The only feeling I've ever seemed to be consistent with is the feeling like I'm missing something.

Home used to be a feeling, not a permanent residence but every time I leave school I live somewhere new. Home never got to be "home," I never had enough time.  

I think I left because I felt like the second you'd become home I'd be uprooted.

So I did what I did best, I moved.

And sometimes I still fall asleep to the memory of me collapsing on my bedroom floor and apologizing for telling you I loved you too soon.

But ten months apart and home isn't home, home isn't your skin on a Friday morning. Home isn't skipping class to feel the warmth of your sheets for just a few more hours.

Home feels like trying to remember your voice when you won't even look at me.

The first time you hear your ex
is with someone new,
it will feel like a ton of bricks
resting on your lungs.
You'll find yourself deserting
the flowers they planted there,
reminding yourself of the things
that used to break you both apart.

You promised to love me
with everything in you,
but ******* does it scare
me to ask the question:
"can anyone really love me
despite my mental disorders?"
Because God, loving a paranoid,
anxious, Obsessive Compulsive,
depressed ******* tore you down.
And God, did it destroy me
to watch you fall apart with me.

I've been stuck on the idea
that all I need to hear from you
is that you don't miss me anymore.

I can feel my sanity fleeing,
harsh memories sliding
through my fingers like sand.

I find comfort in isolation,
because the fleeting feeling
of acceptance by my peers
becomes so minimal that
it keeps me up at night.

There are millions of stars
outside and I hope one day,
far from now,
when I can find a way to
put in words just how hard it is
that you can't love me back,
we can lay there
and count them together.

I dream of it.

But I also dream of
being someone else and
I have spent the past few years
trying to correct an
emotional abuse that just
won't seem to fix itself.
I won't get better until the
existence of my internal isolation
is so minimal that
I won't have to hide
under covers the second
my sadness kicks in.

I meet people that
are beautiful and
I try to be beautiful,
I try to sit straighter,
I try not to push people away
but I just can't be more than
a wilting flower.

I just can't fix it.

I think I'll go back to you until
you ******* want me,
but I haven't wanted to
**** myself in about
two weeks and I think
that says something about us.

Or maybe it doesn't.

Maybe this is as foolish
as the time I romanticized
street lights
because a boy told me
he'd be a street light
over a stop sign.

I think about your smile
when I see the sunset,
because nothing will compare
to the night you told me
about where you'd like
to be by next year.

I'm starting to feel like
a stranger every where I go.
I havn't been able to lose
the vacant signs between
my veins, my shoulder blades,
my bones.

People will insist on
making homes inside yourself,
but Goddamit it's
so hard to find light
in the darkest parts of yourself.

Maybe I don't have
to stop breathing to die.
I just have to love you again.

A boy asked me today if I was happy,
And I couldn't answer.

And when I told him "I don't know,"
He told me I did.

Today a boy asked me
What makes me happy,
and I couldn't answer.
In most cases, I'd tell him it was him.
But it was too simple,
too in-the-moment.

Do you ever meet someone
and wonder how they could love you,
and more importantly how someone
couldn't be crazy about them?

I want to learn the crooks and crannies
of your ******* skin,
and I want to learn the wheels
in your brain that turn
when you wait for me to answer -

What makes you happy?

And I wish I knew,
I wish I could tell you it is you.

I am not so sure quite
What frightens me most;
The knowledge that my
Hands could break
You in half, metaphorically,
Or the inability
To judge the way
You could break me, literally.

I find myself lying next to bodies
To feel their heart,
As if their breathing
Could somehow remind me
That I am still here, that
I still breathe among them.

We can destroy the
Homes we made in people,
With the same shaky hands
We used to build them.
We can rip apart the same flesh
We tenderly kissed just hours before.
We are monsters;
I cannot breathe among them.

I've been finding myself
Alone in dark rooms,
Often with the ghost of
Your past and God,
Do we miss you.

I can no longer trust
My judgement on others;
I will lower them to my standard,
I will rip them apart
In my mind until they
Are no longer human,
But rather pawns.
I cannot love you like pawns.

I don't think I can love you at all.

September 6th, 1994
The leaves have started dying
Early this year and so has
My hope for spring.
Wilted flower petals blanket
The ground and I think I can
Relate to the way they've been
Hiding the trees' secrets for
Far too long.

October 31st, 1994
When I was little, Halloween
Was always my favorite holiday
Because I could be anyone I wanted.
I haven't decided if it's
Poignant or powerful that
I never grew out of not
Wanting to be myself.

November 24th, 1994
What is the point of thanksgiving
With a godforsaken family,
And a death wish on the side?
I love him, I love his eyes
And his smile,
I love the way he whispers
My name and the smile
Lines that fill his cheeks.
But being thankful for a boy
That has broken me in half,
Is as ridiculous as a
Thanksgiving with no thanks.

