Why err on the side of caution when I can
Breathe in vast amounts of cold air without a jacket on
So I intentionally freeze
At midnight;
Get back home and invite the bed bugs to bite?

Why err on the side of ******* caution when I can
Talk to strangers in the dark and
Walk home along the train tracks,
In the hopes a spark will shock me back to life?

*

I just want to feel something.
Anything.
To feel anything other that the weight of my duvet,
Holding me still, but threatening to pull me back to rock bottom
As time draws in and tells me
“What a waste”.

As the Eternal Footman looms over me and peers into my soul-
He laughs.
This is not a life worth living, but it’s also not a life worth taking.

Stay here
when everything says run.
Stay here
when the jaw grinds shut.
Stay here
when the breath runs thin.
Stay here
when you're out of your skin.
Stay here
when the drink calls quietly.
Stay here
when the voice says spitefully,
"you're not enough"
because
when it comes to this stuff,
running feeds the fire
and true healing requires
staying here.

I am fixed
to the walls of this house

so tightly joined to it,
this bed
through sinew and bone

thread, thread, thread

another plait into me

the night, the breed she is
with that ****** needle
and thread, thread, thread

knows I can’t stand within it
the vignette
the solitude

the white coats,
the men of the word
those in the mire of the clay
all prescribing the same thing

a hit of perseverance

“Oh, okay,”

“oh, okay,”

“oh, okay.”

I lick, lap at
the slow drip
so tightly fixed to where I always have been

don’t come in,
don’t go out

“I’m sorry,”

in the pooling of spit
one hand in the *****
reaching into the pit

the *******
night
I don’t say in vain

“Okay,”
“Okay,”
“Okay,”

she waits
loosens my thread
slips those little tethers
so much good slack

I run
take my hit of perseverance
I burn
burn, burn, burn
right up in the fire of day

she waits for the ash

the sun rises and sets
on the same thing, always

always
always
always

they don’t understand
those free feet, walking the narrows
I watch them all go
no wince, no limp

no thread, no spit

the way that it seems,
from my portion of shadow,

“Oh, okay,”

so easy ‎

You reached for the stars
and put them in my eyes

I keep them locked
behind my eyelids


fearful

that you´ll change
your mind

What a cast of characters
we parade through this play-life,

they're dying Juliet deaths 'til we're bereft,
pondering the qualities of the stage light:

how it caresses empty sets with as much grace as our dramas,
unrequited in its love of the playwright.

I lie to you like you lie to me
Only each you is someone new

My hands quake,
my mouth quivers,
my nails dig into the skin on my stomach,
my breathing grows
heavier and
heavier.
Finally, you grab my hand
and I am fine.

Then I awake.