And as existential doubt sets in,
I know that I couldn't want you
But I couldn't help the rush of rejection
And so I fell
A thousand times
Screaming drunk filthy
I swear you were the one
Until I sit alone with myself and I know what lies within
But I don't know what lies beyond
And my hollow eyes find yours across the church
You in your white dress or suit or whatever nightmare you picked out
Plastered perfection
I was not the one for you
Because currently eternity has been looking more and more like a graduation ceremony
And I watch as everyone I've ever loved or loathed makes their way across the stage as I am seated in the back
And it doesn't really sting
Until the curtain falls
And I hear congratulations
With a mouth full of hell and a head filled with wine I stumble out into the crowd
And I spill myself all over your gown
Church or school auditorium it's all the same now
It's all the same now
Let the curtain fall on this too as I say congratulations
Congratulations
Congratulations
I still feel the same.

There isn't much left to say but,
I felt every part of this
from the hot nights spent with  friends hanging out the window on the interstate chasing feeling beyond cognizant thought
to the cold day in my back yard back when it all began when I realized for the first time that I was truly, and honestly alone and that nothing and no one could save me from the person I was becoming
no one, that is,
but me  
and some concept of God long forgotten with space and time.
and I see every fault so clearly
like my past is just a passage in my chemistry book with every misstep highlighted in different colors
one color for the effect it had on my existence

Yellow: to remind me that no matter how close to balanced I may come,
I will still feel the need to deconstruct every good thing I know
so I can understand the higher significance
and **** the magic and well being of everything I love.

Orange: for the bridges I burned
the relationships that if I had only been more gentle
or more caring
or more honest
or more careful
I could still have today.

Red: for the messes I made
to remind myself that no matter how much bleach I can pour on a stain
there will always be a slight discoloration.
doubt
trust issues
bad reputations
being held at arms length like one might hold a filthy child

I see every fault so clearly.

and I can move away
change my name
dye my hair
pierce my body
cut off my friends and family
turn the ******* page
but I will still be able to see the colors no matter how many pages I turn
all the yellows, oranges and reds bleeding through like some unholy sunset
staining my body and covering my eyes
So you can hear it in my voice.
So you can taste it on my tongue.
and there isn't much left to say anymore
I feel it all.

"...who are about to graduate in six weeks..."*

Six weeks.
Six weeks?!

How is it only six weeks
to the end of safety?

Am I really ready for
the real world?

Her baby walks
She looks on proudly
One foot then the other
Step by step
Across the stage

His eyes find hers
Arms thrown high in victory
Diploma in hand
“Mommy look at me”
Her baby walks

To the class of __,

I hear them call my name
as I briskly walk across the narrow stage.
Encumbered in my regalia
weighing me down like chains,
I peer up into the blurry faces
protruding a hand from ambiguous bodies.
I shake rigidly looking across the stage
to face a mass of opaque beings
accumulating into one lump of ambiguity.
I know not their names nor their lovers and dreams
I dreamt alone I sat alone I cried alone I ate alone I worked alone
I sighed alone.
Though in the company of many,
their ship had sailed and I sat in the lonely rowboat
moored to their rear listening from afar
to their ecstatic shrieks of glee
glimpsing the glow of fire in their eyes
flames like distant stars finally reaching me
a dead and gone ancient memory.
A diploma weighing in my hand,
I exit the stage and take my seat to wait patiently
then once we turn our tassels to the right we rocket
into the air blissfully triumphantly
bodies joining hats soaring I amidst it all
the aimless rowboat in a sea of smiling faces--
tossing and turning in their wake.

Feeling like the kidney transfer in a foreign body.

Back on the loop past my old flame's house again
I sleep in and I show up late because I can't get you off my mind
Between failing friendships and endless gap years I feel like there isn't much of my heart left
But I'm still here
And I cry but I don't talk about it anymore. The people I love are a text message and 45 short miles away
But I'm too scared to cross the distance
Emotional or physical I'm too ******* scared to even ask for prayer
Singing out hymns to an estranged father imortalized in memories from last year and in the gruesome images depicted in stained glass windows,

Hallowed be this place in me.
Hallowed be the space in between my ribs.

 and my brother is a gospel singer to a basement full of people who are just as scared as I am
And He rides the crowd like Jesus walked on water
He lifts his hands caught in the same spirit that torments the angels and demons alike
And maybe god hears him screaming through the walls like I do
Maybe god cries too
But if he does he does a good job hiding it
And my parents are on the continent that I turned my back on a year ago.
I traded family dinners for a decomposing raft and tried my luck at the sea
Only crossing the water to drink wine and share the communion of post apocalyptic dreaming or political warfare we are so horrified and mesmerized by
The fellowship of the modern day saints,

Hallowed be this place in me.
Hallowed be the hole in my head.

