Today was weird for me.
I was so nervous and trembling with guilt.
~I don't have enough money.~
But my grandmother was going to buy everything.
I saw her pick out things like the price meant nothing.
She saw a pretty blouse and said "do you like it?"
Of course I liked it.
It was a pretty blue and had a very adorable set of flowers at the cusps.
The flowers were vintage.
It spoke of a librarian's day off.
A golden morning while sipping coffee,
with a walk on the beach after lunch.
but it was thirty dollars.
And I knew that if I said I liked it, she would toss into the cart.
She couldn't.
~ I don't want you to spend money on me.~
I shriveled.
As if I had aged significantly in under thirty seconds.
my back caved and my arms tucked themselves around my waist.
I suddenly found a great source of interest in my feet.
"I think it's really pretty," I utter.
"Do you want it," she asks.
It hangs like a thirty pound weight in her hands.
Of course I wanted.
"Oh, I don't think they have my size."
Of course they had my size.
She put it in.
I felt my soul snap.
How could I ask to spend so much of her earned money on me.
She works two jobs, and decides to use her paycheck on a lavish blouse for her granddaughter.
That thirty dollars could have gone towards food or gas.
How dare I become worth more than comfort?
She bought it despite my attempts to change her mind.

I love the shirt, it fits me well.
I feel confident and pretty in it.
but the guilt feels like I traded the world for it.

you asked me to stay home while you worked.
I would take care of the house and the baby.
you would give me the money and I pay the bills.
I went to school and did the paperwork.
I cleaned every room.
You told me that you hated your job.
So now you stay at home while I work.
I still go to school.
I still take care of the baby.
I still clean the house.
I still do the paperwork.
I feel drowned by the promises you didn't keep.
Your video games wake me from my daydream.
Your voice soothes my anger,
but it never leaves.

I feel lost.
Like there is someone giving me the wrong directions.
I am constantly taking the wrong turn at the intersection,
My car is low on gas.
I am lost.
It’s like I am in the woods for the first time.
Every tree looks the same, every cave is new
Even though I passed it minutes before.

This feeling goes deep into my chest
And wraps its fingers around my organs
Squeezing them until my chest seizes up.
I sit at the dinner table while my body goes to war.
I guess it doesn’t matter though because there is only one casualty.

They say not to think about it.
Pretend that the feeling isn’t there.
Blink three times, and breathe.
Snap your fingers and breathe.
Whistle a tune and breathe.
Do nothing,
Ignore it
And breathe.

So many colors in the world
too many to see
and pick from.
people that have a favorite color
astound me.
How can you choose something that
stands out in a world of beauty?
Who am I to say that green is my favorite color
on a day when I am clearly feeling blue?
Tell me something I don't know about a color,
and I will absorb into my skin
and live in the pigment.
But show me a pretty flower and suddenly
I'm consumed by red.
Let me smell a beautiful scent
that reminds me of purple,
or a song that screams magenta
and I am nothing but the rainbow.

You made it just in time,
For me to reminisce.
Looking back through the glass
I vividly see your face.
Your smile
Your hair
The way we’d encase our love
In midnight conversations.
You were
And still are
My love.

My Little Pony makes me think of papaw.
Weekend visits with Saturday cartoons,
We’d sit in the living room together and watch tv
Or read the newspaper.
He’d whistle so softly that my ears would strain to hear it.
Then he’d fall asleep and small snores left him in
Tiny puffs of breath.
The newspaper lay forgotten in his lap.
Eventually, he’d wake up and try to act as though
He’d been awake the whole time.
“That one is Applejack, right?” he’d ask
And although it was obviously Fluttershy,
I would ask playfully if he watched it when I wasn’t there.
But, overtime
The snores darkened
And the breath more shallow.
I began to listen more to his breath than the show,
And watch the rise and fall of his chest instead of the screen.
I waited on edge for him to wake up.
And he would.
Except, he stopped waking up last year.
His snores evaporated
And his breath died.
And with that,
So did my love for my little pony.

At what point does love become love?
When the butterflies become eagles flying in your stomach,
And your heart skips too many beats?

Does it start when you come together
and your eyes connect like old friends.
your hands meeting like they’ve been apart for too long.
When there is too much distance between your knees
And not enough time in the day to look at them.

