i'm like a dog running in circles round your feet
like you've come home again every time we speak
and i've been tailed tucked, waiting at the window
didn't even realize i was waiting til you came
and i'm running round in circles, jumping up again
making myself dizzy, giddy

a part of me will always be attached to you
and coming back to you will always be like coming home
i think these are facts
and i'm not sure how to feel about that

I often feel like the means to an ending
Filling in the blank, the wrong word with the right amount of letters
A shoulder to lean on, tremble though I may
And weak as I may be
I will slide easily into character
I will do my best to be everything you need
But what you need may never really be me

One day I hope to feel
Not so lost without you, not so
Broken into pieces, scattered too thin across creation
My heart weeps to read your silk but it has been so long since you have written
I will stop checking, I will stop refreshing your page like something will materialize, some confession about that wild boy you decided to start missing
Like you'd suddenly grow new sentiment, years later
I swear I will pick myself off the floor
I won't see you in everything that smells like summer
One day I will move on
I will be okay without you

I'm so exhausted of trying to stand on ground that constantly trembles,
shakes with tremors like my hands
like when I'm anxious
like when I think of you
I'm so exhausted and my legs are about to give out
I am crying, clutching onto anything I can for balance
and the earthquake grumbles to me
says to give up
says I was always going to fall through the cracks

Have you stopped writing?

The streets we used to walk are forgetting the sound of our footsteps
The soles of our feet forget the heat of the pavement
Barefoot Arizona summer

Our hearts forget the sugar high pace,
The remaining memories lose their clarity
All childhood games end eventually

I think magic only exists when you’re young
I think we lost it somewhere along the way

I wish I could remember
I’d give anything to relive those days

I want to renovate a van into a little home
So I can go wherever I want to, drive around the world
Have adventures every day and never grow up
(And maybe sit on top
And watch the sunrise with you again
Maybe my head on your shoulder
Maybe your hand in my hand)

i used to be so sure of what i wanted
and you know i'd still jump at adventure
but **** ******* i just want love
i'd go against my nature, settle down
to have a familiar pair of arms to come home to
even if that home is rooted in stone
and i never get my chance to roam
**** ******* i'd give it up
to be with you for good in love

Yes I've taken my pills but they cannot tame
The violent thoughts that rattle my brain
There is no cure for the pressing desire
To know the taste of the barrel of a gun and retire
Some of my ills are the chemical kind
But worse are the demons inside of my mind
And therapy has never worked for me,
I fear it never will
And that I will live out all my life
Insurmountably ill

Head ache, heart ache
My body tries to make up for my lack of feeling with pain
Reminding me that I am alive
But I don't feel alive
Sitting still 7 hours a day
All my art has fled my system, all of my words have fled my brain
Show me how to breathe in stale air and still exhale creation

Over 18,100 words
Have not been enough to teach me
That you cannot force unwilling feeling into words
Lightning can't always become poetry
I am angry
And it lives inside me
Refusing to leave
My tired bones alone

we were never anything,
but, oh, you were my everything:
my hazel-eyed addiction,
my heaven and my hell.
we sat hidden in the tunnels of a playground
pretending we were children
playing make-believe
to the tune of cicada sound.
i've recalled too many times, now,
the sunlight in your lashes,
but maybe one day it won't be true
if i say it again:
when i spent last summer
next to you at the poolside
i wished
(i wish)
it would (have) never (had to) end

you're safe you're safe oh god thank god
i haven't seen a word from you since the day you hated me
i was so afraid, my dear, that i'd killed you in trying to keep you safe
but even though i didn't Lose you
i've lost you just the same
you feel that i betrayed you
and i don't know how to make it okay

You crash into my heart again as our favorite songs mesh easily to medley
The ambiance of inky night accompanied by songs I listened to on repeat
And I’d think of you, think of you, think of you,
And I don’t want to think of you,
Not to the tune of Marry Me,
Not to the sound of songs to which I once wept with joy and warmth
I will sing along softly to I’ll Keep You Safe
Keep myself present through the white line fever
And I will try not to think of you
Like a reflex,
Like muscle memory

y'know i really do try my best
and the crashes are a shock to my system
suddenly we're back here again, try to fight the wires in my skin, try to feel alive and real and human
i need you to be with me though this
please
when i am with you through everything
can't you stand by me this once

I will dye my hair red and blue and bright neon green
Tattoo flower petals over my scars
Rip up the flooring
To every house and every apartment
and every run down trailer I've ever lived in
Anything
Anything
To feel whole
And alive
I will reinvent myself
I will forget my name

