It's a little too late
to call home
I stood at your door
wondering what your lips felt like
And the next week
you seemed to forget the moment
like your next doctor's appointment

-cj

Let's make things fun,
I whisper
and pull you to my chest
Your breaths are getting heavy
as we slowly undress
Our lips, ribbons meeting
Our heartbeats, swiftly fleeting
Until the clock screams and I see
the white of my ceiling

-cj

When I said we really need
to let her go
I wasn't talking about me
Did you think I was
Either way
We're both delusional
with hints of sugary intellect
resting in our bones

-cj

the sound and the fury
gorgeous repercussions
beginnings, ends, and middles
all the idyllic centres
it makes me wonder
if I ever needed anything else

-cj

At the start I am sewed up
At the end I lay ripped open, blood and thoughts for all to see
And after all this time I know this is what is supposed to happen

-cj

somehow you are entitled
and the rest of us
swear and scribble the notes
we are told to take

-cj

A sweet assurance had come over me,
and I caved so willingly into myself without all of the insecurities of before
Though he had denied me the companionship I thought I had earned, I was content, somehow, and his absence was probably a blessing
The times were changing, especially within; how my dreams from the past were still alive but new ones were coming to life
It was nice, to breathe again
I had gone on for so long holding my breath, keeping these secrets, hiding my true emotions
Maybe the times weren't changing as much as I was
Whichever the case, it was good
It gave me another chance at something called living

-cj

watch the emblem invert
this confidence is not gone
there's crime to commit
your fleet to farewell
sharp bon mot and silk
they'll capture this place
I'd save you in this moment
but in lace you'll sink
and sway once more

oh, severe, rest next to me
you've been abandoned but
you don't speak of it
finally, don't betray me, don't
you're merely a hanging novella this time

-c.j.

Has money become your god?
Beauty your saving grace?
For if these are the figures you trust & bleed & scream & fight over
You will be in deep regret when the day comes that your deity runs out

-cj

I'm sure you know that we tied our wrists, then,
to resist further spark
severed from reedlike limbs came the string
together, unbound
what we want is ours

-c.j.

always ready to tuck the darkness in so
it has no way of painting four walls,
no way of seizing her spirit

-c.j.

"Have you ever asked her who she is trying to feed by emptying herself?"
Maybe to them it will appear vague
But to me, I'll know
I'll know that she is feeding a monster

-cj

this is prettier than just walking
picture a few decades later
this is prettier, you're an image in my pocket
that I keep
you're not st. peter, my thread and spool
each stop carries us, we'll vow to the ocean
I won't let this slip
please trust me, now
the steel workings pry no entry for us
captain and his strategy will rupture like a raincloud
I suppose it's isolation, your young isolation
you dare not sneak out the house
our parents are too wrecked, inside

-c.j.

She thought the day was done but she had just confused the moon and the sun

-cj

we lack the connection, wireless, at least
while you are in the sky, I'll be sighing
at home, glancing at the chocolates you
gave me that I keep beneath the bed
unopened, contraband- the only heart
I won't touch

you'll see the cathedrals, and winding
roads, and you'll think about me
how I cry without warning and wait
every morning for you
through the databases, at the least the least
primitive, may be unresponsive-
our mouths will move but no sound
will come out

we have our ways, we will find them
and reside in separate nations with
our eyes and minds full of each other

-c.j.

She left, claiming her bones ached
If one believed it wasn't manifest
Nonetheless she wandered home and softly lay to rest

-cj

deprivation and intuition-blue & white, until the bell sounds for the billionth time.
I will sit and not speak, companion to the wall, and enemy to the friend.

-cj

Subtleties are the vacancies today
Each stop sign is an encouragement
Stripped of pride, I am so sorry I lied
Entitled to saving or something, even now

-cj

If we don't have trees, what will we have?
I search the archives, come up blank
Each other, you answer
And the kiss that follows is evergreen

-c.j.

Singing required lungs,
but true singing forced every thought into the art of feeling

-cj

Sidewalk cracks and ladders don't scare me anymore
Black cats in my path and shattered mirrors have effect no longer
But the fortune cookies and the occasional green light give me some kind of hope, somehow

-cj

She remembered the night his body was
so close she could see it even though
her eyes were closed
The rhythm they shared could never
be repeated
Virgins cleaving to their day
and reveling in their night

-cj

chambers are stained magenta
and vivider dreams paint
themselves throughout
each moment is another vessel
and a chance
rose petals fold in and shield
from the thorns

-c.j.

I sent ships
and letters
with black ink
Return my
fleets and
pale sheets
My heart
longs to
harbour them

-cj

They'd throw rocks and wait for you at the docks
And as for the devil,
at the door,
he quietly knocks

-cj

The moon shivered
and said goodnight
You never said hello
and as we both know
That should never be
taken as a
loveless gesture
Only I wish I could
slice time out of the night
Just to spend it with you

-cj

I said it but the meaning
must have yawned back
into my pillow
Every word is muffled, now
There are amplified voices
speaking horrors I do not
want to hear
So I neglect surroundings
and burrow into my inner home

-cj

tonight's jigsaw puzzle is a bunch of little white lies
lying in little strange shapes
their edges give me a deep sweat, no matter how near or far
from home I happen to be
fictional fragments like messages in a bottle,
pleading mercy with human nature and other curses

-c.j.

