My hands feel cold like ice cubes
They are shaking and awkward
My hands are aching for contact
They are yearning for the touch of your hands
My hands are confused because they don't know what to do when they aren't intertwined with yours
They are incoherent because they now only know what it feels like to hold on to a bottle of liquor

We,
who watched them,
down bottle after bottle.

We,
who are afraid to look
at a mirror, simply because
we’re scared to see
the alcoholic who raised us.

To all of us who don't look,
knowing we'll only
​see our predecessors -
those who couldn't stay sober
enough to raise us -
instead of seeing change.

my friends watched, as I tore the madness from my skin.
this is a battle I’ll never win.
and maybe I don’t want to
so thanks for not caring
going out with yesterdays makeup
no one cares what you are wearing
when all they want to do is soak you
in all the liquor they can find
and all the drugs to make you unwind
because then they know you’ll be easier to take advantage of
you don’t rise above
you think you deserve to be hurt
you black out and wake up with bruises all over your wrists and arms
you don’t remember a thing,
then you get a text saying,
last night was fun

-last night wasn’t fun if you had to hold me down

i wrote poetry
he partied
i would overthink
he would oversleep
too lost within the oblivion
of trying to numb away
life
while i was here
thinking about "life" too much
writing about it too much
i enjoyed wine
on a quiet Tuesday evening
he enjoyed liquor
on a wild Friday night

surely
truly
love does attract
"opposites"
i loved him
and he loved me
but he didn't want to live
life
and i
wanted to write about it

we're sitting
in a ***** garage
blasting music
with lyrics
that i am so appalled by
this is his life
this is
it isn't mine

i am
the quiet
Tuesday afternoon girl
who writes her words
to figure out
life
while he is trying
to forget about his
on a Friday night

these lifestyles
we tried to clash
for far too long
so sadly
too long

i left
with love still
beating inside of my heart
because you could never
love me
the way you love
your Friday nights
like you couldn't love
my Tuesday evenings

love is so
crafty
and deceiving
it brought us to meet
we both understood
that life is sad
yet only i
could see its beauty

and our lifestyles
were too different
to sustain the life
for one another

I couldn't figure out the missing
piece of me until I was driving home
from my childhood home and realized
I didn't actually have a home.
My childhood home was filled with
so many ghosts and a father
who couldn't stay sober for the
sake of my mother, brother, and me.
My home away from home was
filled with so much pain that
I caused on my own
seeing as I was nothing
but a train wreck these days.
I was missing a sense of warmth
in my heart because I had no where
to run. But maybe it wasn't about
running, maybe I should have made
my own home inside my own heart.
Maybe my own body and soul
would be the only home I could
make sure would never crumble.

You are allowed to be angry.

You are allowed to be angry that you missed out on childhood.

That the sound of a slamming door terrifies you.

That the slightest touch of a hand makes you flinch.

You are allowed to be angry that it took you years to be able to look at yourself in the mirror.

You are allowed to be angry at the way you were treated.

You are allowed to be angry at people who hurt you.

You are allowed to be angry.

Sometimes I wish you were never apart of my life.

But if it wasn't for you, what the hell would be left of me?

Would all of the cuts and scratches and scars disappear? All of these ugly, little things that tell my story would simply evaporate?

It's because of you that I can tell the good days from the bad.

And it's because of you I appreciate the small things.

I appreciate smooth roads because I've driven on rocky.

Some days I close my eyes so tight they hurt. I beg and I beg and I beg that when I wake up, all of the bad is gone.

The memories.

The hurt.

The ache.

But I open my eyes and I'm still just here. So I exist.

And some days, that's all I need to do,

Simply exist.

I drank an entire bottle of wine today.
It tasted like loneliness.
It reminded me of when we broke up.
And when I cried myself to sleep for days because you weren't mine anymore.

I drank an entire bottle of wine today.
It tasted like sorrow.
It reminded me of that time when I was eighteen and I saw that you moved on.
And I drank until I couldn't walk every single day that week because I knew you weren't coming back.

I drank an entire bottle of wine today.
It tasted like anger.
It reminded me of the way you didn't care when I walked in on you sleeping with another guy.
And I chased an entire bottle of sleeping pills with a glass of wine because I would of rather died than replay that image in my head.

I drank an entire bottle of wine today.
And I will drink an entire bottle of wine tomorrow; and I will pray that one day I won't have to drink an entire bottle of wine to forget you.

This rosé tastes like I will be texting you two AM
It tastes like I will gather up my thoughts and tell you I am oh so in love with you
It almost tastes like I want to see you and feel your embrace once again

Four glasses in and this rosé tastes like I should be entangled up with you in my California king bed
It tastes like I will send you a three page text confessing things I shouldn't ever say out loud
It almost tastes like we should be up in the middle of the night making pancakes in our underwear

I graduated from rosé onto ***** now, and it tastes like every feeling I have been hiding for the last eight years
It tastes like I should not even have access to a phone where I can text you my heartfelt feelings
It almost tastes like I should go to bed and forget that we even were together

goodnight

he takes one more gulp
finishing the bottle
whiskey dripping from his lips
he looks at you
you are frozen
as he drunkenly stands up
he sharply wipes his upper lip
and then licks them
your eyes look left
and then right
searching for your younger sister
thankfully
she is nowhere to be seen
as the home you shared
was now unsafe
you don’t move
as he takes a step toward you
paralyzed under his watch
you start to sweat
he swears under his breath
and you are beyond nervous now
you hear his belt unbuckle
before you see it drop to the floor
your mind tells you to run
but your feet do not move
his eyes squint at you
as he says, “don’t you think it’s past your bedtime?”
and you silently sit still
praying to God that he will turn around
he does not
in fact, he starts moving in your direction
faster now
and you squirm in your seat
afraid of what comes next
you look into his black, soulless eyes
hoping he will see your innocence
he does not
his zipper is now undone
and his grimy fingers
roughly jerking at your skirt
you are afraid
but the numbness sets in
and your eyes become heavy