My dream girl found a lover
She speaks of him in rhyming lines
the joy she feels dancing between every heart shaped syllable,
thumbing it's nose at my breaking heart.

My dream girl found a lover
the deal was sealed with a rain soaked kiss
and hands that fit just-so.
A love tightly bound,
according to her rose tinted ink.

My dream girl found a lover
I hope he hears the fragility in her sighs
over the beauty that radiates when her smile crinkles her nose,
for that alone can distract a man from the sound of breaking.

My dream girl found a lover
to mend her broken heart,
a coveted position filled.
Leaving me forever dreaming
of almosts and half smiles.

We pretend we won't lose touch
But we will
People like us always do
We are the almosts
The almosts never last
We never last in love
We never last in hate
We never last as friends
So we fade
We fade into our own lives
We fade into memories
That may cross out minds every once in a while
We fade into acquaintances.
Into strained "how are yous" and "I'm doing fines"
Because to be close is too painful
But to hate is impossible
So we fade into that place
The place for the almosts

what my forays into online dating offered me that wasn’t s*x; european coffee beans, a film camera from the 70s, a workshop on ceramics, chicken parmagiana, bottles of blueberry lemonade, thai food that isn’t spicy, help with calculus homework, notes on gen chem, all the Star Wars movies, a book about magic: the gathering, a ride to an nba game, museum visits, nature walks, impulsive road trips, stories about their exes, silly anecdotes, photos of their pets, quality memes, awkward hugs that felt good.

such small intimacies, never blossoming into something bigger yet still imbued with meaning..

filled with what-ifs, if-onlys, and almosts.

When did Wishes become as commonplace as pennies in Fountains?
When did Unicorns stop dreaming?
In a place where Unicorns can Dream
And Stars are Paths
And Fat Orange Cats are Sullen Irish Dancing Potatoes
With Biscuit Legs and Waterfall Eyes
With an Everything complex
Due to feeling the Absence of all
Whilst having felt an overwhelming Nothing
And Ant ****'s full of Honey and Air
Pirouette and bend their slim Amber eyed head backwards
To see such hopeless Unicorns Dreaming of
Trollops and Almosts who don't know what Mermaids are
Mermaids that only Sing Underwater
And watch Sullen Irish Dancing Potato Boy
With Biscuit Legs and Waterfall Eyes
And an Everything complex
Because Garfield can't figure out
If Fat Orange Cat is okay with loving Selfish Harlot Mermaid
Or not

Maybe we should all just stay Honey-Eyed Harlots
And Hero Twin Flames
Maybe the penny can be a Wish
And the Star's dust pathways
And Unicorns can see black instead of Dreams.

she was wearing soft red lips
and blue eyes as deep as the ocean
and a shirt that read “THIS WILL DESTROY YOU”
and you should’ve known then but it was already too late
too late
too late
and you were already moving, already in motion
she made her darkness shine like gold.    

she was wrapped in silk and satin
that would have burned you if you tried to touch
and she was sitting by a window
waiting for you.
she wanted to keep her sadness close
and her vastness open.
she didn’t understand what it meant to be the moon
and you should’ve known then but it was already too late
and you were already moving.
she was a wolf, she said
and her knowledge could eat you
alive.
you, on the other hand
have always been a deer.

                        she spoke with a voice of lush and luxury
and wore her jacket over her shoulders
on the first day of spring.
her enigma was thrilling
and she scared you
almost to death
but not enough to make you leave.
she had hands of ice
and the breath of heartbreak.
she still remembered how to laugh
however cynical.
she was just as lost and dismembered as anyone else
but knew how to hide it
among sharpened knives
and glasses of red wine.
she loved the thought of drowning
but yearned to be saved
and asked you for help.
she let you in
but she was a self-proclaimed goddess
with secrets deeper
than your lungs.
she was water
and you have always been air
and you should’ve known then but it was already too late
and you were already moving.
the whole time you moved within one word
and that word carried you to places she never could:
chance.
she tried to warn you
she knew she couldn’t be the person you loved
yet somehow you still did
somehow you still did
(she) did still you, somehow
somehow you still did.
it was already too late
late too, already, was it?
it was already too late.
before you even met her
before you even saw her turn around in that coffee shop
before her smile
before her accent reached your ears
before your arms touched
before she read her writing to you
before she opened
before she placed her hand on your back
before you watched her walk away down the dark city street for the first and last time
before you met the body behind the screen, you did
you loved the words.

