i don't think i believe in love anymore
it's just a transaction of brief attraction
it's what the poets write of
what the poets dream of
what hides behind every locked door
they find themselves standing in front of

but dreams aren't real
and thoughts are deceiving
love is a fleeting negotiation

but here we are
still wondering why all the great love stories end in tragedy

be aggressive with your love babe
i need you to demand
be harsh with your affection
it's the only way i'll understand

i have a wall of the things you said,
it sits and it rots above my bed,
and it sits and it waits and it turns to dust,
'cause you said it was love when it was only lust.

i fell in love with the words you said,
so i strung them up above my bed.
but the shadows played tricks upon my eyes,
and your beautiful words turned into lies.

the perfect ugliness
was ruined
by a broken women
who created beauty

i loved him because he made me feel small and fragile,
a feeling i never got quite used to.

death is not a considerate creature

he takes what he wants
not just for spite but also for pleasure

death is a cruel comedian

the more you observe his acts
the more his irony becomes apparent

a single twinkling cello string
echoes through the night
or perhaps that is just the grasshoppers
with their orchestra of breezes and rattling leaves
the sky surrounds me
and only a thin cotton string
ties my floating body to the earth
my heavy heart a magnet to the warm dirt
the stars hum and reverberate
and my vision of the heavens ebbs and flows
like a roll of film with the pieces cut out
and only the moon remains sharp
as if it is only a hop and a skip from my eyes
as if just maybe
if i stretch my fingers far enough

i could reach out and touch nirvana.

tiny cracks in the pavement
what flowers will bloom today?
wilted and glorious and good
i walk on them with purpose
flowers are not meant for the street
they are for flickering candles
and whispering fields
and all the other things
i know nothing about

the others weep
at a ****** of daisies
but i will not

they are nothing to me

i killed my mother
i know it's true
she's still in mourning
for the girl she once knew

i wish i could have been a reason for you to stay.

they never told me that my sadness could be physical
but this past year I started to understand
sadness can shape-shift
it hides in the ***** laundry
the empty shower
the matted hair
the bitten and bloodied nails

it's crafty
and smart
and it seeps into the unchanged bed sheets
the closed window and stale air

some people can't understand
that what they see is sadness
all they know
is that it's not very pretty

you ask me why i'm nervous
and in my head i reply,
i don't want you to uncover
the parts of me that i despise.

i walk my dog alone at night
so i can see the sky better
i walk with him and he doesn't much mind
in that serene dark of december

The music was never sad
But now it is
And I can’t quite put my finger on the reason
The wind has quieted down
And the birds are sleeping in the nest
There is a sinking in my stomach
A bug crawls across the screen
Maybe it’s just the night, the wind says
But I don’t think that’s why
No, that’s not the reason why

who ever thought

that life could become

    so

              incredibly



                     ­                 lifeless.

the mothers that come in
seem to have a fire missing
somewhere behind their eyes
their laughs are always piercing
their smiles, rotten
their hatred festers and boils below their skin
hatred for their jobs or their husbands
or their screaming kids
hatred for their brunches and cocktail hours
or their *** life
hatred for their absent fathers or mothers or both
hatred for their marriage
for their husbands that got to have both dreams
hatred for their bodies and minds ruined in carrying children
hatred that they were never told that they had a choice
that there were different paths to happiness
hatred for the box that they were shoved into with a smile on their withering faces

when i take their order at the counter
i see it all
i see this and more

and it frightens me deeply

there was a time
when i was enough for myself . . .
and i do not remember the exact moment
when i decided that i was no longer good.

once there was a young princess
who was consumed with finding her love
she traveled far and wide to find him
scoured below and above

once there was a foolish princess
who gave her heart away
and received it back in pieces
when her love didn't stay

once there was a broken princess
who met a knight in the woods
and he made her laugh and smile and shout
for his soul was pure and good

once there was a young queen
who learned that love takes different shapes
and the loyal knight that bandaged her soul
showed her that friends can be soulmates

and i was never told about lust
and the way that it makes love rust

- FELIVAND

there is a quote from a movie i love
and it talks about being perfectly happy
the main character has completed her arc
she has finished her great journey
and now
she is perfectly happy

perfect happiness

i cannot claim i know of its existence
it might not live in my reality
i think that i am one of those people
who must venture out alone
and might never return
might never finish my journey
never reach perfect happiness
but perhaps i will reach fulfillment
and i think that would be good enough for me
good enough that I may be at peace
at last

My words became
knives.
A paragraph,
a sword.
And when I
made
my first speech,
the room
                was
                        hit
                             with
                                            a
                                                    grenade.

once upon a time
in a land far away
there was a girl
who wished upon a star
who fell through a book
who dove to the bottom of the sea
who touched the moon
who flew among the dragons
who called down the thunder
and lightning
and wind
who held up the sun

who had a life full of beginnings and middles
and a chapter in between the two
and never seemed
to have her
story
end


but what becomes of a full life if it has no ending?