Does love come after you’ve carved your names in the sandstone behind your house?
wrote their name on the corner of your paper,
As if they are your new sun.

Or is  love when you talk to them while they ****.
And sit naked to talk
Or after you adopt two dogs,
Begin step-fathering a cat
Begin the process of adopting another cat
And mourning the loss of two pups along the way
All while having a child of your own

Is it when you agree to argue,
because the relationship is so perfect, it leaves no room for anger?
When passion is so bright that marks are left and cherished?
And each day is the first time that they smiled at you,
The first time you kissed, touched, yelled.

Love is hearing that people knew you two were getting together
Long before either of you did.
Knowing what the other wants without even thinking about it

Love is buying socks for Christmas
And not being disappointed.
Buying candles that you both like.
Never cleaning the house when you say you will.

Sleeping with two blankets but never feeling separated
Compromising on the small things
Struggling together for the big  

It is seeing them pack on a few pounds
And wish they would put on more.
Because each pound in another that you can love
And hold.


Love doesn’t come from the big infatuations
the loud confessions on rooftops
Or swimming pools full of rose petals.
And diamonds on a weekday
It is the soft shelled,
Gross
mess
that makes every day more amazing than the last.

Soft vibrations
waft through the air and
touch my ears like water on the edge of the pier.
They caress and ******
as if they know that I'm close to shattering my own walls.
I can barely feel them press against my teeth
barely taste the copper laced with sugar as they slide down my throat
and can't even feel them wrap around my lungs.

with your upturned nose
so naturally, you were born to be ******.
Your hands so genetically set at a predisposition to
wrap around your own throat.
Whilst your heart yearns and aches for every heartthrob story out there.
You walk around like the world is inside you.
As if you are neither too good to be on top,
but not good enough to uphold it.
You act as if you represent human nature in all of your flaws
instead of admitting to yourself that you have low impulse control.
I noticed you haven't been wearing shoes lately
you pretend to like the way the textures of Earth feel on your skin
but I am you
so I know you're only wishing to cut your feet.
The world looks so small through your telescope eyes,
so far from the ground even though you are standing on it.
Nothing makes you more special than the times you look away,
when the light hits the scar on your forehead.
Of course, you don't know this.
You're too busy thinking of other things,
wrapped inside your mind like a blanket.
This is a reminder to breathe.
To look in the mirror like you love it.
And to let yourself feel something beyond what's fake.

She crackles like a campfire
Looking
And listening.
Still feral.

Wild eyes.
Big as moons,
And a maze.
Piercing.

She moves with purpose
But stops to smell the roses.
Feels but never touches
Hears
And always tastes.

Leaving copper on your tongue.
Debates spark at her footsteps.
Hello she says
Just as fast as goodbye

Lightning with no storm
She is beautiful.
In every way

When I look in the mirror in the morning,
I feel fine.
I brush my hair.
I am fine.
I brush my teeth,
And I am fine.

Then I notice how my teeth aren’t as white as they could be.
But I'm still fine.

Then I put on my clothes and I notice how I spill over the sides.
But I am fine.
Then I notice how my hips jut out
And my jeans are never long enough in the ankles.

Then I spend ten minutes thinking of changing my jeans,
Because this shirt is too tight
But I opt for a hoodie instead.
Then I am lost in the hoodie.
I feel like a blob of fabric.
And then just a blob.

I get in my car and look in the mirror to adjust
And notice how dark under my eyes are.
When I’m pretty sure they weren’t that dark earlier.

As I drive to school, I notice my hands on the steering wheel
And ponder how they can be both fat and scraggly at the same time.

I get to school and notice people staring at me at the red lights
While I begin to cross the road.

I pass windows and with each one,
I notice my thighs grow larger with each step.
I notice how wide I am when I pass other girls
Then I think about my ankles and I swear I can feel them swell.

By the time it is twelve o’clock,
I have convinced myself that I am a
Bulging,
Suffocating,
Beast
Who tramples everyone in the room.
And the Earth is suddenly too small for someone as big as I am.

I promise I will get better,
if you give me
time.

How can you still
Hold my hand while
stealing my breath?