My Almosts

1.
You were drunk.
I was naive.
You were older.
I fell for your charm.
You took advantage.
Too bad you’re going nowhere.
You could have been great.

2.
We had a blind date.
You brought flowers.
I stayed blind.
I forgot to see that we were awful together.
You’re a stupid ginger.

3.
You caught my interest.
We saw a bad movie
and giggled together the whole time.
You put your arm around me
in the uncomfortable movie theater seat.
Bad kisser.
Too short.

4.
We got hot and heavy.
Nostalgia stuck around for years.
You didn’t.
You kept leaving and coming back.
I wanted you so badly.
I loved everything about you.
You didn’t.

5.
We bonded.
We had things in common.
You made stupid jokes
and I laughed sincerely.
We picked out kids names
and wedding colors.
So close...


6.
We met at work.
I was loud.
You were shy.
We took it slow.
You treated me with respect.
We made a solid foundation.
You never let me go to bed angry.
I might marry you.
Almost.

Don’t fall for me,
simply because
I will turn your kisses into similes
kissing you is like watching a sunset; slow, and beautiful.

Don’t tell me you love me,
simply because
your words will form metaphors in my mouth
you are a thunderstorm my heart is not ready for.

Don’t fall for me,
simply because
I am selfish,
every breath you take, every word you speak
I will find a way to turn that into a composition of letters and sounds
for my own purpose.

Don’t try to be with me,
simply because
I will try to trap you with my words
every space in my broken sentences will be filled with thoughts of you.

Stay with me,
I’ll turn your existence into a poem
stay with me,
I’ll engrave your name into my verses
stay with me,
stay with me,
stay with me,

so I don’t have to turn my heartache into a poem of sorrow once again.

I have not felt at ease with the world in a while,
but that has changed,
simply because
you are my world now
everything I do,
I do for you.

So this is a warning;
don’t fall for me,
simply because
I am a thief who is good with words,
*I will steal your love
and turn it into stories of malignancy and almosts.

1/17/10

dopesick boy
make me dope sick
his black in the blue
eyes vanish
he vanishes
the skeletal frame
of his guitar
& all the almosts
that got shot
cause he shot up
the broken window in time
the self steams out of in
the night
his black & blu eyes
pinned
pinned wings in a glass
case
another face
wings evaporate
dust where a boy once sat
holdng my hand in love

one, two, three, four
you each got
nothing.
deserved
nothing.
because i was an empty body
trying to find peace
with no one
but myself.
one, two, three, four
there was nothing to do
but be there
until i couldn't be
anymore
one:
you saved me
you truly did
you were what i needed
at the time
but you are not
what i need
now
two:
i think of you
and it almost
makes me
***
almost.
three:
you never knew me
you never tried to.
what else is there to say?
four:
you are a liar
and will remain so
until someone
beats you
at your own game
one, two, three, four
the could've beens
the might've beens
the never-will-bes
and I am okay with that
most of the time.

I'll never forget the look on that dude's face
Walking through the door into the store
To pay for a tankful of gasoline
He reached into his pocket
For cash but he didn't mean to pull out
And drop that big sack of marijuana
That hit the slate floor with a "tap"
He pretended he wasn't embarrassed
But the expression on his befuddled mug
Told quite a different story
I knew right away
He wasn't the generous, sharing kind
So I just pointed and said "you dropped something"
Bending over I could almost read his mind
He was afraid I was going to call the cops
He needn't have worried but it ****** me off that he did
Even more so that he didn't offer me a bud as appreciation for my silence
But I suppose you get these kinds of people in all walks of life
Besides he'd never seemed to get over the shock
And covetous look in my eye when I first saw him lose control of the plastic bag
He paid for the gas without much of a word
Walked back out into the heat and his
Luxury automobile that was clearly outside of his price range
"Goodbye,"I said, "O selfish dope head
You would probably have been a drag to get high with anyway...make sure you didn't drop anything else on the floor, you stupid *****. I'd hate to be stepping over little chunks of hash you forgot were in your in the same pocket as the dope. "
My opinion of you has not changed
And it's been YEARS

I want to cash in on the last 7even years
of being your friend
And—I wish I could collect
the almosts—
save for a maybe
let me redeem the maybe's for a
this time
—this time
Okay, lets try it.

