There's a pyre in my chest, silver and gold
tracing the mountains of jewels and silks,
overlooking the cliffs of lost dreams and
broken memories like a woe lost in hymn.
It constantly burns, but like throwing a
flag onto the flames, it changes intensity --
colors green and purple and blue.
  Sporadic, bursts and sparks
    that threaten to engulf the soul
      that stands too close. I'm absent in thought
        when another memory splices the embers;
          effulgent, phosphorescent, lustrous, scintillating
            with a radiance unparalleled and unchallenged.
              The burns of your skin on mine clutching
                at my throat with such a wraithlike intensity --
                  I gasp.
                    The skirts of my soul catching, ablaze and unforgiving.
                    cowering at the echo of your lips teasing a mere inch
                    from mine. It does not run, does not leap for the
                    chilled waters below, just simply lets the fire burn
                    the smell of your clothes into the air around me --
                    whimpering all the while.

I heard you today, calling my name.
The first person to give me that nickname
I heard it clearly, your voice ringing
in the school corridor.
I raced around the corner,
so desperate to see you.
The teasing smile in your voice,
like the way you called after me
when you wanted my attention,
when you wanted to tell me something.
I waited,
waited for you to say something more.
But I realized that you are another
person who has forgotten me.
The voice wasn't real, but I could swear that it was.
You are haunting me,
your ghost calling to me.
You are stealing my sanity,
making me delusional.
I'm losing my grip on reality.

Exhausted yet I carry on, boots grind with each heavy step I take. I trudge through bones of fallen men, whose hearts I had to break.

Wings that used to carry me, now lay as a reminder on my back. Haunted by the ghosts of lovers, who once counted all I lack.

The wind whispers names of honorable men, who survived yet I left broken. Names not worthy of my poisoned lips, that have parted but not since spoken.

Beautiful in reflection, but color fails to hide. This heart of frost that beats within, that so long ago shattered inside.

They stand in line and follow me, yet I tell them with regret from the start. If this was a fairytale, I'd be that twisted witch without a heart.

Shatter music as relief
when the rest will burn away
until only bits remain
and I beg for it to be day

Nighttime as my prison
when my hauntings ride the dark
and even in the morning
on my eyelids leave their mark

When sleep unfolds my mind
my dreams leave scars upon my feet
where my demons creep inside
and my fears and sorrows meet

I'm encrypted in this pain
and I feel as though I'll never escape
so I submit to endless agony
of death and torture, sin and ****.

She feels her frailties
Gnawing at one another
Believing that's the escape
From the somber vessel in which they've been trapped
The vessel that constantly strives to set them ablaze
Yearning to free herself
Of these blemishes that keep coming back to haunt her
As if they never really left -
As if they've always just been watching -
From under the bed
Or through the window
Tormenting her with their eyes
That seem darker than the hollows around hers

i used to believe only ghosts of previous lives haunted
but ive since learned
im haunted by the absence of your presence
like the clothes we never wore when together
im haunted by your old lighter i found under my bed last week
memories of fire and hidden cigarettes
the way you last tossed the half-empty lighter under my bed
when suspicious eyes came about,
like the look you gave me when the pills ran out sooner
when one morning it sat on the kitchen counter
and the next morning on the coffee table
im haunted by the stain of coffee on the carpet
your cup was overflowing
just like the bathtub at the end of january
by the time i got to the bathroom
the water had gone cold just like the pool on the warmest days of fall
warm like the alcohol we snuck last summer
beers that sat out in the sun
***** that burned our throats
lighters that burned our skin the first couple of times
the first couple of times we kissed
new,
passionate,
evocative.
evocative like the blue tablets i continued to take
after the "they're bad for you"s
and the "i'm not stupid"s
and the "please stop"s
the worst thing ive ever done
was ignored your pleas
because now you're gone, now im numb
i stopped the pill popping at the end of january
when the bathtub overflowed
and i was too late
the withdrawals are worse than i imagined
but nothing in the universe could ever be worse
than the haunting i feel
from the absence of your presence.

The walls howl at night--
they shriek, they
moan aloud and wake me from sleep.
My House is haunted
(it’s been haunted for years)
with all the shadows I’ve projected
just to empty my tired mind. I
tip-toe quietly,
speak softly,
because my ghosts, too, are light sleepers.

Dark thoughts perch lightly above
scrawny limbs,
while underneath my feet touch
the dismal comfort of phantasmagoric pastures.

and there's a muzzle on my mouth
and a noose around my neck
tightening, gripping
I find morbid comfort in it's baleful
embrace.

The crows don't sing but their feet
sting my twigs
and they stare
and they whisper.

Clocks melt away but the numbers
remain etched in to my skin.
the muted rhythm,
I begin to lose my sanity.

The colors run down my skin
down the drain
someone's poured water
unto my charcoal world.

isolation is now familiar
my heart is upside down.
The dark thoughts perch
in the fragile balance of my mind
will snap
and I'll become part of a past.