I want to feel like the other half of him.
but
instead,
I feel like the lesser half of you.
You are always one step ahead of me.
ready to pull the trigger
before I even know you have a gun.
I walk in your shadow
and no matter how many times I pay the electric bill
I am never seen.
Every movement is yours.
my tongue is lost in the phrases you once said.
my eyes show clips of you.
your laugh escapes my teeth.
It is your hands encircling my throat.
your legs guiding my feet to the grave.
I am never able to breathe without asking your lungs.
I am never able to think without asking your mind.
I am never myself, but
always you.

I'm ***** once again.
Grime that was once scrubbed away
has crawled back onto my skin
and made itself at home.
As if it never left.

I looked into my chest for a reason;
weaved through the vines
and flowers rooted in my lungs.
I searched beneath the butterfly intestines,
the flowing river, and  
I ignored the drifters floating by.
I searched for what seemed like hours,
though it may have been but a minute.
I wanted so badly to find it.
But I didn't.
Instead.
I  found my mother's necklace.
The one that I gifted her on mothers day
and she threw back on a later date.
I found the four notes that I wrote
when I hit rock bottom.
I found the time I fell into a creek
and felt the air leave my lungs
before my grandmother pulled me from the water,
then was pulled from me into a sickness.
I found the hands of every man who ever touched me.
found the first poem i ever wrote
found the razor blade
found the ripped jeans
hairbands
car keys
but I didn't find my reason.
I didn't find the reason why she left me
the reason behind every lie.
The reason why I can't sleep at night
but she is sleeping tight.
The reason why I can roll so smoothly off her back
while she does nothing but stab mine.
I don't know if i ever will.
But I'll keep searching.

Take me to a place where the air stands still.
Where I will be but a whisper
heard only by the stars.
Where I will be trapped in my bones.
Held down not by earthly conventions,
but by my will.
Where there is moonlight leaking through every window.
Where the ground weeps for my footsteps,
the sky aches for my grace.
Take me where I am can become my own cave,
feel the serenity of being
against the feeling of survival.

There are things inside me that are broken,
shattered by my own  hand.
Parts of me that are open
to the travelers of the land.
A part of me is willing
to go where none has before.
Somewhere the woods are silent
and I can peacefully sleep on the floor.
Tell me your darkest secret
and I will whisper mine.
Only in those moments
are our hearts intertwined.
We have become divided,
distant on our own.
Being right beside her
while wishing to go home.

The door is locked
the key is gone.
swallowed.
sorry.
Can't help you.
Or you.
I helped myself.
I felt as though I deserved a chance
and by giving myself that chance
I took yours.
My stubborn little brother
I am sorry.
My words fall flat on your ears
you miss me.
I'm living.
I was so breathless there,
constantly giving.
I took and now you're without.
I'm sorry.
You called to ask me how my day was.
I can't give you my answer.
I'm sorry.
Forgive me.
I love you.
I'm sorry.

I am currently going through
A rough time.
I have kinda been saying this since elementary school.
At first, it was the death of grandmother.
Two weeks before my eighth birthday.
I guess that was God was saying,
“Happy ******* Birthday, expect the rest of your life to ****.”
That Christmas, I found out that my “daddy”
Wasn’t my daddy, but my stepdaddy
And my real father was a pill pumping *******
Love you, dad, xoxo.
New Year’s my stepdad leaves my mom
And kidnaps my brother
We are homeless
My mom starts drugs
I am assaulted by my uncle
He sticks his finger in my mouth
I cry.
He leaves too.
We move in with mom’s new boyfriend
We starve
Get hit
Listen to them wither.
I cut myself for the first time
Foster care
Drunk man tells me I’m pretty
Until he found out I was a ******.
Maggots crawl through my floor
I write my first poem
I move.
Stop my mom from suicide
Stop myself from suicide
Drive a car for the first time
Mom meets another man
For my 16th birthday
He wants to make me woman
He touches me for months
Takes my pants off
I cry.
I don’t tell my mom
Then I do.
She kicks me out.
I live with my boyfriend.
My grandfather, finalizes his will
On thanksgiving.
I spiral down to the point that I hate holidays,
Find no joy in the regular days,
Feel nothing any day.
Hell.
Is what I am living in.