there is a biting chill in the air
today
that's snuck into bed with me
ruffled my hair and
wrapped around my wrist
caressed the hollow of my throat
it is not unkind to me
no it is not a storm
it's just a slight crack in the window
and it says to me
just lie with me
let me weigh down your soul
the world will wait

and so i stay
and my soul is weighed down
but biting wind is a bitter lover
and on the third promise
it lied
the world did not wait for me
and so i am left behind

perhaps that is all for the better.

my favorite radio station is static
i find the melody fills the space
even when i dial up and down
a song never takes its place

turns out there was a limit
to the music that i could play
i wished and i got and the songs disappeared
i thought it better that way.
i thought what i needed was static and gray.
perhaps i should have made the music stay.

everyone says that it's brighter in the sunshine,
but baby,
it's the rain that makes all the colors shine.

silly girl,
                  silly girl


       hands clench,
                                  toes curl
  

                    it's so much fun,
                                                    watching­ you unfurl.

drown me
and breathe life
into me again
i beg of you
bathe me
wash me from myself
swell
and break
into my skin
curl around me
and take me under

it's the type of secret that isn't yours to tell.
you know?
but oh how i wish to feel less alone.
it's just me and this secret i stumbled upon,
and it's trapped me in this perpetual state of processing.
it's not mine to tell,
but it lingers on the tip of my tongue,
waiting for me to betray it...
and betray you.

i am so
disgusted
revolted
by your image
you narcissistic
shell
there is
nothing left
in you
but ash
and even
now
you are
overreacting
you think
that you
deserve
to feel
pain
you
egotist
for once
can you
think of
someone
other than
yourself?

i have always struggled with physical touch

perhaps its because
i received too much
all at once
and never quite understood
what i was being given

perhaps its a million other reasons
but it is too difficult
to understand the past
so for now I'm stuck with
my present longing
for some kind of touch
that doesn't make my skin crawl

and i'll read more poetry,
and take the dog on a walk,
watch Peter at his computer,
and the bird in the pine tree,
and i'll just continue,
doing nothing
                             important
                                                  at all.

isn't this the life?
isn't it?

i wish i was a soft girl
the ones you find in movies
with tears of honey
and kindness that warms like golden sunshine
dewdrop flowers with ambrosial petals
blooming with unwavering patience and soft lips

instead i am just a girl
with a chest of steel
and i am angry
that i foolishly keep waiting
for someone to lift the curtain
and maybe see me
as a soft girl too

i seem to always be waiting
perpetually counting the seconds
the minutes
the days
the months
the years
until someday comes.

i am tired.
i do not want to wait anymore.

at night
when everyone is sound asleep
i have to remind myself
that i am breathing
and i am alive

there are some beautiful things,
that the eye of a camera will never see.

the poets are up late at night
we love to see the stars
something is hidden in them we believe
and we spend forever looking upward
trying to find what we are missing
trying to find the last puzzle piece
trying to find
something
amid the velvet expanse of the night

it baffles my mind,
that the world didn't stop when you did.

welcome to suburbia
where numb is the new norm
stay awhile and realize
it's the quiet and never the storm
oh i'm not complaining
i'm just stuck here waiting . . .

warm soft hugs
like gold hued ships
bathed in the setting sun

arms restrict
like drowning dark ships
the panic has just begun

we spent all day at the river
you, me, and carl
it was the first real day of spring
and it was the last weekend before
the library would eat away at our sanity
it was the first morning in months  
where i could not find a single cloud
and the space above me was simple and blue
and the sun was good
and the river was laughing
and so were we
and even as your nose peeled
and my eyes stung
the river stones were a little lighter
and so was my chest
and you and i fell asleep in the van on the way home
wet and sun-tired

i looked up synonyms for self-love today
and apparently someone who loves themself
is narcissistic,
                          self-absorbed,
            ­                            ­                conceited . . .

how saddened i am
that this is how we perceive those
who live without doubt

you think that i'm indifferent,
dancing with everyone here but you,
but honey I'm just nervous,
waiting for you to catch a clue.

“i just don’t really wanna be here anymore,” he said softly.

“where? where don’t you wanna be?” i asked.

“i just can’t be here anymore.”

and still,
it is there.
an undeniable
and persistent
sort of ache.
the kind that sinks,
and festers,
and cries.
it is still there,
"the missing."

do you think i'm happy?
i just wanna know,
have i been good?
put on the right show?
do you think i'm happy?
have i smiled enough today?
have i laughed enough,
gave all my care away?
do you think i'm happy?
because no one seems to ask
what's going on inside my head,
what's beneath the mask.
do you think i'm happy?
please, god, just say no
because if you don't notice,
i'll know that i'm alone.

and i can feel it pecking underneath my skin
with prickling feathers that reek of disgust
its wings are stagnant
and all it can do is keep

pecking

pecking

pecking

and it laughs at those who don't know better
and it scorns the ones that think they do
and it shows me the disease it has spread
but i am too melancholic to **** it
and its feeble wings sag around my heart
but it never tears them free
so it just screams
                                  and screams
                                                         ­       and screams

and even if a thousand people read my poems and said that they were beautiful, i still would not feel peace