FIREWORKS, STARS
I WANT TO FEEL SOMETHING BRIGHT AGAIN
I WANT A SWEET SONG TO WRITE AGAIN
LOOK ME IN THE EYES AND TAKE MY HAND
LET'S CREATE A KINGDOM AND RULE OUR OWN LAND
WHISPERS AND LAUGHTER
SECRETS WE KEEP WITH THE HILLSIDE AND THE TWILIGHT
CONSPIRING WITH THE STARS
CARBONATION IN OUR HEARTS
MAYBE IT'S THE SUMMER, THE WIND, THE HEAT
THAT MAKES ME YEARN TO UNBIND THESE SHACKLES AND RISE TO MY FEET

You are in the passenger seat of your best friend's car. Souls you love so, so much are with you, howling like wolves to the radio from the back seat. This is your pack all together. You feel connected, like a single string is tied to each of your hearts. The windows are down and the city is asleep as you fly down the highway, but the music and spirits are high. An unimaginable number of stars swims in the thick black inky sky. It's midnight but you are not tired and you have no where to be. You can sleep when you need to; for now, you're wide awake and buzzing, swelling, about to burst with this feeling. The pack howls along to songs about this, this very moment -- About experience, about connection, about raised voices and pounding hearts. This is the feeling of being alive. It is all you need, and all you've ever known.

if time keeps bringing us back together
lifetime after lifetime like you say
then time just must be out to **** me
cause oh god, you break my heart

Hello, my bleary-eyed conquerors of morning.
Again you have slain the little beasts that cling to your skin and weigh you down, urging you to dismiss the sun.
Some may not understand the war we wage,
But I see and commend your strength on this day.
Many battles have we lost to the weight of our thoughts,
To the repetitive rumbling reminders of the day's duties.
But today,
My Warriors,
We have defeated the dreary drag of depression
To fight another day.
Hello, my bleary-eyed conquers of morning.
I hope we meet again at tomorrow's dawn.

hold me close
precious thing
breathe me in
like fresh air
something that you've missed for years
something that you need
hold me close
hold me tight
tell me that I'm beautiful

lie to me

oh i adore you
and so again i gush
i am never more comfortable
than when im
wrapped around your finger
but i have this habit of loving
ten thousand percent and giving
everything i have and i just
love and love and love my heart out
it's so easy to make you
the center of my world but baby
sometimes this is a solar system where
you're the sun and i am out here,
revolving around you, but cold,
so far away

I miss you
Your warm existence
The way I could read you
Know your genuine smiles
I miss you
But I don't miss the anger
I don't miss you screaming at me
For not letting you die
I don't miss the blame
I don't miss the fear
But I hope you're okay
Still wish you were here
I will be here if you need me
Though I know this will just hurt me

I promise
I'll try
to reprogram myself
not to love you anymore,
but i don't know where we stand,
or what's allowed,
or what will push you further away from me,
so tell me what to feel.
ive always said id do anything for you.
say the words,
I'll turn away,
but tell me how it's gotta be
because i don't know if i can keep it up,
loving you wholeheartedly, halfway,
putting all my effort into repression, uncertainty,
only honest when i spill my soul into words you don't read -
you won't read this.
listen.
i love you to the very tips of my fingers
but i don't know if it's okay anymore-
just, please.
tell me what to feel.

should've seen it coming from a mile away,
saw it coming but pulled the covers up over my eyes,
suffocating but reveling in the warmth
as if i could ever have anything good
as if anything good could last
i thought you were
forever
for real this time
i thought i grew out of **** like that
guess i'm dumber than i thought

imagine if you were born at the beginning of time
imagine if you had the whole beautiful world placed in your hands like soft clay, ready to and waiting to be molded
imagine that you were the first domino to tip, the beginning of the chain reaction

i think about this a lot
i think about the big beautiful world in all its glory
i think about the big beautiful world and what we've done to it

imagine that you could look up at night and see the stars before light pollution, before air pollution
imagine that you could see every animal that has since gone extinct
imagine every life and every glimmer in your hands, watch them die faster than you can keep track of
would you do anything, everything to prevent it?

we are just here
we are just... here
we created society and money and the concept of purpose
hand to the throat, grip tight, contribute to society
you owe corporations for the air you breathe
it is up to me to decide if you are worth basic necessity
burden
free-loader

imagine
you could just
live

Sitting here
I contemplate taking the razor to my stomach
Trying to carve away all of this
Trying to escape my body
In reality
I know they'd say it was suicide
But I only want to be
Everything I'm not
I only want to be
Beautiful

i don't want a valentine
i want all-the-time
i want midnight late night laughing too hard to go to sleep
i don't want some gesture card
i want to touch your heart
let me breathe my intensity your way without you running away
hold my hand in the long dark hallways
i want your love forever and always

