My eyelids paint a picture that I just can't recognize and I thought at once, dear, that it was you here- but now I see that it's just sorrow in disguise.

And I am bothered by the slaughter that her hands and wrists and knives and heart had cost her. She said that this time would be the last time, but she still cuts herself to ribbons in her free time.

She said, "I don't care anymore." She said, "This life for me is stale and growing cold." She said, "I'm not fine, but I can't find why I should care anymore.

I've had as much talk about fear and distraction as I can react to before I start going numb.

Between secondhand smoke and lies in the bedroom, these serenades to no one start to feel rehearsed.

But she said, "I don't care anymore." She said, "I'm sick and ******* tired of being bored." She said, "I'm not blind, but I can't find why I should care anymore.

She said, "I don't care anymore." She said, "I never wanted much but to feel loved." She said, "You were the last good thing in this world left to me. But now you're gone and I can't care anymore."

I've had as much talk about fear and distraction as I can react to before I start going numb.

Between the secondhand smoke and the lies in the bedroom, these serenades to no one start to feel rehearsed.

Like I couldn't tell that I'm ****** up. As if I didn't know I was boring. No. I'm not talking. I'm just choking on biting my tongue.

It's the things I neglect when I'm trying to stay calm:
Friends
Sleep
Picking up phone calls

Nervously eyeing the clock again. I'm running on low it seems.

The sound of your voice, crackling softly over telephone wire, is cracking from the miles between us.

I don't blame you for not picking up.

I don't blame you for not calling back.

I don't blame you for any of it.

It's easy to forget:
Five years seemed to move so quickly.
And those scars, have they faded yet?
Do you know how I hate I remember it?

I'm haunted and losing it.

I know how it seems. I'm lost and empty and tearing at seams. I stare at walls and off into nothing. I know that I'm boring.

I'm just trying not to scream. At these strange feelings, when I'm not feeling anything. I'm afraid of myself again.

I know how it seems. I'm awkwardly tugging at sleeves. I don't like to speak. I know that I'm boring.

I know how it seems. I'm pacing my room again. I know how it seems. I've got a heart made of porcelain.

I'm afraid of its brokenness. I'm afraid of myself again.

I know that I'm boring.

Take me to those places where I first learned that I could love. In school yards, and in churches, car rides, Longhorn's, and smoky music clubs. These places feel so empty now that we're telephone lines apart and I'm alone.

Take me to those places where I first learned I could hurt. Phone calls on my bed, the last of car rides on the road. The street where we last embraced before I left and headed home. These places feel so empty now that we're telephone lines apart and I'm alone.

Take me to those places that I first learned I had hope. On couches watching movies and those places I wrote poems. In Rome, where we saw zebras. And that mountain path we got lost upon. These places feel so empty now that we're telephone lines apart and I'm alone.

Take me to those places that I had happiness. All those places in time that we had shared before you left. And when you come back, we would share some more time in places I won't regret. But then those places will feel empty when we're telephone lines apart and I'm alone again.

In bitter seas of ruin is where you cast yourself to drown 'til tides of fury would carry your body back to the shore to rot upon.

And gleaming eyes in life are now dead and staring cold. Lifelessly your body lays in its repose.

In death you have now traveled to places I dare not ever go, until my time to join you in the vastness of the God Knows.

And I recall your stuttered breath and your final sputtered words. How your breath cut like knives, and how your words had cut like swords.

I remember the upheaval of my heart and how you snared it with your claws. And how your bitter end etched into my brain gave me a cerebral pause.

And how I wondered if I had caught them, if I had acted on warning signs, would I have been able to stop it: your self inflicted demise.

But now you've left me to go on to a place I dare not ever go. Until my time has come and when you finally call me home.

We spit rhetoric in rhyme,
Who will save us this time?

I'm doing fine without you asking.
So don't ask and save your breath.
I was fine before you waltzed in.
And I'll be fine even now you've left.

You were the last good thing in a world of "I don't care anymore."

If I let go, I would float off.
I would disappear into the abyss.
There'd be nothing left tethering me
to you,
Or this place,
Or to just this.

It's funny how you use photographs to remember the things you want to remember the best. Using colors and shapes to isolate what you love and to forget about all the rest.

And how I draw out scenes and emotion using poetry and prose. Capturing the minute details and the seemingly superfluous differences and nuances in the way life and love flow.

I know you despise being called an artist and how you claim yourself "lackluster!" in romantic expression. And I know how you call me poet even when I write too much about death and it gives your heart some trepidation.

But, love, the difference between our art isn't in talent or creativity. It's in the vulnerability in my words that I've penned for you. It's the realization that my art isn't good enough for you.

The difference is you don't let your art let someone break you.

It's okay. I never had much hope in it anyway. And besides. I'm horrible.