"****** purest," swims through her head, shes growing,
oh god, oh the sinking dread

unrecognisable, her eyes with the shame,
her blood poisoned, the toxins remain
pulsating through her skin, her brain

and when you eat her guts from the inside out
while shes crying for her mum

shes a good for nothing, good for nowt

and she tastes like blood and ***

there's something bitterly comedic about seeing you talk about trauma
like you're the victim of something great,
like you're holding all these secrets in those big, wretched, calloused hands i feel in my darkest nightmares.
poor baby, poor teddy,
oh brother,
do you feel small?
and did i feel small, hiding in closets, or under that loft bed?
under that same loft bed. hand made, white painted wood,
heart-shaped pillow, lavender dollhouse,
quiet games,
dead childhood,
stolen innocence.
come to me, cry to me,
you just lost your girlfriend,
you just lost your job,
your life all fell apart
and i am soothing you through gritted teeth
remembering how you ruined mine before it even had the chance to start.
they say
i know you don't like him but you must love him.
i wonder if blood is still blood once you've drawn it?
and i still feel like i owe it to you.
it was us against this whole dark world that left us
but you were supposed to protect me.
i should have been playing with toys,
but i was the toy.
when we went hungry i was the raw meat in your mouth.
you starved for anything you could tear into, cut up, make a mess of.
we had that holes in our couch, holes in my childhood,
"you're not on my hit list yet,"
"i'm just checking up on you" kinda brotherly love that is swept so neatly under the rug until it eats right through the floorboards.
i try to will those gaps back in my memory.
it would be so much easier if i just swallowed it right up dry, choked it down, let it digest, let it melt away to a stomach ache so i don't have to think about you.
i will scrub my skin raw at the end of this scream,
try to wash you off of me,
but this has been embedded deep in my skin for so long,
too long-
can you tell me when it started?
honest to god i don't remember.
what was it about me, soft face, soft limbs, empty mouth that made you want to hurt me?
my earliest memories exist in haunting.
my formative years are a poltergeist, you are the evil thing inside of me.
and so you come to me with stories and expect sympathy,
And i will hold my tongue in my mouth lest i feel enough like a wounded animal to try eating you alive,
pretending the iron taste of blood that floods my mouth is yours,
that i am as strong and metallic.

When you hear the ringing bells,
you’ll know the time has come
but it’ll be too late for you
to make up for the lost youth.

When you lose what you thought
you’d always have,
you learn how to care
when it is needed.

When the earth smells like sin
you find the truth buried underneath
it’s been years but
it has not changed a little bit.

When you open your mouth
but nothing is willing to come out,
you fill it with some more guilt instead,
no feeling in your head.

Years might have gone by
but you still can’t escape that place,
he might be gone, yes…
but are you sure he is?

I used to be more,
full like the morning sun,
a fool but made of dreams bittersweet.
Grief took over me.
Suddenly? No,
a long process,
I did not notice.

Time passes by unexpectedly
even if you expect it,
it flows and flows,
unbothered by cries,
by dying men,
flowers melting like
my heart every April;
it asks no one
for it has no mouth
to scream and shout,
for it’s not alive
like you are
or like the papers say,
like your mother used to say.

Oh, if only she knew…
you left your self
on the front seat of his car,
too young to sit there
but he didn’t seem to mind.
He should have been terrified
but no. He was calm.
'Not your first time, is it?'
What?
'How dare you?'

There are times when
I simply sit and imagine:
vanilla ice cream turning to liquid,
dripping on my tummy
under the filthy, scorching sun.
It’s cold and I prefer chocolate
and it’s not fair but
I don’t say a thing.

Make it subtle,
invisible it should be,
shush it all away,
it passes so it’s okay.
I’m telling you,
it should be.
And it will be
one day.

insects under my skin
they're there they're there they're there
you're there

redacted oh redacted
i dream about maggots eating your eyes

the only justice i will ever find is in my dreams
maybe that's why i sleep all the time