December 14th, 1994
I feel as invisible as ever;
I talk but no one hears me.
He hasn't stopped crying
For the past 48 hours,
"Please stop crying.
Please stop crying.
Please stop crying."
He doesn't reply anymore.

*January 1st 1995
The clock just hit midnight.
I could feel the room fill with
Reminiscent screams of
"Happy New Year" and "I love you"s
Between laughs. They never
Go past arms lengths and
The glasses of champagne seem
To separate us by miles.
I slipped out of the room in
Failed attempts to calm my mind.
Three hours later I heard a familiar
Crying from the bathroom floor.
I've never seen him
Shake so hard before or seen
Such a strong refusal to acknowledge
My hand reaching to comfort.

March 26th, 1995
You know that double sided
Glass they use in police stations?
(Speaking of which, I had an
Astonishingly real dream a
While back that you were
Being questioned in a
Police station about me;
You didn't listen when I tried
To tell you about it.
Your ruby lips shook and
The tear that landed
On the folder in front of you
Reminded me of that rainy day
In August when you said
You loved me.) Anyways...

April 12th, 1995
I sometimes hear you
Screaming my name
In your sleep, but
Not in the way you used to.
How do I keep ending up here?
You sometimes wake up and
Grasp for things that are not there,
And it is as if you wake up
And look for me.
Am I a ghost, or
Do you not hear me anymore?

July 23rd, 1995
You got up early and
Went to church today.
You swore to me you'd never
Step foot in that building again,
So I don't understand why
You keep going.
I often wonder who
You're trying to reach and why.
Your mother keeps referencing
Missing me over lunch and
I don't know why everyone
Seems so stuck on who
I used to be to them when
I was with them.
I know my mind has traveled far,
But I don't feel gone.

August 1st, 1995
You say my name so much--
Why, why do you do that?
You utter it softly, indirect,
Like a reminder.
But you don't look at me anymore
And I'm having trouble
Remembering if your eyes
Were blue, like the tumultuous
Sea when we went to the beach
That day in late October,
Or the stained glass in the church
That's become your hideout.
I'm praying to your God
That you look at me soon,
Because I'm losing the oxygen
In my lungs and your eyes
Are like a breath of fresh air.
Darling, I'm afraid I'm not all here.

September 27th, 1995
I am petrified because
You are not getting better.
I heard your father kicked
You out again and
That you were found four days
Later in the church basement
(Pronounced dead at
6:14 AM, September 24th,
If I remember correctly).
You touch me now, and
I mean really touch me.
You don't cry much anymore,
Maybe when you
Miss you mother or your sister,
But you do not wake up screaming
My name or yelling things at walls.
You may not be getting better,
But a part of you is put to rest and
You have found hospitality
Next to my grave.

November 23rd, 1995
You told me today that the reason
Why you still go to the church
Is because you first kissed
Me in that church basement.
You sometimes remind
Me that I would
Have been better off not
Killing myself at all,
And maybe my brother would
Have grown up a bit
Stronger and more naive.
I learned today that,
On our second Thanksgiving together,
I had something to be thankful for;
You.

Rewind to the first day you
Asked me to marry you.
It was raining, I wanted to kiss you.

December of our first year married;
You woke me up every morning
To watch the snow fall.
I rolled my eyes as you
Watched like a child.
You looked at me the same way.

Our first Christmas together was
About the same. It was
Only two years prior to our marriage
And you bought me a necklace.
I wore it every day
Until the day you left.
I hope the river likes jewelry
As much as I did.

Fast forward to our
Second spring together.
You pulled the car over on the side
Of the road to pick a wild flower.
We were already running late.
We always seemed to do
Everything too late.

Fourteen and a half days later
You told me you wanted me
To buy a nice dress for myself
And meet you at a restaurant.
I told you no,
I had work in the morning.
You drank every night
For a month after that.

You sang to my small unborn baby
Bump every night before bed.
Our next trip to see our baby's face
Did not go as planned.
You never could get me out of that
Black dress after her wake
And your eyes matched it
Perfectly every day after.

Fast forward to the day before you
Asked me to sign the divorce papers.
We made love.
I cried and said "this isn't working."
You said "I know."

I could hear you cry from the
Other side of the bed
And your hands felt miles away.
I remembered the first time
You touched me this way,
Long before your hands
Were calloused.
We were Hell bent on doing it
And I could hear the same lack
Of hesitation in your voice when
You said you had to leave.

Flash back to the first time I told you
I loved you.
I said it too soon. You said it back,
I didn't expect you to.

You left your ring on the
Coffee table our last night.
Suddenly I missed the rings
Of condensation marking the
Table every night and the
Clanking noise your ring
Finger made against the beer
Bottles after every fight.

I wish I could have been enough
To stop you from drinking.
I remember when you drove away.
"Turn around and beg me to stay.
Turn around and beg me to stay."
You didn't turn around and
I did not stay.