He finalized his will
Put his signature at the bottom
Left me the house
And the china set
His death should have been a surprise to me
But now.
I have to wait.
I can feel the news lurking in the shadows
of the darkest part of
My closet.
It waits, coiling, licking its lips
Waiting to come out and wrap itself around me.
Waiting to see me cry.

I struggle with was and is.
I know he is still alive,
But he doesn’t think to be much longer
Do I deny or accept the truth?

I imagined him being eaten by worms
And I threw up.
I imagined never calling his phone number again
And had a panic attack.
I’ve memorized it since I was little
Now, someone else will be memorizing it.
I don’t know if my reason for pre-mourning
Is normal, because I don’t want to spend more time with him.
I don’t want more memories to remember.
But I don’t have enough.
I know that when it happens, I will lose the
Ability
To write again.

I won’t want to do anything that he can’t.
So I write this now.
So everyone knows.
I love him.
My grandfather was pure.
He was every inch of what we pray we find in love.
Every man pales to expectations he has placed.
He raised me.
He cared for me.
No questions asked.
And I want people to know that whether he is alive or
Dead.
He is my best friend.
Finalized will or not, he will be with me.
Every step. I take.
He is my grandfather.

My chest is yours to crawl in
You constrict my lungs
Play patty cake with my heartbeat
Make yourself a nest in my ribcage
When I speak too loudly
Or jostle too much,
You turn into a hurricane
Where I feel the rumble in the back of my throat
But I dare not kick you out
Cause you have embedded yourself behind every vital *****
Where if you go, they all do
Bye bye kidney one
Two
Bye liver
Heart
Brain
Your hands lace through my bloodstream to find yourself once again
Touching me
Everywhere I don’t want you to
My stomach
My thighs
Every place I swore to change for you
You never fret
When the times are good.
When I lose my voice for the sake of convenience
Or not gaining too much attention
Or when I don’t ask for love letters.
Or romance.
Or presents on holidays.
We get along fine when I let you have your way
Let you tell my spine when and where to show up
And when I never ask you to invest yourself in me
God forbid you go to thanksgiving with me to my family
Or to Christmas
Or my grandmothers grave
I don’t like letting myself get low,
Cause you always turn yourself into a rock
That sinks down into the pit of my stomach
So heavy
Becoming just another weight to carry

What part of me means so little
to you?
I mean,
why am I so forgettable?
When you stay on my tongue like a blister.
Every world I speak
drives the conversation back to you.
where my heartbeat crashes,
I suffer a concussion,
but you walk away just fine.
Why?
Why not?
I mean, is that your motto?
something you say before you lose yet another tooth.
Crash
Boom
Pow.
There goes one down the drain.
same as my blood.
your future.
our relationship.
How many nights has my memory haunted
YOUR  
dreams?
1
2
17
does it take how old I am to return you back to
reality.
almost 20 years of neglect for you to give up on.
Quitter.
Why am I so angry?
How many nights did I pray to anyone who would listen
to get me out of there.
but the second you let go of my hand,
I fell flat on my face
when I thought,
when I thought I would walk just fine.
maybe even run.
but it seems the only running I have been doing
is away from my guilt.
I left him there to drown.
His hand sticking out of the water
begging to pull me back under
so maybe he wont die alone.
Instead,
I fell asleep in a clean bed.
full stomach, and heavy heart.

I remember the distance of our hearts
As you walked away
For the one hundredth time.
You smiled and said
"Be back later,"
Before trailing behind the same kind of monster
To hunt for the thrill of killing.
The thrill of killing
Not the monster.
But yourself.
Because you too remember the way it felt to be knee deep in one million questions ******* you under.
"Why?"
Is the most common.
The one threatening to eat you the fastest.
It stares you in your face as you break and laughs.
This question mirrors every breath you take.
And i know you felt the way I feel.
I know.
I remember seeing you look human for the first time in years.
As you threatened to take your own life because the well had swallowed you up to your chest.
Mom.
I know.
I remember the purest moments of ourselves as you danced in the dim light to a country song.
I remember the times you grew into a bear to protect me from the lashing kind of monster you eventually began to follow.
I remember the first monster.
I remember the first time you chased that thrill.
But i can't remember a time when you said
"I love you,"
And meant it.
So now.
I hope that my walking away in the arms of the sunlight will become a memory to you.
I hope you take this as a reason to laugh back at the question
"Why,"
Because i did.
I laughed back and it told me the answer.
The answer saved me and told me to run.
The answer that question gave me is the reason why when I walked out the door a turned to tell you
"I won't be back."