Don't ever let anyone make you feel like you're "nothing."
You are not nothing, you are everything.
Matter cannot be created or destroyed;
We are all SOMETHING,
Something incredible and constant,
We are a part of the beginning and end.
You are made of stars and oceans and canyons.
You are BEAUTIFUL.
You are INFINITE.
So when that boy with insecurity dripping with the sweat off his forehead calls you "nothing,"
Tell him "we are the same.
If I'm nothing than so are you,
So let's take these blank canvas lives and build
Because your atoms will be passed on.
So let's make a little magic for whatever we become
And they will be magic, too."

I grew up so much on your bedroom floor
With our backs to the carpet, we’d lay there and listen to Muse and talk about *******.
Nothing matters when you’re 11 years old, it’s just cartoons and sugar and whatever darkness grows behind closed doors, but those doors are closed
And I thought I kept my shadows out in the hallway where they couldn’t catch us playing make believe in your pool.
I thought it’s too bright outside for dark things
And we were far too fast on our bikes,
And it was far too high when we’d hike
And the Arizona summers would protect us.
I guess the dark things got in when we’d sleep,
Maybe you could smell the cold on me,
Something slipped in through the cracks and ****** things over.
I miss sleeping in your basement, I miss living in your back pocket, and I miss thinking of your name without trying not to cry.
You are so ingrained in me, but you want nothing to do with me, and that place can never exist for us again.
It’s a terrible thing to wrap my head around.
We could be laughing in your kitchen with some horrible concoction that’ll keep us up to watch the sunrise again,
But I’m just left to wonder where you’ve been.
I know you’re smart, I hope you’re happy, I hope you have a new best friend,
I hope they grow with you and learn from you, and I hope you do with them.
I hope you think of me, but not too much, I think dwelling would be sad.
I hope you forgive whatever I did wrong and look back fondly on what we had.

and it's the feeling of being alive again
of being inspired
i want to write everything for you
i want to learn how to turn my sour notes sweet
everything seems so bitter in the past
this is something new
this is all thanks to you
i will be in your arms soon and i cannot wait
i cannot wait to sit silently in the same room
i just want to be near you
you are everything in brights in color in music
you are the world as it turns
you are the sun that warms me
you are the adventure, the happiness i've been trying to learn
and i know we're tiptoeing on cut up skin, trying desperately not to fall into the chasm of old habits
but i've got your hand
we can make it i promise we can make it
we will take these broken pieces and build a castle, a kingdom
sentimental streets and loud citizens
so very human
you are the most genuine person i've known, you love completely, you smile a fire, you feel a windstorm
i haven't ever met someone so like me
i can be the high tide, the flashing neon lights with you
i can say i love you i love you i love you a thousand times
my chest warms, swells, i can cry from happiness and not from fear with you
and there will be times when we are afraid, i know, i know
but i know we will get through
this is too good to lose
so i will say, again and again,
i love you i love you i love you

im doing it again and i crumble
take it, take it, take all of me
throw my heart at you, pour out my being
i try to reclaim myself with distance but only succeed in isolation
i say "i can't do this" like this is my purpose
like i am nothing more but a resource to give with no source to replenish
i hang onto the tiny fractured pieces of myself and constantly get cut on the shards
i make promises like a death sentence
i say "i can't do this" and crawl back into my cell away from everything i need because
i am needed
needed and given and taken and used up
and i need
but when i need i am grovelling, overflowing, and still trying to give with nothing left of me
somewhere along the way i convinced myself that i need to be needed
but i've been serving purpose all along
i exhaust myself with being needed, with putting myself forward even when i am not asked for
i need to be able to need
i drain myself dry of affection, passion, compassion
i will not eat for days, i will wear my binder for days straight
i will put everything away for you like a guardian
like i could ever be anything but a broken thing with a mask
trying to fluff up my chest to seem large enough to take care of anyone who needs me
i have been walking on broken legs and i think they healed wrong
i have been tearing out the same stitches over and over again, bending over backwards, contorting myself
i am so afraid to speak in anything but metaphor because i don't want to shatter this, show my underbelly, cave in to my own weakness
i don't want to say i need more than this, that is how i get broken, that i how i am discarded
i don't want to show my marred skin and remind you that i am bleeding, too
i don't want to be anything but a shelter for you
i will continue you to tear myself apart in chunks, crying
take it, take it, take all of me