Icehead baby don't you come to close to me
I'm friged baby I'm too far gone to see
And I've been dreaming about summer while I've been reading up on life in Antarctica
Cold tundras and odd communities I could work in maintanince for the price of living
Meanwhile I'm surviving my own tundra the endless night never gives way to sun for seasons on end
And my friends grow wings and fly into the sun
 a thousand variations of Icarus they're going to be dead and gone on while I'm still landlocked in concept
Or in orbit far in space
Wherever I am, I am distant
Living on the memories from years past
So I'm driving the endless loop past an old flame's house again
Connecting the dots between my ideas of dependency space and time
And I'm fine
In love with the seclusion of the towering trees
The security of a prolonged gap year
The warmth of the ice in my head
And as the roots of the divine cover my mouth and bloom in my lungs
I sigh and give into my year of hibernation.

Hallowed be this place in me
Hallowed be the expanse of this space.

we fill up schedules for senior year
and imagine what we'll be then.
i'd like to imagine myself beside you,
but i can't even look you in the eyes
without my mind
clouding over with daydreams
even my pencil is at a loss for words
and a year from today
i'll still be hovering over empty love letters
but if im in the same class as you...
i might be able to say something more to you than
small talk for acquaintances
i could tell you
about the daydreams i live in
and how you are always weaved into their stories
or how you are a daydream
and im a dreamer who cant reach to the stars
but finds herself stargazing every night anyways

I am coming to the end of a road many have travelled upon
Hardly beginning to fathom the magnitude of what’s to come
It feels like I’m waking up at the brink of dawn
Unsure of the day which has yet to arrive.

The final semester of a twelve-year journey
I remember a time when I didn’t want to think of the future
But now with the future close enough to see
I realize that my confidence is not as pure

It’s easy to think of what you’re going to do when you graduate
Talking is easy
What about when it actually happens?
Most people like to talk about being a daredevil, but hardly ever do it.

Graduation is like my daredevil moment
It’s like I’m jumping out of a plane without a parachute
And I don’t know where I’m going to land or what I’m going to do when I land
And all I have to guide me is my head and my own two hands.

I’ve always had a plan in life
I’ve always known what I wanted to be
But why is it when the opportunity is in my face
That I am cowering under the idea?

Why is it that the boldness I once had
Has turned into fear?
Why is it that the person I wanted to be come
No longer feels achievable in my head?

Maybe I’m just in shock
Graduation is nearly here
All I can do now is watch the clock
As the time grows near.

It's supposed to feel this way
sitting quiet riding high
the slow burn
the weight of another's hand on my thigh
it's supposed to feel like this
tracing my forearm along the curve of the earth while the party rages on inside
I'm spinning fast
all orange juice and half smile
caught tripping on my own two feet
and you say that we're the same
white hot like the lines of your teeth
you were always so willing to devour me
copy paste impress
the effort of becoming effortless
it doesn't make any difference
because no matter what you say
I know you know what you're doing
so I hide outside
scrape constellations into my mouth
run ragged down your street in my socks with my closest friends
laughing numb about my aggression and burning bright with white noise
It's supposed to feel this way
picking fights with myself in the half light
tearing my teeth out just past midnight
it's supposed to come in waves
youth
forever in four years of closed doors beige walls
and all those fake friends
will burn out hot and fast like dying stars
you'll slip away into forever and I won't miss you even when I think about the blue days
on the edge of the city catching streetlights in my chest
I won't miss you
just miss what I thought you were before I realized that nothing is forever
and we are not infinite
not even a little bit
not even when you play that song or say that thing that you rebloged at 2am that you thought would make you seem deep or intellectual
we are not infinite
but you were apart of my forever even still
so when I climb out of your windowsill it isn't because I'm trying to look like the kids in the videos
I just need to catch my ******* breath
just need to walk with a couple of people who know me
just need to trace my forearm along the curve of the earth
don't worry about it
you'll burn out soon enough
after all
it's supposed to feel this way.

Lately I've been thinking about becoming bigger than my body
I've been processing you through **** demos on my phone
Through grey skies and empty bottles
Through blank stares and perpetuated silence
( I used to need a rhythm to write but the white noise in my head seems to work)
I've been turning corners and changing lanes
Doing the dishes and doing my time tangled in empty sheets
And it seems okay
As long as I'm not by myself for too long
Because if I let the white noise in I'll be swimming in black till the weekend
I'll numb myself in neon shades
White hot and weighty
Glimmering image of the silver screen dream
Spent shadowed twisting out into the intersection until I remember that you are not the same as you once were
And I am not the girl you needed
I'm just processing
And working on becoming bigger than my body
More than my bones more than my skin more than my gender more than a character in someone else's life
More than a thin wristed timid thing weighted down by years of neglect and indifference
More than a pair of wide dim eyes
More than myself.
I'm sorry I didn't call you back.