I watched the playlist get smaller, and in turn felt your love for her grow stronger. I’m no longer a part of your life, but the love for her that you have, I feel it too, because as it grows inside you, as it crawls through your throat and vomits out of your mouth, so full there’s only one way to exit, my heart contrasts and restricts and I feel it leaving me and entering her. Everyday. Little by little. I become just a memory. But to me, you are everything. To me, you are the moon when I can’t sleep, the sun when I wish to wake, the wind pushing me, the air I breathe in, and everything I wish not to exhale. I want to keep you inside, in my lungs and in my stomach, but every time I exhale, you wonder farther and farther away, into her arms, into her heart, and I can not breathe fast enough to keep you in anymore. I love you but I can not. I dream of you but I will not. I miss you but I

California sun kissed your cheeks
California sun held you in her arms,
Wrapped her hands around your neck
Like the rope you hid in your closet

I miss you.

Do you remember picking flowers
In our backyard

Making homes for bugs
Thinking we were keeping them safe
Locking them away

Do you think our parents
Thought they were keeping us safe too?

How many more times
Did I need to tell you
That I love you and couldn't live
Without you
For you to have stayed

Missouri rain cradled you in her arms
Kissed your track marks and told you
There was nothing wrong
Missouri sky's picked the needles out of
Your arms
Like I used to pick the splinters from
Your fingertips

I miss you.

I think about going back in time a lot
I think about all of the ways I could have done something differently
I would go back and tell my parents I appreciate them or
apologize to everyone who deserves it
I would go back and learn people's worth rather than ignore them based off of what I had heard
What I think about the most though,
I would go back and hold you.
I would hold you while you cried
And I would press my lips on your forehead.
And I'd tell you it isn't okay, you can be hurt, your pain is valid
but that does not mean you should feel ashamed.
After the first time it happened,
your dad found you in the living room.
He asked the boy why your underwear
had been pulled down.
You don't remember this, you were too young.
And I wish I could go back
to that moment and stop him.
I would grab his wrist
and squeeze it so tight I would hurt myself
and I would tell him to stop
but he didnt because my grip wasnt strong enough.
And when his finger tips touched your delicate skin,
you felt your entire like change.
And when his fingers tips spread and his palm met your stomach,
you lost the first piece of yourself-
your memory.
But don't worry, dreams will tell you the things you pray to all of the gods not to remember.

I think about going back to the first time you asked him to wait.
You closed your eyes and went to somewhere he couldn't touch you.
You dreamt of somewhere far away.
A room.
A dark room with no doors so no one could come in and the lights were always off.
Now, beautiful angel, this is where it began.
You didn't have to be there anymore.
He wasn't hurting you anymore
or- you don't remember anymore.
Only now in my dreams.

I think about going back to the first time he didn't wait.
Because the lights turned on.
I would find a way to get inside your far away room and I would hold you.
I would bring your face up to meet mine
and as I press my forehead to yours
I would tell you I am going to protect you.
And I would.
And it would all stop there.
But I can't be in two places at once my sweet sweet baby girl
so I will leave you with this,
I way to ask for your forgiveness

poets massacre me,
Authors cut off my limbs
And create a banner
With my fingers being the assumable
Of letters that spell out something
Meaningful,
And hang it high above
My dismembered face,
Welcoming my parents
Back to a serene home full of
Laughter. Sweep up the eggshells
They walked on and replace
Them with the beautiful
Carpet my mother always wanted.
when you're ready,
Find something beautiful about me
And let me help you destroy just to be the
One responsible for creating it

Sometimes I want to get up and leave
your house
because you **** me off

Sometimes I want to tell you
to shut up
because you sound dumb

You tell the same joke
and it's not even funny

When you make me really mad
I smoke a cigarette
and walk away
because I avoid confrontation

sometimes I never want to see you again


while I'm smoking
you come outside
to look at me
and I can't look away
I'm not mad anymore
so I kiss you

I still hate your joke