Don't touch-
Don't touch the live wire don't touch-
Don't touch me don't touch me don't TOUCH Me
I am a Live Wire
I am made of fire and thorns
With lightning in my veins
And trembling in my hands
I will rattle unstable
Reaching out for a tether to the level-headed world
And wondering what it's like to not be made of
Fire and Thorns and
Fear and Anger and Electricity
Really, truly, I am soft
They say I Lash Out but I am soft
Like flower petals
Like down feathers
Like memory foam
You could press against me and leave imprints
But I will not let you hurt me
Don't hurt me
Don't touch me
Static Electricity
When I'm angry, or scared,
Cornered and baring my teeth
You will watch me,
Tense,
And not dare to approach me
So as not to be shocked
You will not hurt me
You will not touch me
You will not try
And I will ignite again

I am not getting high in the basement with the best friends of my life
Or standing in the back a pickup truck, arms outstretched in a million lights
I am not throwing popcorn or laughing or smiling or feeling
I am crumbling and everything is wrong
So wrong
We are supposed to be living and loving and dreaming and feeling "infinite"
We are supposed to come back from our hospital beds stronger
But I am locked up in my room in the dark and it's 3 am so if this is where I should be then why does it feel so ******* lonely
I want to laugh so hard my stomach hurts
I want to listen to music too loud in the passengers seat
If nothing else I want to talk to someone other than my mother and my therapist today
I want to live I want to live I want to live

meet me at the corner like we're naïve again
before we were afraid of the dark and would rule night, again
let me climb over your wall and tap on your window
let's go run our kingdom
when the town is sleeping, we own them
the two of us, princes:
reckless and brave,
too mischievous and star-eyed
to be told to behave

Something's gone
Ripped out of me sleeping
Someone put me out
And the smoke is filling my lungs

i hope that one day i stop stuttering, that i become good enough with words to do justice to your love,
to the way you wrap me in your arms on a daily basis, even so far away
i hope that one day i can tell you that you are an oasis in the desert, a warm blanket in the winter in a way that is less cliche
you are so much more than "roses are red", than all my tired metaphors
i am stupid in awe of you, it's like the english language leaves my head,
or maybe it was never really equipped in the first place
to describe
the exhilarating, calming, comfortable riot of your love
so i just stumble over simple phrases,
i just say over and over again, you are the sun, you are the sun, you are the sun,
i cannot quite describe how caught up i am in your gravity
i just ramble on, i say
you are my person, you are my safe place, you are my favorite song
flipping through dictionaries and thesauruses
i don't think i will ever have the words to describe you, to verbalize what you mean to me
but i'll happily spend my life by your side trying

the sky lives in your eyes
the stars spattered across your skin
you are made of something beyond
and the beyond made something beautiful

don't have a second to waste,
projects piling up around me.
it's that time of the year I guess –
busy busy busy –
but it's good,
less time to think,
less time to dwell,
and I'm determined to stop dwelling,
start living,
taking in the air around me, fresh or not,
breathing it like I'm addicted.
start smiling,
because I've got my headphones and my sketchbook and that's all i need.
all i have to do is stop waiting for more,
stop waiting for the world to catch up with my thoughts and give me something new.
im so in love with adventure that i waste my time pining over it
instead of going out and finding it.
i wanna make every day an adventure.
learn a new word, listen to a new song, find a new fleck of color in your eyes.
i wanna laugh without feeling ashamed and love my friends like they deserve.
ive got projects piling up around me
and i think
this could be a new day,
so im pressing start.
let's go.

an odd age
i'm caught in this inbetween
looking back at things that seem to be an eternity ago
staring into the future, where i've yet to go
and i've come so far, and i've got miles ahead of me
and i'm one step forward, two steps back, dancing on the path
uncertain and sure and fearless and afraid
running forward, bold and blind,
shrinking back a ways
trying to cling to, yet shake off my past
trying to slow down, but still live life fast
this strange imbalance
don't want to rush, don't want to drag,
wanna live, not dwell, but i don't wanna miss it
i want to make memories, have fun with friends by my side,
i want to cherish these moments,
but if i think too much, they'll slip by,
and I'm so afraid of every laugh line I'll miss
But so ready for the opportunities.

look at a pig
(the resemblance is striking)

one day i will stop writing
dead poems to dead lovers
but my feelings
have a tendency to hold on-
i read over memories of you
like scripture
because if i forget the pain,
the sentiment, too, is gone