I need to leave here
run away.
Find a breeze to ride on.
A dream to eat.
I need my feet to carry me
from this.
to leave.
before you do.

I lived my life held down by chains
whips
and sour wails.
Then came prince one day
and saved me from myself.
He took me to a place
of glass
it must've been the stars
and it must've been the
sky.
But, it was only glass
it seems.
Not even fragile to my surprise.
I began to train.
to fight for freedom
for none one but me.
I let my demons
push on my chest.
reminding me of who I used to be.
friends, lovers, and enemies  
passed right through my hands
as I figured out my fate to follow
there in Adarlan.

I am
strong
because you were
weak.
too busy
living
to give a **** about me.

I am
shattered
because you were
free.
Not trying to slow down
or think about me.

I am
grounded
because you were
soaring.
Your brain never resting
while mine looks forward.

I am
here.
because you were
young.
So in love.
but yet so dumb.
Not thinking of what would happen
if you spread your legs.

I am
dying
but your mind is dead.

I was a woman of water
A river for a body
to flow like a current.
I was meant only to sweep men off their feet.
But never do anything but slip through their hands.
Used only as something to mop up.
But I found a man made of fire.
That turned my voice into a voice.
It was no longer a trickle.
He took my rocky heartbeat.
And turned it into a heartbeat.
Then one day,
His flames turned into a fingertip.
One that caressed my jawline
And whispered to my riverside cheekbones
Telling me to become an ocean.
To drown.
Have a fierceness of a tidal wave.
To crash anyone who hurts me.
His hand touched me like a hand inside a wishing well
And I grew the size of the Atlantic.
I carried him with me, but his flames came back.
Turning me back into a river
A creek
A puddle
A girl.
I held hands with a campfire
Burnt my skin into submission
And evaporated.
Like I’m supposed to.

Words scatter in my mind and I get this image
of a girl.
White dress.
Beauty curls her hair for her and the sun shines her sidewalk.
But the sidewalk wants to eat her.
Take her white dress as a condiment and her beauty as a side dish.
She crosses a crack
Feels it open beneath her feet, but precious to her mother, she leaps.
A back is safe,
A girl stays beautiful,
And a sidewalk starves.

Help me to forget my eyes.
My hands.
His lies.

Show me how to hide my feet.
My ears.
Her deceit.

Tell me how to burn my tongue.
my legs,
my lungs.

show me that it isn't my fault.
tell me that I AM strong.
burn my past.
because that was what I wanted gone
all along.

Has our love been tainted by your jealousy?
Can I look the other way
without you demanding my chin to be turned to yours?
How can you love me if I am barely able to breathe?

Every sunrise brings a wave of hurt to wash over me like a typhoon.
Every sunset brings my regrets to come rest like bricks on my shoulders.
Threatening to snap  my spine in two.

Every doubt comes and shackles to my ankles.
I let the metallic taste melt into my blood stream and become part of me.

Every noise shatters my ear drums and sends shocks through my body.
They leave burns streaked across my body like tattoos.
Tattoos that won't wash off in the sink.
They won't fade with time.
Tattoos that remind me who I am.
...Or used to be.

Every blade of grass cuts my feet like words cut my back as you stuck each one in with precision.

Every car drives away with my hopes and dreams buckled in the back seat listening to the radio.
Singing every word like they can't hear me crying for them to return.

Every cloud rains on my mind like acid that pours from the bottle into his glass.
Like hatred onto the plate that she sniffs.

Every warmth I feel drowns in my sorrows like I drown in the typhoon that lays at my feet.
I will always have my tattoos.
a memory of myself.
...or used to be.

Your mouth is like the galaxy.
You have skin like the Milky Way.
Eyes like moons, twinkling like stars
Heart the size of planets.
You’re so beautiful it’s galactic,
it take my breathe away.

