smoke lingering around his mind and out of his nose like smoke creeping through a burning building with no hope of escape for the one that broke in just to leave the gasoline by the furnace and his twisted insides were replaced by infinite spacetime and universes, bending and breaking and breathing stardust and misplaced trust and alcoholic aftertaste and burning paper

to be honest i never knew how to write about a boy who was replaced by cigarettes and whiskey and outer space and music and reasoning and tshirts and sarcasm and modernity  
but i did know how to write about someone who mattered
and i did know how to write about being entirely made of little something elses and being replaced
and he knew how to be the muse

Who are you to advise who I should be?
Why have I been told to not be who I am?

Do not pursue teaching, you'll work a luckless and poor career. You'll devote your life to an occupation that won't put food on your table, you better marry rich Megan.

Do not love like you do, it's is overwhelming. It is too intense, too encompassing. It is the ocean- unpredictable and vast. Do not love me like that, I can't handle your love. Do not cry oceans, do not have streams down your cheeks. Do not feel, do not express yourself. Please don't.

Do not love who you want to love. It is too difficult to explain, accept and live with the fact that you may love someone with the same chromosomes as you.

Do not dance at your leisure, you cannot hold the beat or sway to the rhythm. There is a time and place for expressing your joys, remember that.

Do not cut your hair for it was so beautiful when in cascaded down your back.

Do not pierces your nose, people don't like metal in your nostril and god forbid you puncture a hole and stick a diamond in your pretty face.

Do not wear the short shorts, the baggy tshirts, the sandals with socks, the buns on the sides of your head, the face make up. You know those all mean you want it, you're lazy, you're unfashionable, you're a wanna-be, you're a try-hard who cares too much.

Who decided one day I couldn't be who I was born to be? Who decided I wasn't able to being myself and being okay as is?

Today I decided I will be the high school English teacher and I will change lives with my big heart and encompassing love. I will inspire through my educating hands and words. I will love who I love with all I have in my soul. I will dance in dead silence, in the rain and in the middle of a song. I cut my hair and it'll grow back. It always does. Metal in my nose made me no less beautiful, I was beautiful before it and I can be beautiful without it. I will wear the ******* shorts and let my thighs shake, I will do my hair as I please, I will wear the baggy tshirts because they are comfortable, I will wear and say and do and be whoever I want to be.

I am a combination of atoms and particles made from stardust and centuries before me. I am made of hope, acceptance, knowledge and ultimate love for myself and others. I am made of spontaneity and the daring risk to be who I am meant to be, I am infinite and you cannot bottle up stardust. You cannot contain me with your mere words.

Who are you to tell me who to be? Who am I to accept that? Who am I to let you tell me anything about my bones and brain, my mind and soul? Who am I?

You only wish you knew.

i'll leave my mark
follow me please
spots upon tshirts and sleeves
wont wash out
slowly will fade
all these breadcrumbs i have made
words instead actions
again my silent ploy
breadcrumbs made from blood you stupid boy

the mutual tenderness
between us
feels nice
even if its fleeting

fingers intertwined
shared laughs
tugs on the hems
of cotton tshirts

adjusting the radio volume
in your car
squeezing the dish soap from sponges
in your sink
peeling back the sheets
in your bed

moments feel intimate and infinite

I was bullied from kindergarten to freshman year.

I loved to imagine a tall boy
three inches taller exactly,
just tall enough that
each kiss would have to happen
on my tip toes
and riding on his back
would feel just like
flying.

His hair would be dark brown
and his eyes would be
unremarkable
a brown so dark that others
would think it black
no one else would get close enough
to tell the difference
and no one else would love them
as I did
just as I hoped my eyes would look
to someone else
some day.

He wouldn’t speak much
to other people
his words would mean much
but only to those
who could understand what he meant
and I would be the first
to major in his language
but I would never teach it
to any but our children.

He would look at me
like I personally rose the sun
and hung the stars at night
I would be so high in his regard
that my word would be law
and he would never doubt
anything I said
and even when I lied
obvious and wide eyed
sarcasm dripping from my lips
he would believe me

He would visit me in school
to sit with me at lunch
walking slowly
past the girls who told me
‘no one will ever love you’
and ‘who would ever want to kiss
a face like yours?’
He would prove them wrong right there
at the table they shunned me to
kissing me in full view of everyone.

He would dress in leather
and his hair would be greased
combed back just like a bad boy
he would have a motorcycle
and a car he never drove
and his jeans would be
perfectly between baggy and skinny

He would call me
His Girl
and if anyone messed with me
he would narrow his eyes in such a way
that made them fear for their lives
My bullies would never bother me again.

He would describe my skin
with words like silky, soft and succulent
ebony, stately, and irresistible
but never would he compare its color
to any sort of food
except perhaps sugar
when speaking of the taste.

I built him in the lonely hours
when eyes followed me
and whispers rose behind my back
I made sure that for every insult
tossed my way like live grenades
he threw back with easy confidence
as though my life were a game of COD.

My hair was never too wild
too big or too ‘ethnic’
My lips were just the right size
to **** the breath straight from my lungs
He didn’t care if I shaved my legs
and he liked my sense of style.
He didn’t mind if I was wearing
basketball shorts and too big tshirts,
and he told me that tight clothing
left nothing to the imagination anyway
and besides he didn’t want the other boys
to see what they’d missed.
He didn’t care that I was as boyish
as I was shy
and he knew that the wall I built around myself
wasn’t all there was to me
and he always knew just what I needed,
and sometimes when I was lonely
he showed up just to give me a hug.

And when I got to high school
He shaped how I saw things
He always told me I was beautiful
and if no one else could see that, it was their loss.
He told me that there was never anything wrong with me
and if no one else could see that
then **** Them and All They Stand For.

He faded back into my subconsciousness,
speaking to me though I never truly
thought of him the way he’d been
He stopped bursting into classrooms
to show others what they were missing
and he started whispering an idea
that I didn’t need him anymore.

I would pass a reflection of myself
and He would lift my chin
‘Look how beautiful you are.’
He knew when I was sad,
and promised it was only temporary.
He smiled and gave me thumbs up
when I doubted and shook with nerves.
And with him I could cope.
And soon without him I could too.

Now when I passed mirrors
I lifted my chin myself.
‘Look how beautiful I am’.
and when I was sad
I told myself it was only temporary.
I gave myself smiles,
and I laughed at myself,
and I learned to love me as I’d always imagined
he did.
Unconditionally.