you bought your ticket,
year round roller-coasters

and a faded welcome sign,
hanging on by one lonely *****,

the most unamusing park
there is.

practicing screams in line,
"I'm not even scared,"

you boast, but I see your eyes
shifting a little in the slatted light.

chewy popcorn, almost squeaks
when you bite it, coca-cola like

midwest flat land. looking
around, it feels that way too.

pretty sad when you beg the
tumbleweed for some of it's time.

blows past you, unaware,
uncaring, uninterested

in anything but the wind.
startling clarity settles.

you have a ***** loose, honey.

I was talking to the ferris
wheel, of course, but

I'll take you high too,
scrape the sky even.

"why touch a storm cloud?"
because I can.

poke the sleeping bear.
I want to see where he hides

those claws, if he has any at all.
I've heard the rumors, but

some people have to find out
for themselves.

what's honey without a few
stingers in your shoulder anyway?

still honey, but that's
besides the point.

reminds me of the gas station
lollipops we got on the way here.

bee's honey, my honey, it's all
the same: all honey, tastes sweet

no matter who it belongs to.
still nothing on victory though.

more cotton than candy, more
squeaky wheels than you're used to,

this house of mirrors a revelation.
hold my hand on the trek up, and

scream for me.

and i only feel safe when you speak first
my welcome's only valid from the moment you say the words
and each new day needs a new renewal,
'cause i'm never sure of just how you feel
and feeling like trouble is always worse
than never gaining the courage to tell you it hurts

when you're spitting acid on my unassuming form
expecting me to know what it was i did that's wrong
i look to you, i'm helpless, so if you're leaving just go.
my head is smart, sure, my heart is stupid, though
i'll ask you to read this and pretend you never read it,
an admission of a problem - pain? i'm an addict

Stranded in the abyss between dreams and reality.
An unhealthy position for me to put myself in.
But as I open my eyes and focus on the picture, I realize I'm right where I need to be.
Alone, Stranded, and Hungry.
I strive to become someone who has never known hunger.
I strive to become someone who can fly away as she pleases.
I strive to become someone who fills herself with her own company.
I strive.
I strive.
As I strive to become who I wish to be.
I learn.
And I learn to become every part of me that has been hiding in the shadows for the last couple dozen years.
That's a long time to forget those parts of you.
And they come back without hesitation.

It's something maple,
something thick when
you breathe, like dark
chocolate, like tinnitus,
like overandoverandover
again, hard to explain.

I have never met anyone
that could fade and still
burn like you do.

Smooth violence,
bottomless in all its
eternity, moving in water
so deep the ripples never
make it to the surface.

It's not weightless. It never
is, but it waits there, half-
suspended, fixed and
unfixed, solid but slippery
in your hands.

Hold your breath. She
knows you in a way the
angels don't. There's
something she coaxes out
of your chest, something
dark she rolls her tongue
around.

The act of inaction and the
odds, particularly of getting
by unscathed, may be slim
and far between, but the stares  
last longer, everything in  
h
  o
    u
       r
         s

I was going to tell you. I was going to let you read a page. I swear.

I just wanted to put a
face to the feeling,
wanted a solid "you"
to write to, something
other than the blurriness.

I didn't pull you out of
your grave. I said,
scoot over.

When you walk a mile in
someone else's shoes, you
find your feet growing to
fill them out. That's the thing
about empathy:

Your own shoes are a little
too tight now. You've got
blisters on your ankles.

I had a dream that you bit
me and then ****** the
venom out. I had a dream
that you gave me mouth-to-
mouth so heavenly I forgot
who drowned me.

You had dibs over both sides
of the coin, half-dreamer, half-
dream. You made a place for
yourself inside my head. There,
you said, *now I can live forever.

Gravel night, nails on a chalkboard,
two styrofoam lids rubbing against
each other in delicious dis-harmony.

I wouldn't call what I do coping.

I thought the truth was buried
somewhere. I dug up your grave,
looking for something real.  

Dead bodies are real, but that doesn't
make them any less dead.

Rope around the wrist, risk surrounding
whim, and the resounding yes.

Just wanna get you drunk off solitude,
want you to know what alone feels like.

I tried to find the more human parts
of me, tried to construct a person out
of the fabric, and spent too much time
threading the **** needle.

You're waving your arms. You're trying to convince me that words are more than words. You're cracking open peach pits and looking for flies.
You're wrecking the car, darling.

We're finding places in the pavement to rest our heads, and all I can hear is: I told you so.

I'll risk the dying. I'll risk the trouble. I'll risk the risk. I'll take the keyboard and smash it against the wall. I'll call it a poem, and I'll miss you anyways.

Here, from the cracking ribs rattling toward something so close, so cutthroat, to the moment where you finally get to watch the bliss bleed out.

It's all just one big blood-pumping, give-me-now balancing act, and the things that see the walls of your fist are the feeling you can't shake.

So I will hold you tight and make a lunatic's prayer of you, the world in gloss and the *** you said made you holy. It's useless, but I still try.

Our hells may have been the same, but our heavens weren't.

Once again torn apart
Unspoken words, like knives, cut out my heart
Feeling alone
Lost in despair
Stripped of my hopes
Not that you'd care
Big waste of time
Confusion at best
I learn all the lessons
Right after the test
I give all I have
It's never enough
When it's all gone
Still I'm the selfish one
Tired of crying
Fatigued and betrayed
So sick of feeling
As though I'm not sane
Conditional love
Conveniently gained
Secretly stored
And never the same.