I passed the garden we were
Married in on my way to the court
House to sign the final papers.
A couple was leaving, newly wedded.
I find irony in that.

A few years later I passed you
On the street.
It was snowing, you had that same
Look in your eyes.
You smiled at me, a distant
"I'm sorry," smile.
I nodded, but I could not smile back.
You see, I never stopped loving you,
But I was never sorry for
Letting you leave.

I still find your cuff links buried
In my jewelry box some days.  
This is the day I watched the
Locket you gave me
Sink to the bottom of a river.
I think you could find my
Hope lying there, too.

Remember the time you kissed me
In the rain?
First slow and timid, then
Passionate as if it was the
Last time we would ever kiss again.
I apologized thirteen times that day
For things that had
Not happened yet.

I think a piece of me knew all along
I would have to let you leave.
The day I said good bye
The words burned my lips
Like acid exactly like they did that day.
I said "I'm sorry."

Seven hours staring at empty
Beer bottles as you
Slam them on the table.
In fact, it's been months since
You slammed anything but beers
And I think that is where
We started to fall apart.

Three years since you left and
I cannot bring myself to love another.
I bet she is beautiful and
Kind and loving and
I bet she does not cause you to
Drink until you cannot feel.
Three years later and I realize now that
I will love you until I die.

I wore a light blue dress the day you kissed me and every day after to prove that I was in love. I had floral patters around my waist so I could twirl around for you and show you the life inside of my heart.

You squeezed my hand as if every letter of their vows was your silent message to me. Red. We wore red. It took me six months for me to let that dress go, and I swear to God I never felt as beautiful as when the rain poured around us that day.

I wore a black dress for you with ribbons down my spine but every touch snagged the lace and it's starting to hardly cover me spelling only your name across my hips and my sides. Those dresses were the most appropriate for the days I let you take me. Sheer silk laid across the small of my back. I saw an inviting place for your palms but you only saw the zipper.

How fitting is it that I wore a fitted blue dress to my first real date after we gave up (exactly one year, two months and nine days). The same dress we made love in. The first time you did not tell me you loved me after.

A tan dress just like our skin in the summer. I let a you touch me naked and I've never felt fully clothed ever since. Not even the sleeves and loose skirt of my dress could hide the scars no matter how many times I twirled around for someone new.

I wore a polka-dot dress the first time you touched me inappropriately. I remember it being hot out. I wish I wore something else. November 1st, 2013. You would not even look at me after we became one, never mind talk to me.

On Sundays I wore white dresses to feel innocence again. I never failed to ***** the precious pearls lining the collar of my dress every week, though. I felt the bow across my back untie by your hands and the pure white tulle was ruined by my blood stained skin (though it was not the first a life ******* residue remained).

New Years Eve, 2013 I wore the prettiest dress I had ever owned. Apparently he thought it was pretty, too, because a taken boy kissed me in it. I remember being afraid you were drunk. I remember fighting with you. I remember missing you. I remember telling you that you only talked to me because you missed her. There's not a day I don't miss those drunk texts.

I wore multiple colors and threads fabricating all my good memories into a dress except I can't remember much anymore and this is rather skimpy.

A suicide letter with your name on every line.
Love was a one way street and I was just trying to get by.
I had once been beautiful, I had once been strong,
But now I am the tempest that ripped the door from your hinges,
And I am destructive to everything inside.
I've tried to forget the way you cut your hair and the way you cut your meat,
But the cuts on my arm are just a reminder that
You were good with everything that involved a knife.

It's true what they say about becoming like your surroundings,
Because I've carved your name into my rib cage with consonants like a blade,
But you went behind my work and sliced deeper with every vowel.
I think it was my heart dying the day we left blood in your sheets;
I didn't know letting you inside of me meant being haunted by
Everything that remains and never left when you did.
Every pill on my tongue tastes like your mouth on my thighs.
The fire you left beneath my skin holds crimson relief and secret sin.

I thought the meaning of lust was to exclude love from the mix,
But you confused the two and now
I'm not so sure what love means.
I've hit rock bottom in the form of an avalanche
And the weight is far worse than the weight of you on top.
These demons are eating me alive and I see them in my dreams,
But my dreams are of your smile and I think
The good dreams are worse than the bad.

I find the irony in that.
I begged for your presence once in my uncertain attempt to survive.
You said some things you just cannot control, like why these bad things have happened.
Were you talking about yourself?
You said I had to be careful; "you never know when you will die."
I am aware now that, that was your greatest lie.
I died by your hand the day your poison left your lips.
My fight against death was your fight for life and
Every sting from your hips against mine nailed me further to
My own tombstone.

No one tells you that the monsters under your bed would
Show their face when you looked into the mirror.
The bags under my eyes look quite like the bags you left of
Bad memories and bad habits (they are all I have left).
You must understand that the screams from the roof tops could
End with a crack of my bones, and
You are to blame for the nights I cannot stop drowning from
The thoughts in my head.