Your voice haunts my dreams,
your touch is so distant it seems.
"Father", I cry.
"Why can't you love me"
You're transparent,
I can see right through,
But after each of your lies,
I still believe you.

Dad, you pass right through my walls,
knocking pictures off
echoing down the halls.

Dad, please.
I will do what you want to love me.
Summon you up,
and hold you tight,
just please tell me that it is alright.

Dad, you're a ghost.
a breath of the past.
Oh how time has gone by so fast.

Never have I ever felt so alone.
Daddy, oh, Daddy,
I fear you're a ghost.

God has forgotten to care
God has forgotten that somewhere
Down here
There are children crying into their pillow
Hoping to smother the demons clawing at their eyes
God has forgotten to see that somewhere
There is a girl who has insecurities like wings that fly her into the abyss of loneliness
God had forgotten that his children are knee deep in sorrow and hatred
God has forgotten to care because he is too busy watching friends’ reruns in SpongeBob underwear and an espresso pressed to his lips.
God has forgotten to care that our first instinct is fire
Words in our mouths are like loaded guns pressed to our temple
Acid pours with the rain
Burning the ground
Sodden with footprints of the weary
God has forgotten that people are only people.
When we ask where god is
The answer is “listening to a nirvana mix tape, getting high enough to stomp on the world”
Letting his big toe crush our spirits
And his athlete’s foot is giving us rashes
God doesn’t ******* care
God has forgotten how to.
We are our only hope.
Salvation for ourselves, because god is gone.
He left with Jesus to go to palates
The only way that we will live is to remember to care.

Daddy oh daddy.
Where art thou now
Have your tendons turned to jelly
Has mind gone to dust
I fear that your muscles,
Have begun to rust.
Your nose is bleeding tear drops.
And your eyes hold crust.  

Daddy oh daddy
Are safe in your head
Locked away with your thoughts,
A child brought back from the dead.
But a ghost isn’t a ghost,
Unless the ghost has died.

Daddy oh daddy,
No matter how hard you try.
I am alive.
I am yours.
I came from YOU.  
And there is nothing you can do to fix that.
Not duct tape,
band aids
or glue.
I am yours, just as much as you are mine.
I am your mistake.
You are my pain.

Daddy oh daddy?
Do you feel it when I cry
Can you smell my sorrow
Sense our love, so desert dry
Has it ever troubled your quaint little mind
That when you are off living your life
That maybe your absence has genuinely ******* up mine

Daddy oh Daddy,
Does it worry your heart
That you don’t own a single hand painted picture
to hang on your fridge
Does it hurt you to know that I never asked for this
Can you sleep well knowing that I won’t a wink
Do you ever stop, just for a second to remember
to think
About me
Can you see my pain, behind our eyes

I am a flower
Pedals moving in the night wind.
Leaves falling to the ground.
Kissed by the moon.
Grounded deep in relief.
Roots outstretched.
Yearning to hold onto something.
I am a flower.
Flourishing and growing.
I am soft and sorry.
I am delicate and vulnerable.
I am a flower.
pedals moving in the night wind.

I am not property to be had.
I am a person
a young woman at that.
My **** isn’t a landing strip for your hands.
My ******* aren’t magnets for your eyes
I wasn’t born for your pleasure.
I am not working my way through life
shaking my hips.
my eyelashes will never bat baseballs
in your direction.
I am a young woman,
please respect me and my pride.

Smoke fills your lungs,
like the secret fills the closet.
Doors shut tight.
Nose hair coiled.
Fire burning
at the end of the stick.
Working down to scorch your lips.
Fire on your tongue,
along with the taste of your lover.
Christianity is baffled by your addictions.
Smoke rolling underneath the closet door.
the smoke swirling in your head,
love dancing on your tongue.
Waltzing with the nicotine.
Your secret is holding hands with the smoke.
The smell clings to your clothes
Like the way you cling to him.
You need him,
You need the taste,
The smoke will fill it,
Your lover’s kisses will help it,
You need.
You need.
You need…..to inhale.

A poet has his metaphors,
And an artist has his hands.
A musician has his music
A mistress has her man.
The fish have the ocean,
And the sun has the moon.
I have my books,
But more importantly,
I have you.