Cosmic projections underlying in spaces
as warm sunburnt bodies move together across the floor
purple lights in neon glow attached to the ceiling,
mind spinning with the fluorescence.
And youth- your mind is spinning with how young you are
only seventeen
you carry the burden in your stomach the sadness on your shoulder.
You are much too young to have abundant regrets
to be living yet dead in a bitter grave.
Wrong choices overlap each other as the grave gets deeper- I know that sometimes it feels hopeless.
Banter with old friends about the aliens and rehab centers, the girl who taught you four square teaching you how to torch the end of a crack pipe.
Cycles of the same tornadoes, dreams of constant death,you’ve seen your best friends dead body more times than you will admit. Yet they’ve never imagined yours, or imagined you, or cared.
The rose colored glasses are ripped from your face given to the other unsuspecting girl who will walk the same journey I did with him.
One-sided friendships get lonely
lovers are no longer loving
and the pino has run out.
The purple lights manifest into messages coming across the lifeline simulation- Give up those who have fallen silent, your mission is not with them.
The mission is uncertain
get a man to prison
to watch a wild orca
have a family
but the process is daily.
My mission right now is to live freely let my hair grow and stick my head out the window singing Janis Joplin tunes on the 105.5
The aliens come through once again to extend long hands and acid tabs offering insight into treasures unknown.
Time capsules I have yet to bury.

The great thing about cycles is you can stop them.

God bless the children-
As they step off the school bus
To a soccer ball, summer camp, popsicle joke stick.
Bless those who return home to empty refrigerators-
Static television and *****.
Bless the airplane rides, holding onto the edge of a seat
landing into a world where their body-
is no longer their own.
Daytime heat rising off the road
walking barefoot from the community pool,
still an aching between legs.
Bless this sky, the grass, God Bless America
And the fireworks that set fires in our bellies
Unforgiving.
Bless lightning bugs making stars in a starless black sky
Waiting for the moon to move from behind the sheet
Guide the blessed children
home
summer camp
soccer ball
heaven.

i look back at the girl i was
when it happened and
darling, you were so young
you didn’t deserve to be treated that way
or to have to grow up that fast
i wish i could’ve protected you and
told you that you were safe
and that you didn’t have to
destroy yourself
because you didn’t want to be in
the same body he touched

you thought you carried
your faults on your skin
so you tore it open

i was a body hollowed out
a skeleton with shattered bones
he ripped off my wings
and emptied me of all light
now all you’ll find
is black paint in careless streaks
across my weary heart
tired of beating

a ***** rotting thing
held a lighter to a match
not as smart as you might think
so i burned
and returned
to ash again

i remember this in little flashes
noises, smells, words
hit my brainstorm like lightning bolts
and take me right back to
a frightened little girl
blurred visuals projected
like a picture show i didn’t want to see
and i freeze
catatonia

my senses swarmed in radio static
and nothing around me is real anymore
not that the broken memories
of buried innocence in an unmarked grave
felt any more concrete
i can hear my panicked
heartbeat thumping like thunder
in my chest while thoughts
run wild through my mind
reverberating around my brain
until they whirred enough
to release cacophonous screams

is it too much to ask to forget
these little incendiary flashes
because they burn me from the inside
and turn me back to ashes
but memories don’t work like that
they don’t dissipate or shrink
no matter how hard you try

secrets turn to cement in my lungs
and i’m drowning in them
suffocating, coughing, wheezing
every time i try to speak
i choke because it’s not over
unless he says it is

to be polite
i keep this twisted sickness inside of me
but i long to cut myself open
and rip the tangled mess
of trauma from my chest
throw it down where everyone can see
because i’m so tired
of keeping this in for so long

i’ve only ripped myself open
to know it was real
because i’m just a terrified child
but the world doesn’t stop
the natural progression of
a child with secrets
to an adult with depression

no one cares
when they see someone like me
hunched over her own bleeding guts
splattered on the sidewalk
apologizing to pedestrians
about her own carnage
because she didn’t mean it
as a call for attention

but god, i wish they did
if only the world would stop for a moment
so i can collect these thoughts
and piece them together in way
i can explain why
i’m bleeding out in front of you
and ask for you
to reach out your hand
and rescue me
from this unrighteous ruining
and help me rise from these ashes
6/22

I fiddle around with the truth in my hands
trying to mold it into a shape I can stand
(that isn't age 7 when I didn't understand)

I look up and say with a pensive sigh,
"I've never made love to anyone,"
because that is no lie

but I promise myself, there is hope for a body profane as mine
a ****** I will be! and I'll make love for the first time-

to a lover, to a tender hand,
to another boy and not a man

in the queen-sized bed, on the soft white sheets
intertwined and in love, our bodies will meet

It won't hurt like this forever.