why won't you love me how I want you too
why wont you tell me its okay
instead of telling me it might be
why wont you say i love you
instead of an inaudible love you
because
the i matters
just like you matter to me
and just like how I want to matter to you

this is an open letter to anyone who has the audacity to try and love you like i did.

dear whateverthefuckyournameis,

i apologize in advance for spilling my boiled blood on the hem of your skirt. what you need to understand, is that you are standing on ground previously reserved for my feet, so forgive me for any bitterness that seeps through the cracks in my clenched fists. i don't hate you, but i can't be your friend. you probably don't know about me, and if you do, let me commend your bravery. i have a tendency to set my problems on fire, and in my bouts of anger everything looks flammable, especially girls with paper complexions. i'm sorry. i have never been one to walk away, so i don't know how to explain to you the holes in the bottoms of my shoes. but i have been further than you will ever go. this is not supposed to be an angry letter, but lately that's the only thing coming out of me. i don't even know your name but the thought of your hands reaching for him makes we want to break them. i will douse your dreams in gasoline and strike the match against your cheek. but i know that's not right, see, the poison crawling out from the end of my pen belongs to a scarier version of myself i try not to know. my heartache is an insatiable war cry in the dead of night, that will stop at nothing to shatter all your windows. it shames me to admit that i've found a sort of twisted satisfaction in using passive aggression to breach your armor. i am sick with missing a set of arms i was not privileged enough to know. i speak with all the grace of an atom bomb and wonder about the rubble at my feet. you are white picket fence and i am barbed wire. some girls are lions, some are lambs, and i learned to love, teeth bared and snarling. one of the only things that keeps me going is the hope that one day i'll learn how to love something without making it bleed. i may have never been his, but for a time he was mine, so please understand why i taste acid when i think about your mouth on his. again, i am sorry. i know it is not my place to be so full of resentment, but there is a part of me that sincerely hopes it bothers you to know he dreamt of me before you were even a thought. there is a side of me that thrives on the image of the color being drained from your face when you read this. but i am trying to learn how to be softer. this letter is the manifestation of a self-inflicted war that has been raging in my chest since he first told me about you. you will try to be good to him, and you might even succeed. if you ever find yourself singing him to sleep, like i did, don't ask if he wants to hear another song, just keep going until his breathing slows.

- m.f.

in class
they asked us
if we were
afraid of the dark

no i'm not afraid
of the dark that
fills my room
at two a.m.

i'm not afraid of the dark
that engulfs
underground caves
or the darkness
submerged deep in
the atlantic ocean

but
i'm afraid of the dark
that seeps through
every fissure
and crevice
of my splintered heart;
the blackness that
cascades through
my veins
and the gloom
that fills my lungs
(with no room
for oxygen.)

yes, i'm afraid
of a certain kind
of darkness:
the kind that can't
be illuminated
by a flashlight

There's something beautiful about freckles and blemishes and imperfections before I'm made up in the morning. There's something right about naked in the mirror; flaws and scars and age that accumulates with the years. I am a story to be read. I've got skin like a song.

you can't see it but i am a flame
pulled straight from the matchbox
and struck against it's side
i'd been burning so long
i lost my ability to feel

you can't see it but you are
covered in kerosene
poured over your body
again and again
you bathed in lighter fluid for so long
it started soaking into your skin

i kept you at a distance
never close enough to light you up
because i was too afraid of what may happen
to your smooth, tan flesh

but alcohol is flammable
and as we doused ourselves in it
I felt my body draw towards yours
like a magnet

and when we touched
everything exploded

like you had become a bomb
and i was the tiniest bit of heat
needed to destroy everything
within a ten mile radius

as we laid there
tangled up in each other
the smoke filling our lungs
i couldn't help but think about how
matches become bigger fires
when dropped in kerosene
than they ever could have been
on their own

this is you
and this is me
and this is us

this is the late night phone calls
about futures we are too sure of
the midnight drives
across miles we aren't scared enough of

the butterfly kisses
the chubby cheek kisses
the french kisses
on your bed

this is every night
I've called you crying
because my sister is too sick
to function normally

this is every day
you've called me fuming
because your dad makes you madder than you've been in months

this is you
this is me
this is us

this is the feeling I get in my gut
when you tell me you love me
this is the calm that takes over me
when your lips are pressed to mine

this is the tears that well in your eyes
when you look at me for too long
this is the quickness of your pulse
when my hands are in your hair

this is the closeness I feel to you
and you to me
the understanding we share
the laughs
the tears
the beauty
the bad

you, me, us, we
we are not our distance
we are not the miles between us
we are not the doubt
the fear
the complications

we are friendship
we are love
we are us

this is you
this is me
and this is us