If love was suicide you had as much life as spring and
I never made it through the chill of winter.
I've been taking medicine for the pounding in my head and now it suddenly makes sense.
My mind is sicker than I thought.
We have always only been human and I can only bend my heart so far;
But you needed me to be broken.
I cannot understand why you had to feel my break.
The death seeping through your pores brings out the colors in your eyes.
If needing you is suicide I know I'm going to die.

There is more to be said about the way it burns on my skin
Long after your hand has moved to another inch of my body.
The walls were filled with lies and I think your mouth wrote them itself,
At least they sound quite familiar and I wish I could say
"I feel safe."
The bathroom floor is covered with my blood, sweat, and tears
And I swear if you didn't know I loved you then, at least
I know you never loved me now.

I can't even love myself.
I've been told strangers cannot be trusted and I think that's when I became afraid of the mirror.
Being touched by you was like being awake after sleeping too long.
My heart was confused and disoriented,
But my hands never forgot what to do.
Loving you was the best pain I have ever felt.
Everything you are made of hurts but I love it, I still love it, I still love you.
This self inflicting torture has become my addicting sadness
And I know that's because it is as
Close to your heart as my trembling hands will ever reach.


If there was a stage in between life and death I think
I entered it the day your words ****** the life from me.

You walk through the doors of the library and everything is in it's familiar place on every dust covered shelf. Somehow the feeling of it's untouched surfaces intrigue you (probably because you envy the hidden finger prints).

You open the first book and it breathes a hard nastolgia into your face. The sound of the porch swing is the first thing you hear, and the library is transformed into a summer's night. You feel the rush of your lover's touch and you wonder how it is possible to ever move on from that night and from the sounds of "I love you," in your ear.

The next book you pick up has a strong spine and thick pages. Everyone knows this must mean it lacks a good story but you wonder why that is so. Simply because it has been untouched? You long to be the unbent book on that splintered shelf with no crumbled pages or folded corners of someone's favorite things.

You refused to open the next book you saw, and yes, you judged it by the cover.  I suppose he judged you by the cover, and you could feel the weight of "you're not what I thought you were." It lives over your shoulders like an angry cloud and you hope to God there is a window to bring sunshine into this room.

Looking down the row of books you see one out of place, different from the rest.  With a gentle hand you pick it up and feel it's weak pages between your fingers stained with tears. You know that this book has been in the possession of many and even has a few tears the further into it you read. You wonder if this is how you appear. (fragile and weak) or if maybe the bold print you see on every page speaks louder than the condition each corner is in.

The next book you find is a childhood memory, and it was always one you'd love to relive.
You missed the sound of your father's voice, but the memory was as good as the father who knew how to leave. The baggage may have been heavier than his own suitcases, but you forget that all because you were back at your eighth birthday party, and the smile he had was one you'd never forget.

You close this book lightly and grab the one directly behind it. It's a fairytale, and the exact way you always imagined your life to be. Your eyes scan every page quickly but as you near the end you read that walks in the park are not always perfect in fact they can often be filled with tears and the little girl in a dress is broken inside scratching her story into every page of this fictional disillusion.

The last book you grab is one that shouldn't have intrigued you. You sit on the only piece of furniture, besides the dusty shelves; a wooden chair infront of a fireplace. The story displays you and him, and the future you wish you had.
The book starts out at a wedding, but it isn't yours. In fact, the only thing sentemental about it is the way he squeezed your hand when they said their vows.  You scream to make the story stop, but your eyes never stray.  The book ends with you alone. Ironic, isn't it? Because you were always alone, even when he was yours and everything felt complete. The wooden chair breaks as you move to burn the book, and the flames help bring the story to life and every lie fills the walls. The library becomes a labrinth that will never release you.

The chair is a mirror to your heart.

You are alone with the writing on the walls and that is all that is left of you.

Venus was back to her wicked tricks; I never planned for the way you stole the breath from my lungs, but kept me begging for more. Or what about the beauty in your words? The Goddess of love and beauty could never compare to the way you once made me feel.

I bet Zeus had never thrown a lightening bolt as shocking as the way it felt when you first held my hand. I bet every lover he ever had never quite made him feel as complete as you could make me feel.

But there you were, and like Hephaestus you built me a stable castle for every pulse of my heart. I never felt so safe in such a small room, but now the walls close in and even Vulcan's fire can't match the heat from your embrace.

You were also Mercury, and your quick feet made me trip far faster than I should have. I just wanted to keep up, but our messages must have been left behind and now Cupid's arrows don't quite work like they did when we were young.

I felt like Tantalus when you let the vulture of your mind rip apart my stomach and leave me in sections on the rug. You were the food held just out of my reach and you were the waters I drowned deeper and deeper into, day in and day out.

Every thread wound through this sweater traveling in different directions like the fibers of anxious thoughts dancing through the synapse in my mind.

