an accidental intimacy is committed
between the right-now me
and the me-a-few-minutes-ago
as i slip onto my body,
(made cold by the air of the room,)
the warmest shirt i have ever felt,
soft and hot with the heat of
my own body
that i had already forgotten.

two me's converge, here.
i wrap my arms around myself.

i forgive my old self for all he has done to me
yesterday
because look what he would do for me
today,
he would keep himself warm
so that one day he would be cold
so that one day i could pick this hot shirt up
and wear it.

we waltz, we dance,
until the heat calms under the fan,
and then we are just one man
and i catch myself missing him.

taking the trash out one night,
i begin to fantasize about my own disappearance.

with the way it's raining, loud against the
metal of the house,
of the car,
of the little, singing bud in my ear,
i think to myself,
i don't think anyone would have seen this coming.

i find my place between the mazda and the bins,
walk there to the beat of this song which sounds
so much like an insistentlyapproaching bootfall,
and the bag is heavy as i swing it up and in,
and i return inside for the second.

right, the second.

i think about the documentary after i'm gone,
when they do the re-enactment.

and he walked inside again, mom will say and
dab at her eyes, for the second bag. i saw him, saw him go.

out of focus, the false me will wooshslowmotion with
a grocery bag of scraps around her and out the door
and then he will be gone forever
and he will have been taken so much for granted
and he will have incredible ratings.

this bag is smaller.
it takes no effort to toss,
and i latch the lid of the bin closed
with bungee rope like needy restraints
and i slip through the gate,
unfollowed,
close it behind me,
untaken,
up the steps beneath the awning which shouts
with rain,

and when i enter the house,
it is empty and sleeping
and dark and nothing.
there is no one to miss me in here.

well yeah man, it's like-
you take a drag, inhale.
your eyes sink and i watch your lips
part slightly and let out a trail of smoke
but your words get lost in my mouth
because i sit up and kiss you
it's sort of slow and feverish
and i climb in your lap and chase it
automatically like a moth to a flame
twisting i almost smile, i lick your teeth
-like this ? i not quite growl
you forgot everything but this moment
but you nod anyway
and i see some indescribable want or need
some days i can't tell the difference
i guess i like you like me
i watch you sit and smoke
every breath you seem a little farther
when you're done you grab me
pull me away into your room
i lie on the bed and taste incense
you look back as music plays
then join me silently and pull me on top
i rest over you like a misshapen blanket
and you get too hot
you look so far gone deep out in space
floating somewhere under me
your eyes glazed and our thighs
it must feel so great to be treated like this
someone to keep you safe
and do anything you say
and selfishly i tried making you mine
but your and my bruises healed
sometimes i wish they had stayed

it’s always too warm or too cold in my grandmother’s house. windows open in the winter and shut tight in the summer. it was july, i think, and i was still figuring out how to wear my tank tops in just the right mix of confident and coy. i remember her hugging me on my way in, and noting the sweat pooling on her forehead. the windows were closed, curtains flung open, sunlight spilling over the hardwood floors.

it was always offhand comments from her, things like, have you thought about a diet? as if i haven’t been throwing up every meal since i was thirteen years old. like, jesus can fix anyone. i have always wondered if she really meant that, because i never felt like she thought i was broken. in between those sour comments she would spoil me and gush over how beautiful i am, how i'm really growing into my features. in between those comments she would give me ziplock bags of her favorite earrings from when she was a kid, and i would smile and humor her because she was so excited about it.

but those comments always sit in the back of my mind, stewing along with all of the backwards glances from men on dark streets and the angry red scars peppering my thighs. that big house is full of both sweet and bitter memories, and even now that it’s empty i can picture every sideways glance, every uncomfortable laugh.

i guess i'm spending too much time alone. alone, that's right, all-one. one of me, two shots of the cheapest ***** i could find.

my knuckles are scarring. like my fingertips would, back when i was happy enough to hold onto things like music instead of, just hold on until three, that's it, then i can let myself bleed.

no, this isn't right.

i think my heart is too small for my ribs, i can feel it slipping through the third and the fourth. skidding, slippery, across my bedroom floor to collect dust under my desk.

i'm hiding from more things than i could ever count, but mostly its the five-six-seven-eight-when-will-it-end scars branding my shoulders and my thighs and my ribs.

but i really am tired of rearranging the same ten songs into different playlists that all mean the same thing. i know that adding one more wouldn't make a difference. mundane.

i've ignored every thought of the ugliest ways to go. a dozen tylenol can **** just as easy as a pistol, that's what i keep telling myself. but what i really want is to maul every inch of my body until i'm soaking my dark blue sheets the same color as the inside of my head.

and my life revolves around 13. haunted number, maybe. maybe there are ghosts around every corner in my mind and i've just gotten so accustomed that i'm treating them like guests.

i've been imagining myself fourteen years from now, how i'll wander around whatever ****** apartment i'm sharing with some stranger. how i'll tiptoe around those floors, trying not to disturb the dust that will have settled over every inch of my skin.

fifteen feels like too many years to pretend but i have to keep up this facade because there are girls who care what i think and who maybe would be hurt if i didn't have the proper insides to think anymore.

i don't plan on living till 27. but you know, things are good. this is fine.

you will never understand how much i hate myself.
how my throat collapses and closes in on itself.
and how tired i am. this aching body is an empty vessel.
sometimes my veins still ache to bloom red roses.
i put my headphones on and the whole world becomes a drone.
a blur of colors and half assed dreams bleeding together.
do you remember that january night in the snow?
we held each other close so we breathed the same smoke.
rosy cheeks and ripe noses, gray eyes and frozen toes.
someday, maybe soon, i'll choose to go through my skin.
by way of rope or knife, i'm not quite sure yet. but it will be scarlet.
my white tissue paper sliced and torn apart by your fingers.
my favorite time of day is any time spent with you.
your arms are home to me, and my heart rots inside out.
i want to scream far and wide into the cold dark sea.
and drown in your recycled oxygen, kneel at your feet.
i will never be more than a kicked dog, a hollow corpse.
oh darling, don't cry for me, this is how it's supposed to be.

trigger warning. eating disorder.






i wish my hips were smaller. that's it, i wish my hips were smaller and my waist slimmer and i wish my stomach was flat and defined the way i know it's supposed to be. i wish i was delicate. i wish i wasn't so surprised when girls call me pretty.

but it's habit now, i know i look sick, i know i'm too pale and my hands always shake and i look like a ******* ghost. my own mother would cry at night if she knew i had to safety-pin my favorite jeans.

i cut my hair short again. started noticing strands all around my bedroom. cut it off at 3am on a tuesday. dyed it blue. now the color of my fingertips isn't so strange. it's the dye, see, it might not wash off for a while. weeks. months. god, what am i doing.

stuck my fingers down my throat in the shower last night. nothing came up.

i'm falling apart like my hair falls out of my scalp, easy, unhindered.

i fell for a Polish girl, i looked at her like she was the ocean that i am too afraid to visit now. but i left her after i hit that last stretch, swallowed too many aspirin for my headache, washed them down with white wine i'm too young to hide in my bedside drawer.

i never tried to die, but i also never looked before crossing the street.

i'm not a monster, right? all i want is rest. is that so wrong?