I feel as though
You left a void
In the spot where you stood
Next to me
Whether in line for lunch
Or a movie
Or on a drive
In the afternoon
You are everywhere I go
Except you aren't
You are gone now
But I suppose
You are everywhere I go
Because you aren't

Kiss one:
And I’m left thinking,
“Have I found him?”
The one
Who can love this mess that I've become?
Have I found the one
Who can repair
This broken vase
I call
myself?
                                          No, it can’t be.
                                          He’s only drunk.
                                          There is no way.
                                          Not me.
                                          No.
                                          No.
Kiss two:
And I’m left thinking
"Was I wrong.
Was it not
Just the alcohol.
Have I found him.”
                                           Yes.
                                           I have.
                                           He can love me.
                                           He can.
                                           He is the kind of man
                                           That can care for something
                                           So broken.
Cold December night:
I discovered
He was no man at all.
He was a boy
Who made a broken girl fall.
                                          Fall.
          ­                                  Fall.
                                              Fall.
Until she hit the bottom.
And then buried her.
And her hope.
And her love.
6 feet under the ground.
Because he was a boy.
Who found it easier
To go back to what he knew
Than to try at something new.
So he buried
That broken girl.
6 feet under.
That cold,
Hard ground.

When did I let myself trust
Again?
I thought sure I was just as far away
As ever.
But you never really know something inside out
Until you lose it
And it's the same with people.
You never really know what they truly are
Until you miss whatever that is.
I don't have friends.
I know it looks like I have friends
And a lot of you might even think you are among them
But I don't
I don't have friends.
I stopped talking to my friends.
I stopped way back two years ago,
When I lost everything and nothing could fix it.
And when seeing someone's face who wasn't her didn't hurt me terribly
It was still simply too tiring to have friends at all.
So I stopped talking to them.
Little by little.
They didn't wanna let me go.
Apparently I was pretty great or something.
But they did. They let me go
Because I am great-
At being persistent.
And I persistently pulled away.
And... that was that, really- I didn't have friends.
I had acquaintances.
I had a loose circle of people who I could talk to if I wanted
But who wouldn't miss me all that much if I suddenly bowed out of their lives.
I made a practice of doing just that-
Periodically leaving.
So nobody got used to me enough to like me too much,
Because I didn't have the energy to like them too.
It became that I only gave myself to love,
Not friendship,
Because when I lost love
Even the best of friends became completely invisible to me, hidden behind a haze of pain.
And I figured that must be a sign.
In a lot of ways, I don't do friends.
Or so I thought until today...
But tonight
Tonight I am losing a friend.
She is parting with hugs and promises to keep in touch
And I am sitting on my father's sofa crying
Because I don't remember the last time I cared about anyone I wasn't in love with.
How did I miss this?
When did I start making friends?
How many of them are there?
Will I even know before it's too late?
And why
Do they ever have to leave?

This is a list of the times I allowed myself to collapse.
These are the reasons I tried to drown myself in a bathtub filled with thick crimson and cheap liquor.
This is my final suicide note.

1. Today in science class my teacher brought out the human skeleton and I wished it was me.
2. I've never drank whiskey, but when my blood turns to Bourbon, I need to open the bottle.
3. I cannot count the times I've created spines on the mirror. I need to kiss the white lines.
4. The cats are meowing, they're hungry. I am so focused on not feeding myself that I have forgotten to feed them.
5. I'm a lot like cigarettes. I light easily. Burn out quickly. Focused on destroying you-always destroying myself.
6. I've got poison in my veins-I unzip myself daily. When I kissed you- I infected you. We have poison in our veins. Addicted to destroying ourselves. The Devil will watch and be envious.
7. I am 17. I have attempted suicide too many times to count. Every time in a different way.
          a. cliche; slit my wrist open and let flowers spill.
          b. drowned myself in a handful of pills and a bottle of *****.
          c. hung myself with my bedsheet.
          d. decayed my stomach lining with bleach
          e. starved the ugly out of me-let my bony knuckles callus.  
This time I am going to fling myself from a building, call my friends, and hope they'll catch me.

Because I never truly wanted to die.
I want to be saved from myself. I want someone to zip me back up. I want to look at the sun and not think about burning. I want to be able to sit in a bathtub with clear water. I want to eat a candy bar, and not taste it twice. I want someone to look at me and see flowers-not blades.
I wish I had green thread to sew my veins back together. I wish I had a syringe, i'd **** the poison from my blood. I wish I knew what love felt like, maybe I could perfect the practice.

This is not a poem.
This is not written with the intent to explain myself because I don't know myself well enough to explain.
This is a suicide note.
This is my last suicide note.

My hands, they quiver
My voice, it shakes
My heart, its pounding
My head, it aches
My friends, they're dead
My enemies, in power
My life, its passing
My death, next hour

A thousand moments we took for granted
In the blink of an eye a year flies past
With a yawn spanning decades until suddenly
You wake up alone, not sure why
The diaspora college brings upon us is tragic
Shattered ties and broken hearts litter the land
Forced out into a world lacking compassion
We become adults far too soon
Wandering our way through the desert
In search of life, and love
and happiness
Hoping to find meaning
Desperate for a reason to keep going
Tired and hungry, lost and alone