This instruction manual is
a recipe book for disaster
But we all crave a little excitement,
I suppose
So involve your eyes with
the cramped story's pages
If only to see how this world within works

-cj

i'm the
glitch
in your
system

-cj

If not for the gasoline aspect
I would drive all over town
Listening to music from the stereo
Just me, just the car
Just the world staying still
And moving, still, somehow

-cj

like teenagers in a craze we run into walls
point the other way
and we'll be running into the sun

-cj

five thousand seven hundred miles
six hours
two continents
one metaphor that gave birth to love

-c.j.

bliss is a wrecking force
the kisses are little wars causing our trouble
the metronome seems to say,
"there, there, hear this night song, the dark sky's
crystallised stars have made it for you"
so the music brings peace like it usually does,
surrendering the fight to solace

-c.j.

my friend was in love with a boy who put a shotgun to his head
and pulled the trigger and broke her heart
at his funeral someone said the reason why, the real thing that caused him to do this, could never be known, we'd just have to wait for the morning sun
his speech was bitter and I tasted lemon
the world may believe that the truth is buried, too,
but I believe it's waiting there to be found by people who care about the reason why, the real thing
because it is not a passing fancy; it is not a myth

-c.j.

this queen has been pushed from her throne
lies apparent, the integrity of the crown vanquished
the common girl, the one with the blue eyes
and singing voice, had the man this queen,
partially evil, desired-
as ruler of the kingdom she would
and could do as she pleased,
exercising her power to a terrifying extent,
until the twigs snapped loudly in the night
and though this common girl did not replace
her and take on the royal title, she possessed
more than this queen could ever wish for;
love

-c.j.

all because a girl afraid chose to be brave-
refused to ignore her intuition,
saw beauty in every little thing,
divinity in patterns,
the intrinsic god in everyone

but you fail to ask what came before-
this was a long time coming,
and it was filled with lofty cries and
sunken amethyst days
until the girl said, "meet me somewhere,"
nice was the only word spoken to describe her
she has become brave in the face of a thousand fears

-c.j.

How I once viewed the present as the future- it was me, being a little girl
Good lessons and bad messes work in fixing the abstract pathetic telescope, and very obviously, I hide

-cj

We had all the same friends
as children do
Cookie-cutter neighbourhoodish suburbia
Green grass glinting from the lawn
Shivering dew in the dawn
Thank yous and you're welcomes
And merry christmas
And a happy new year
Echoed throughout the decade
When we grew up, or grew out
of what we were
The years never really seemed
all that happy or new
But looking back on them
We say they were our favourite times
When innocence wasn't wrong
When we could play and work
and only see slight differences
When there was something to live for
Back when we all had the same friends
Same beginnings, but different ends

-cj

I suppose this weak art is the
part I don't choose to ignore
It kind of wakes me up
It's like purple chairs in the old greentree house with the red shutters
It's my days jumbled in sequence
Like these dreams align from
a long long time before
I have time
I have to have more time
to do what the clock strikes within me

-cj

he refuses to pretend-
that stops me hard in my summer sidewalk tracks
his voice creates mountains in my chest
mountains my breath doesn't mind climbing

I refuse to question the sunrise anymore
a simple talk quickens the revelation
I can make dreams bring more mountains

because he refuses to pretend
I stopped, too

-c.j.

There is no name for this
A blanking emotion that fondles each nerve
What I have left to say is
I'm sick of it
I'm tired of neverending nothingness
I want to run
Because I always knew I would

-cj

this is a riot, it started years ago
and will go on tomorrow
is yesterday more innocent, because then we were on
a carousel ride, being Phoebe and not Holden, yet

-c.j.

don't get all riled up
this is not a pipe
yeah, I said what I thought
I guess it wasn't fate's favourite
I am so confused but at the same time
you say it's not gonna work
implying that it's futile
it is not wise
and I know why not

-c.j.

instead of typical introductions
our voices just sort of came out of their beds
and began something we both admit within
to like very much

-c.j.

To be carried
No footprints
In the snow
Or traces
In the wind
A travesty
Against nature
A sin against
Integrity
But I fall
And am swept up
And I do not say a word
For I know
Without these arms
Is the end of the world

-cj

you've probably laid awake
in your bed late at night,
unrealistic notions
bunching up in your nerve endings
at least that's the
impression you give

-cj

Money doesn't grow on oaks nor pines
Coins aren't cradled in the vines

-cj

While he is a scientist
I am merely myself
Feeling gravity take me to his side
Restraint has never been this hard
In the meantime he thinks and blinks
And I stare at the last card

-cj

upon our arrival the holy assume we're evil
friends mistake us for enemies
but we cannot condemn them,
the flowers look like dead drums, songs sound like sirens
no hero nor heroine could save us
there is no death better than this

-c.j.