I never felt anxiety like I felt the haunt of paranoia. I think the ghosts in the walls and the lurking shadows are just the memories of someone I once knew, but I swear you're there, I swear you're following me like something I'd like to forget.

Steam rises from my cup like a ghost, but I'm not sure if it's you or the forgotten versions of myself. I feel my heartbeat in my ears pounding through every vein in my body, causing my fingertips to pulse at every shaky thought.

What if it was you in the dark of the night? What if you were here like you once were? Would I drop my cup, or perhaps throw it, in a fit of fear. Or would I scream for you to leave, or perhaps for you to stay?

I swear I hear your restricted call "don't look back," but this is not a metaphor. I can't tell if you are trying to warn me through my dreams or announcing your arrival.

If the sounds in the walls never stop, will I learn claustrophobia in a form of everything that weighs me down and drowns me in a body of water that represents your eyes? You might was well be the rocks around my ankles; you stole the oxygen from my lungs but you forgot about the effect of loss of oxygen on the brain.

Every wall I ever built appears to fall down on top of me, but this is not opening my heart up. These walls and every brick are trapping me further under the weight of fear on my lips, every time I begin to speak, and the knot of helplessness in my throat begins to grow.

Now I'm not so sure if this weight is you, or just my walls you crumbled. Is this paranoia that follows me (I swear to God, it has to be you) or is it anxiety that locks me in a cage and keeps me up at night? Will I ever know the difference or are these all metaphors for a self-diagnosis?

It was raining the Saturday I hired the carpenter, but I think it was acid rain from all the poison you let escape into your body.
He was a drunkard, and he apologized through sips of alcohol. It was the color of your blood when I found you in fits and I begged him to wash them out of the carpet, but through every sip he said your name just like the walls do.
I begged the maid to clean up the razors but she never did.
The maid came in two hours late and she didn't seem to mind my frustration. Much like you never seemed to mind when you said the right things all too late.
She swept secrets under the rugs and listened to the creak in the floorboard whenever any weight was put on this old wooden floor that reminded me so much of your weak shoulders when I needed a place to hold me.
The builder was far too early, and the maid never cleaned up in time. The builder tried desperately to rebuild the walls, but they shook at the weight of another's skin on mine, and the builder whispered "I think you need him back." I dismissed him, and the force of my door slamming (much like the force when you left that night with everything but me) was enough to destroy every wall.
Gardeners came in flustered at the work ahead of them. There were scars on my heart running up the sides like vines and it was far too thick to be cut down.
I envied the fresh dug up dirt encasing the weeds that I so badly wished would hold my body too. You see I tried to burry myself in your mind but you kept pushing me out and now the dirt is the only thing that promises certainty.

