She always looks up when she plays,
searching for something.
Her eyes are wide open,
she says she sees music in colors.
She says she hears god when her fingers
roam across keys of ivory,
but they speak in tongues of gold.
Here everyone she loves shimmers,
and he beckons her home.

Sometimes I do things that,as a kid, I promised myself I wouldn't.
like forgetting to feed the dog
or lie
or trade in an adventure for light-up sneakers
But that's okay, because now I know better.
(Or at least I'm old enough to say it)
I don't make promises I can't keep,
I don't make any actually.
I don't shoot very high, anymore.
Really I spend most days looking down,
watching how gravity pulls.


I keep seeing light-up sneakers...

I am so incredibly dissatisfied.
With my family,
my lover,
my life,
and myself.

All things that used to sate the hunger,
to feel something,
have ceased to conjure any reaction.
My heart,  
once erupting with passion and purpose
now lays dormant at my feet.

So  I cater to these emotional addictions,
like a ****** looking for their next fix.

I need more.


Hurt me
          **** me
                    Use me
                         then
Make sure you leave me,
you'll be doing both of us a favor.

And I will put back all of the p i e c e s      
I always liked puzzles.
Cutting up something beautiful
for leisure.

These words run
                        down
                            my
                              arm
Like ledger lines, bearing notes
between lovers
and friends
or both.
But no matter how the tune starts,
it always ends the same.
Final chords struck in empty apartments
filled to the
                     b
                  r
              i
         m
with burned out passion.
Just like the light bulb in your bedroom lamp,
that you've been meaning to change for 3 days.
At the end of the day
all that's left is the thrum of the ceiling fan
you forgot to dust two weeks ago.

I am the writer who has forgotten how to spell
I am the singer who lost her voice.
You have given me lifetimes of motivation, but taken all my means.
You stifling ******* muse.

I wake up
while the stars
are still faintly sprinkling
the dark colored blanket
that covers the sun
and quiets the people.

There is so much silence that
I can hear captivating harmonies
that are usually obliterated in daytime's
illumination and bustle.

Like how wind runs its fingers through
Mother Earth's hair.
Comfort.
How the river flow around the rocks,
kissing every inch of her bumpy spine.
Devotion.

At night, as I observe,
it always feels like I've walked into
an intimate setting
I was never meant to see.
Interrupting,
nature's gentle displays of affection.

I wasn't made nocturnal,
but nightfall evokes passion
in the quiet.
And twilight
is for those who listen.

When I was little,
I thought I'd hear god in the back of orchestras,
with shining trombones and thundering timpani.
Now I hear her
in the sobs of broken mothers,
and the rustle of the leaves.
Things that aren't tangible
but still matter most.

When I gave you my hoodie, it was so you could see my heart on the sleeve.
Plus you were cold.
Now winter has thawed and summer is here, you don't want these arms anymore.

You roam my mind constantly, and freely.
For some reason I let you.
You always were special to me.
I never told you, I thought you knew.
Like how a fish takes to water and the tree roots to the ground.
You knew. Didn't you?
But the kids we were are long dead
and my sentimental soul can't handle your whispers.
And I'd tell you to leave except...
I'm afraid you would.

The only reason I know there is a higher power,
is because I have a thirst to write.
I am my own highest power and I will not be bound
by what I do not understand.
I crave to put the colors I feel in my soul
on paper.
I just can't seem to find the right shade of teal.

Every time I stay up past 2am,
I start thinking about my life.
I always come to the same conclusion,
I need: an extensive vocabulary and more sleep.

Some nights I play music in
my bedroom full of mirrors
and talk to myself.

I have the same conversation each time.
Like, if I hear all the different versions I might be able to
piece myself together.
But somehow the dialogue is always new.

And every time the cut is in a different place.
Tallying up the score

I'm winning.

I see symmetry in my face,
but not in my values.
I find the parallels on the palms of my hands,
but not my interests.
I see the lines running up my thigh in
                    a
                  neat
                  little
                column
but that's not how life is.

These conversations did help me find out one thing though;
I ******* hate mirrors.

For the nights my
eyes won't close,
pencil will scratch paper.
And if I'm lucky,
my mind as well.

She holds cancer between her gnarled knuckles
and smoke between her teeth.
Her tongue slips on week late birthday cards, and the five dollar bill that she generously donated to the local abc store instead.
She says she can't find her own spirit anymore,
so she buys others' instead.
Good intentions,
she always had them.
Standing at the corner of the family gathering,
staring at faces she was supposed to know.
But the wine had taken their names off her tongue.
Good intentions,
gift cards for everyone.

97 minutes
wasn't the only thing separating us
I never told you about my fear of falling
off the bed
out of a plane
or in love
somewhere in the distance I lost that fear
and my track of time
because before I saw how close you really were
I lost you

I want prickled arms
and soft chest
with steady ups and downs.
But mostly,
I want your hand reaching out for mine.

Your hands blaze trails through my flesh.
Leaving scars unseen but felt.
And though this skin will be replaced, I'll know.

And the words slipped from your mouth,
just like that little black dress you wore on Friday.
Almost like you were trying them on to see how they might fit,
between your mouth and mine.

When our skin touches,
it is arguably the closest to Heaven I will ever come.
But then you asked to see the book with all my words;
and I suddenly decided that
the mind is more sacred than the flesh.

You looked at me so bravely when you finally said it.
But I'd already been tracing the words on your skin for months.

Just like the mornings when you don't want the sun to peek through the curtain just yet. You recede back into the covers wrapped in your lover's limbs.

This is the part where you exhale the imploding universes you have locked away inside you. Inhale her whispers in your neck. Just like the ones your mother shushed you to sleep with, when fever flushed your cheeks. The same shade of red that colors them now when she tells you "You're beautiful"