i confess i’m a mess but only in the sense that my problems are future tense
i can hear the door knobs rolling down the hall but honeyface, sweetie, grass biscuit
i think i’m unshakeable now

break my collar bones again
on the days i find it hard to just exist, i have friends who will squeeze my ankles and my knees and anchor me down to a planet i’m not sure i was ever meant for
sorry i’ve never quite been able to articulate what it means for me to have been around the sun 23 times but **** i wasn’t supposed to make it this far

i sunk the ship and i burned the house down
sing me to sleep or shake me awake
you want honesty?
you’re looking in the wrong mirror, honey
leave a message after the beep

it’s not you, it’s your situation
it’s not me, it’s my childhood tramua
tell me to ******* or tell me the truth
tell me about teeth sunk into unwilling flesh and how i was never a peach and i've always been the ******* sun

pulling my tired bones and muscles out a bed that seems too big for me now
in a room that once held laughter and love without terms and conditions
i don’t replace the light bulbs anymore and i don’t change the sheets as often as i should and the pile of laundry is suffocating me
i replay the night over and over in my head of you laughing and me spilling whiskey and bodies too close but too far for anything real

i can still hear the chorus of “will you let me in” like it’s my own heartbeat

i am doing just fine, thank you
do you remember how i liked to keep in touch?  

thinking about the united states postal system and how i feel lost in the mail

i want to scream the way i did in 2016 but with the words that my mouth will allow but haven’t said except for in substance induced sleep
driving faster to get to my destinations so i don’t have to think about the outcome has become more of a victory song than a death march
i’ve started writing songs again!
i’ve started smiling at the sunset!
if we keep waking up before the sunrise we’ll last a little longer

i used to paint the town red with the blood from my mouth
i could count the phases of the moon from the crescents caused by the digging of my nails into my hands
it was easier that way

late night side streets accompanied by no one but a playlist and a flashlight
i ran while crossing the road to get to anywhere
sometimes i wonder if the street light near the cemetery still flickers
and if i have any claim to the gravel behind the post office
does your mom ever tell you that i drive by your house?
when i finally woke up beside the lake i didn’t know it would feel like nothing

the rules of the game are simple
keep the dust from collecting and keep your hands out of your hair
keep the sink empty
god i have got to get out of my house
i’m going to eat the concrete from the streets and scrape my knees so they have something to talk about

The cluster of ice in my glass
  looks like a milky fist.
I shake my cup and ask
  about the weather.
He says, 'Hasn't rained in
  one thousand or so years.'
I say how that's unfortunate;
  he says how **** happens.

This party transitions into
  something out of an art-house film;
the Cali-tens are dancing to some
  80's song you would vaguely recognize.
They bump into one another
  like bees in an electric hive.
A Russian drinking a Russian
  asks about drugs.
I say into my drink that I
  don't have that many friends.

Looking for a bathroom,
  I am bumped by hips and lips
into the former eggshell/cigarette stain wall,
where I find my partial reflection
  looking back at me in that familiar
transparent parent way.

I find myself apologizing.