You're standing on the front porch with your arms wrapped around yourself and you stare up at a spider weaving a web of every memory that ever left a hand print on the walls of your home. It all comes rushing back.
Do you remember the night after the fair when we sat quietly on the porch swing? "I believe when you tell me you love me," I whispered for the first time. I will never forget the way you grabbed my face and kissed me, because that was the first and last time I believed that it was possible for another human being to hold my demons safely.
Do you remember the time we sat on the bench in front of your house and we both stared blankly off the porch in hopes that my nervous shaky hands wouldn't upset your demons any longer and my tears wouldn't spill into your lap along with every other unsure promise you ever made me. Or have you tried to forget that as easily as you forgot how badly it bothered me when you wouldn't look into my eyes.
What about the time I first realized you were using me? It was summer then, and you begged me to tell you why I wouldn't leave that ******* swing. I did math problems in my head as you begged me to come back inside; back inside to that bed full of anxiety and I swear our smell was embedded in every ******* fiber of your sheets.
Do you remember the time I had given my innocence to you? Because I do; I remember how horribly planned and spontaneous it was, but after you had touched my face so softly and told me you loved me. You told me every time after that, too, and I think that's where we confused lust and love. But remember the couch in your living room, where we had laid ever so closely after our innocence had been taken. I had never felt so close to you, and I would do anything to have that safety back.
Close your eyes and picture us back on the couch in your living room. Feel every gentle touch and every "I love you" tangled between blankets that we used to keep each other warm when our bodies were cold and our hearts were even colder. Try to imagine the warmth we brought to each other between safety nets of our twisted legs and kisses that seemed to travel miles on our skin.
I try to forget the time I was an hour away for a whole week. It was our first time spending any time apart, and I had begged you to come to my rescue. You did, and I was thrilled to see you again, but we spent the majority of the time touching each other rather than talking and I guess I wish it had been reversed, because I hadn't heard your voice in days and my heart envied the attention you gave the rest of my body with your hands rather than your voice. I guess I just wished for more, and maybe you couldn't offer much more in that living room. I can't lay on that couch without imagining your weight upon me and I realize that maybe I should have given that couch more credit for keeping all our secrets locked inside it.
I can't help but remember the time you danced with my demons in my kitchen while telling me this is how things were supposed to be. A ghost in the form of steam raised from our cups as we spoke of our memories and watched each other laugh the same way we watched our goose bumps raise every time you said my name
My favorite memory of us was the first time you taught me how to Waltz in the middle of your kitchen. I was never really good, but you never stopped teaching me and your family became an audience of smiles and appreciation that was reflected within your own eyes.
but your eyes soon became puddles of tears when we grew further apart and our waltz became more of a sway between closeness and distance and the cold time floor in your kitchen were no longer covered in our footprints
Do you remember the time we had to go to a wedding, and I called you just an hour before because my hair wouldn't cooperate? You drove here as fast as you could in a fit of confusion and I still find it remarkable that you could fix all my problems, (including my hair of course), with just a smile and your creative hands. That bathroom had seen my insecurities, but you fixed them in just a few minutes. I wish it hadn't rained that day, because I felt beautiful for once, thanks to you.
your hands carefully crafted a smile on my face countless times. I can still see us laughing with our heads thrown back as we washed paint off of our legs which stained our hands more than the memory of your smile when I touched you ever would be engrained in my mind
The bathroom rug knew me well, because my tears stained it's cotton the day you told me you never loved me. Was it only days before that you had followed me into the shower? I wish you hadn't; I scrubbed the smell of rubber from my skin but soon enough we were back to touching. How foolish of us to think that there was nothing more to us than the feel of another's skin, because that bathroom rug knew far better then you ever will, just how much I loved you.
you undressed my body the same way you undressed my demons and stripped my heart of any walls I had ever put up to lock you out. I wonder if you still remember the way the hot water felt running down our skin or rather the way your lips felt like acid kissing my body one last time. I don't think you saw my tears through the water but my shaking body firmly pressed against yours was enough. Silent whispers of "this is all we'll ever be" came from the shower walls and I knew it was true
You left the bathroom. You had taken all you could and we moved into the yard. I remember the first time we were there; the wedding. Do you remember the way you squeezed my hand and looked at me as they said their vows? We talked so much about our future, and it was as if it was being displayed right before us.
I miss the time we helped your grandparents pick the garden and somehow ended up throwing berries at each other. It was such a waste, but we ended up playing tag and eventually you stopped me and kissed me in a way I don't think you ever had. There was not a cloud in the sky and there wasn't a cloud in your eye, and I think that was the first time I had seen you truly happy with me. I miss that yard and the childish comfort it brought.
It didn't take long for the rain clouds to roll in trapping us inside. It's funny how I've tried to forget this day over and over again but it keeps creeping back into my mind. I think that day in the office is when it hit me; or rather, you hit me. I was used to kisses on the cheek,  but not like this. Not with your knuckles. No force of impact could have possibly compared to the way it felt when you told me it was a lie all this time
I have never felt so content as the time I did when we laid under covers in your room and you fell asleep beside me. I watched your chest rise and fall and wondered to myself how something so beautiful could turn into someone I feared most
I remember the time I thought you'd be angry with my unwilling to let our unsacred touch happen another morning, but you held me close and said "It's okay, cuddling is far better." I had never felt so safe in your arms and the feel of you breathing was enough to regulate mine. I have never met another person who breathed at the same rate as me, and that saved me more times than I'm sure you could count.
But my breathing became far too unsteady for you to ever keep up with and my affectionate gestures became as boring as your excuses for why we needed to do more.
I guess our affection had run out, because four months of mixing up lust and love was getting old and eventually I had left. I swear everything became cold at that point; your once welcoming eyes, your words, the ground. I remember your comforting whispers in your bed, but I also remember your rough grasps and I guess we could never have both. I remember you, but do you remember me?

Your arms gave my demons a home since the afternoon of February 16th, and I knew your ocean eyes could drown them and free me from their grasp. Who knew those eyes would drown me entirely?

But eventually I could feel the darkness bite at the wires in your brain. They rearranged every night and I think you forgot who I was, because once August 24th rolled around, we had confused love and lust as we rolled around in between sheets, and that was the start of months of confusion.

You had changed the codes on every alarm starting September 13th, (or had our distance made me forget?)

By November 24th, I had lost the key and the spare was no longer under the mat. I still wonder how many had forgotten to wipe their feet while I was gone, so I gave up on praying that Venus would save us.

December 13th, my suspicions of your unscared touch every morning had been confirmed. I remember you begging for one more lustful grasp, and I wish I had said no, because when you told me you didn't love me I could barely stop my rageful fits on the bathroom rug.

Your walls came crumbiling down the following February 10th, when you begged me to come back home. But I knew your chest cavity was no longer warm and I felt no safety in the way you looked at me.

I loved you so much, but the calender is my only friend and this calender never lied, but you always will.

Sitting in a room of different demons, I wonder how some play so nicely with others.

Maybe this wasn't meant to be, maybe your hopeless-romantic demons cannot grab the attention of my self-hatred that wishes to destroy every hint of love I may conquer.

