I fell from the bottle, landed at your door
unraveled before you I can't do this no more
Blindsided, triggered you lay me to waste
How am I gonna to get out of this place?

I scream at the wind my suffragettes prayer
For redemption, deliverance from despair
I run with the river, dive into the storm
Chasing transformation, to be reborn

I question your motive, do you understand?
Dry land falls, I'm washed up on the sand
Craving and clinging, gasping for air
You sit mostly in silence, do you really care?

Sweating the seas, aching for more
Resisting and wanting, fearing the fall
Grace is a mountain, life is a tree
I sit in nature, it breathes life into me

I'm ragged, exposed, I am here, I am now
I look for repose, it finds me somehow
The winds sweep the streets, storms overtake pain
I am searching for me, only I remain

I run with the river, I dive into the storm
Chasing transformation, to be reborn
Words tumble freely into your lap, onto the page
I cry, full of tears and anger, sadness and rage

But play me a soul song, sing me to spring
The rhythms of life let the insights in
You broke the tide, I surfed the wave
Daylight comes slowly, my dance is remade

My words may be distasteful
least they are true
My words may be distasteful
But your actions disgust me
You and your cigarette breath
Your lies
Your actions and words are one in the same

I type all my poetry
In a Word document
Called “Legends”
Because everything worth remembering
Is the stories
Happening
Over and over again.
Repetition until we’re dead.
Same **** different day.
Looking at it this way
And then that one.

I write so I can give someone
somewhere
Goosebumps.
I want to touch stranger’s lives
In remarkable ways
I want to share my pain
My love
My story
With all of you.
My art
is showing the sanctity of words
and leaving a legacy.

I will be dead
But someone will inherit my little black book
Filled not with men’s phone numbers
but the thing
That allows tourists to find their way
That allows kids to express themselves in healthy ways
When what they’re feeling just might **** them
That allows you and me to talk
When we’re thousands of miles apart.
My art
Is words.
And I’ll tell the same ******* story
But I’ll do it in new ways
That’ll make you go “ooo. She’s good.”
Because I am.

No one fawns over us.
We’re not the musicians with admirers
Or the actors who enjoy owning islands.
We’re not covers of magazines.
No one even knows what we look like.

But if I’ve put Goosebumps on your arm
I’ve done the same thing as the greats.
And in doing so,
I’ve become one.

Oh baby –
We were doomed from day one.

Though we weren’t in the Jazz age,
and we weren’t in the modern age,
We were in the age of us.

Wings on my eyelashes,
A silky robe around my shoulders,
You wore a vest and a tee shirt—
Indulged in cowboy bohemia;
God, it was ****.

Oh baby, we thought we were unstoppable
We drank too much
Met new people by liquid courage
And found fearlessness suited us well.
We harnessed the trade winds
and went where we wanted.

Interest and innovation embedded in curiosity;
In art and newness and literature and truth.
Calling ******* like we saw it
We were entitled and young and free
No restraints
And hey, maybe that was the problem.

The problem with freeness
Is running and running and running
Until you forget what you’re running towards
And instead find
You’re actually running from.

Oh baby-
We were doomed from day one
We just didn’t know it yet.
I’m just too tired to run anymore.

I could have been like Zelda.
Tired from the facade,
Strong and petrified at the same time,
Finding distractions in every part of life
That made me forget we weren’t as free as we thought we were.

God, Baby—
Didn’t you know we were doomed
From the very first day we met?
I suppose I should thank you:
Thanks for breaking my heart;
You saved me from breaking my own.

I could have been like Zelda.

Man in the long black coat
as ominous as the Dylan song.

Eyes with wild abandon
Hurricanes happenin’ in them eyes.
Flicking a half-smoked cigarette
into a ***** puddle.

Sizzle of extinguishment
the sound of his life.

The dark cobblestone streets quiet, for once.
His cowboy boots keeping him surprisingly warm,
despite the November cold.

He stands at the crossroads.
If the devil came to make a deal,
he wasn’t sure he could say no.

“Lead me not to temptation.”
too late.

Stories of stuff, not people filled his head.
He found people broke more than stuff.
Warranties.
A whole department there to pay you back.

He lit up again.
Surrender to addiction
Just let it take you.

The nicotine rushed to his head and he exhaled,
feeling a little bit better
than 30 seconds ago.

He thought of the girl at the bar.
God, she could have passed as her twin.
Thinking of her was like
being hit by a battering ram
over and over again.
Crushed chest,
Crushed soul.

Again, he flicked the half-smoked cigarette away.

The cold November night,
The only one joining him tonight.

She’s not coming.
She never was.