But I still feel them beg for the warmth of another's skin, so I wrap them in blankets and tangle myself in memories I'd like to forget; the way you'd get tangled in my hair, the way you'd whisper "mine" at every hint of doubt that so selfishly pooled on my face. But my fear never demolished and soon you were gone with the summer.

I beg to not let them win, but I still crawled into your bed every morning with an intent that had set my demons on fire. It was like fighting fire with fire and the flames grew and I let them burn every bridge to the ground.

I took the tools from the shed and built walls higher and stronger than I ever had before and the weight of another on top of me did not break them down like we had intened.

So I watched you pack a suitcase like all the others. "Don't forget your socks," I'd remind you as you'd button your pants again.

I opened the door for you and watched you leave from the broken window, but you never once looked back and all I have left is every bed sheet we crumpled and every memory we demolished.

I've been begging for the one thing in life that can promise certainty; Death.

Death opened his arms to me, and every demon dragged me by the legs to Death's tempting smile.

I never imagined Death to look like every regret I ever had. He smiled like you, his eyes matched the sky and his voice whispered in the way you did everytime you lied.

Death was friendly; he shook my hand at our first meeting but his grasp was a bit too friendly and a bit too tight. It intrigued me, and it surely intrigued the anger inside of me.

There are two types of demons inside of me, and the strongest ones are masked with your laugh and your memory. Every time you told me you loved me, every time you lied and said "I'm not mad, cuddling is far better," created a breed of demon that begs for Death's kiss.

The other kind, the kind that I may never understand, begs for a love deeper than any body of water you kissed me in. But these demons are afraid of fire, they are afraid of passion. I call these demons Cowardice, and a coward I may be.

Death offered a home for us three, at the cost of giving up the life I had. I begged Death to let me go, but his response was just like yours and I still think of Death's kiss as if it's a reminder of every kiss you place upon my skin.

Your eyes open slowly and your blurry vision begins to fade. You look around and the room is white. Hanging over you is a canopy collecting every butterfly you've ever experienced. You step from underneath it and your feet touch the  floor covered in satin. You begin slipping just as your control once began to slip through your own fingers. You feel for the wall for support only to find your hand stained blue and cold.

The room was flooded with blue. You walk towards the cd player, and push play like you have a thousand times before. The cd plays the sounds of the ocean, the splashing against the rocks reminded you of a love that always came back for more. You were calm and every ounce of you called out for the warmth of the sun and the taste of the salt on his lip.

His kisses grew far more passionate than you ever intended and the vines leading down euphoric paths became green and quickly the room fades a deep emerald. The leaves began to change and your vines snapped much sooner than you ever planned for.

Sun poured into the light and reflected on every mirror you so impatiently refused to stare into. The room was yellow. You were alone with mirrors and a puzzle. The puzzle represented every piece of him that you never understood and your frustration pushed through your mind like crepuscular rays in a cloud. You heard yellow meant happy, but it only reminded you of a cowardice and an irritation that could cut holes in granite rock.

You look down towards your chest slowly rising and falling only to find the floor is orange, the walls are orange, every table and chair is orange. You walk over and sit in the corner, in the chair, seeming to be nailed to the floor and suddenly you remember every regret hammered into your head with no intention of release, just like the chair.

Power, lust and *******. You were covered in his scent and the marks on your skin were as red as the walls. The ruby matched your hatred, but it represented the passion that once coursed through your veins and raced with the beating of your heart that sounded far too much like the clock that was ticking out of time. It was red and it was quiet, but your intensity diminished as the  luxury of purple took its course and had its way with the walls.

The hands on the clock were amethyst along with every shelf end and every book within it. You reach past the cobwebs to reveal a book of your life. The pages are stained with deep purple smudges similar to your arms and knees after your demons have beaten you down. You begin to read the words on every page covered in black ink.

You realize now the colors are painted along the wall of your mind. It is as dark inside your mind and you feel submerged in a water deeper than the well your family had once thrived from. But the well of hope has run dry and you desperately search for the water that once kept you all afloat. The only noises you hear are every regret that ever snuck its way into the crevices of every memory. You pray for white, yellow, red, anything but black. But you are alone with the demons and you are alone in the walls of your head.

Your words cut me like the harsh frost of winter. It's been a while since you've been gone but it's been winter year round, and I've been hoping for spring to melt away the bitterness in my head. There is ice on all of the paths and I keep slipping into a darkness that comes much earlier than it used to. I pray for spring to come, but all I've known is winter and what if it is harsher than these past few months? What if the warmth it promises is covered in morning dew and its smell is wrapped in our sheets?

Or what if the chains formed by the ice of quietly whispered lies keep me trapped against the post of un-forgetfulness? I'm beginning to believe the warmth that the sun brings has been trapped behind that same post you've locked me to, except the post is your bed, and it is the words that you let seep from your lips into my ears.

I have been longing for words delicate enough to live inside my heart but also longing for words of bravery strong enough to dance with my demons until I see the seasons change within me. I've been longing for spring. Desires glimmer in my eyes, grasping for the hope of change. I've been clinging to hope more fragile than lilac's petals when they first begin to bloom.

Spring was warm this year, but the nights were still cold and it froze me to the core. I hid under piles of blankets to keep my demons warm, but the fabric smelt like us and it only fueled the bitterness in my eyes. I could not even admire the flowers, never mind touch them. I imagined myself destroying them in my palm, much like you had done to me with every ungentle touch and every forced word through gritted teeth.

The summer promised warmth, but you promised love and I have yet to feel either. I was still frozen, I was still stuck in winter even if the sun kissed my skin. The ocean looked like your eyes and I will never forget your stare as long as the ocean remains a deep blue. The tide reminded me of every embrace you'd push away from, but I'd always come back for more because you remained there like the sand that matched the color of your hair. You were essentially always my ocean, but your ocean drowned me and I'm still recovering from every gasping breath and every un-spoken cry for an escape.

The salty ocean kissed my skin before the tide pulled it away again. Ill never forget the way the sun reflecting on my drenched skin reminds me of your shoulder the time I cried on it and left tear stains on your shirt as proof that you were once mine. This seems to be my only proof that the words "I love you" once escaped from your lips because I never hear them anymore and the small flower buds I saw when the seasons changed have begun to wilt the same way your feelings for me did, when I could no longer handle being used.

Fall came closer and I could hear it in your words and see it in your eyes when your gaze became more lifeless than your touch. I watched us both fall through the branches of empty promises we formed along side our webs of fading emotions which never seemed to soften our landing as we planned. The sky darkened the same time our chances at being okay again did, and I think I could see love's flame burning out inside of my own body, except I'm not so sure that the flame I was feeling was every actually ever love or just a rush of feelings and helpless falling into the pits of our disillusions.

The leaves were full of color and full of life, but there was little life in your words, and they fell into piles of lies. I wanted to jump in them, but I could hear the crunch of time when I was forced to choose if I would let you continue to touch me with an untruthful hand, or if I would leave as fast as the summer had.

I'm not so sure which month I would prefer to die in. To be honest, I died in all of them. Winter came back and the familiar fear of icy roads and bitter words were all I had left. I don't think I would last more than three months in winter, but spring left little hope. I was as fragile as every petal, on every flower, on every bush. I was broken by your words but to die in spring was to die by your hand and that is a fate I could never obtain in a peaceful manner.

The heat from summer approached and I swear I could feel your touch in every beam of sunlight that hit my skin. The warm rays hit my neck like the kisses you planted there and trailed down my spine like seeds that were meant to grow flowers inside of me. Or at least that's what I thought. Every cold fall day raised goose bumps of fear on my skin with the uncertain thoughts multiplying in my head. The seasons still change every year much like you did every time I thought I understood you.  I hoped one day the seasons would find a balance and allow my heart to beat at ease again; but that has yet to happen and I still live every day in fear that you'll bring another winter storm to me again.

Loving you in the form of forced "I love you"'s between every touch, between every doubt inside that screams "no" while you keep screaming "yes" but all I wanted was for you to touch my heart the same way you touched my thighs and grabbed my face unapologetically
Loving you in the form of bare feet on wet pavement similar to the way you carefully walked your way into my mind. I wish every natural disaster would sound like our hurricanes of false "I love you"'s and forced moans

Losing you in the form of blankets on that cold November morning when our hearts were no longer fabricated to beat the same. I never quite forgot the way the frost matched the color of your eyes the day you decided loving me was as worthless as hiding from the monsters that lived in your head.
Losing you in a form quite similar to the closest way we made love; you'd lie with I love you after minutes of me hoping you'd stop. The cadence of your voice became stale and I think I could see winter in your eyes even when I was not looking at you and my sighs became more frostbitten than your words.

Missing you in the form of sweaty palms but you never really were one for holding hands and now your fingers are shaking harder than they did during our first kiss but it wasn't our first kiss I missed, it was every one after that and the way you'd whisper I love you as if one time you truly meant it, just to watch me walk away when I thought I'd had enough.
Missing you in the form of wearing your deodorant every night after years of you being gone because I will never feel safe without your memory. I was clinging to your memory in hopes that these nightmares aren't my reality but you never woke me up and I'm still waiting to be held by your words.

Forgetting you in the form of burnt love letters smothering out your voice in my head but still stinging deeper than any cut you placed on my heart. I still remember the rush of blood to my face the first time we touched, but now I wonder if the heat was a spark in interest or a warning sign. Forgetting you in the form of sleeping the time away, just to see your silhouette in my dreams. I don't trust my own two hands, how can I ever grasp yours again?
Forgetting you was slam poetry except its not beautiful at all and the only thing being slammed is the doors to my heart because I'm not sure if it's safe inside anymore.