How many almosts and goodbyes
are there in a lifetime?
Life is too short they always say, so live it to the fullest.
But each silent farewell kills me a little inside.
You don’t know how many times I’ve died in this lifetime.

How many laughs will escape my lips,
how many I love you’s shall I say
in my one lifetime?
Because every time I do, I remember to breathe
and from death of a thousand cuts, I begin to heal.

Almost.

The word alone has its own impact, already a thought-consuming word. It reminds me of things I was on the brink of doing, on the edge of making, and on the verge of having, but never did.

"There is no poetic beauty in pain."
I am learning this slowly.
My hands still shake when it's past 2 in the morning
and breathing isn't easy most nights.
I am not poignant with my words
and some days it's hard to get out of bed.

This is my adolescence:
A tangled mess of dismantled almosts
and empty promises scribbled messily on the back of restaurant napkins.
It's stolen kisses in sleepy coffee shops,
failing chemistry,
driving recklessly,
and staying up late on lonely nights to watch the sunrise.

There are days where I'm convinced life shines
with a brilliance unknown to me,
so I continue on and live for those days.
Those days where breathing comes a little easier and I remind myself
that everything happens for a reason.
I hope you find these days where all you know is basked in a vibrance you've only read about.

Live for those days.
Live for me.

i can't help but wonder
about our kindled fire;
about our light-
almost illuminated;
about the dazzling star in our night sky
that faded

I once had a dream
Of thousands of faces
All of me
Along the sea
Each one had an idea in her head
And a pure beat to her heart
But one by one they started falling into the sea
Whether push or jump I watched me
Drowning in forgotten love, almosts, and could have been
Melting away into the night at the worlds end
Many a book could have been wrote
Many a dollar could have been made
Many things lost in blue
Thrown in by family, lovers, liars, thieves, and friends
Cast aside by fakers acting as kin
Some just couldn't take it and tossed themselves in
Drowning in what could have or should have been
Then there was one
She was older now than the rest
She had walked many miles
Carried her heart heavy but strong in her chest
She had lived
And she had learned
What is right
And what is always wrong
She alone could withhold the sea from engulfing what was left of me
She came forward
She is as I was
She is what I will be
She is what I am
She is what I needed so desperately to see
No words were spoken but I understood what she meant
I see the woman she was and the woman I could be
She looked back as she headed forth into the sea
She didn't sink she didn't swim
Only floated away from me
And then I awoke and looked into the mirror
And the face in the glass wasn't the same as before
Green eyes, sparkling smile, creases, hair curly and beautiful.
Older and wiser
Young and ready
The strength in the woman I am within
My light that has always shown through
Even amidst the darkest of night
Will always be true
To me to them to you
That girl I used to be was innocent
She was beaten and used
Her voice was too weak
That girl is just a memory
The rebirth of a powerful woman
I am transforming from my cocoon
Raising my voice high
Spreading my wings as far as can be
There a little sore
But you can only know true love when you understand pain
I am happy
I am altruistic. And that's ok.
my dreams awakened the butterfly in me
Time has put the girl to rest
To drown in the sea
Future has awoken the woman
To capture the ocean
Set her soul free

i tried to lay our kisses to rest today
but when i covered them with dirt
and looked to see that they were away
i realized nothing disappears
that never existed
and the fantasy proves to be
as ephemeral as you let me believe you

and this is how it goes
following the "almosts" of my life
that stripped of my optimism
were never in the cards
and my naivety hides
reality that knocks on my door

a trait hard to shake
or snap out of when you feel
so strongly for someone
and want only for them
to pat down the pit you dug
and reassure you it need not re-open

this is not about you
and I am done writing about you because all you really ever were was 3,000 almosts that never meant anything in the end
I'm not writing about how much I love you anymore but about how much I absolutely loathe your menacing brown eyes that glitter and gleam with fire
I'm not writing about how beautiful you are but how terribly rotten you are
to the very core
I'm not writing anything about you anymore at all because that is exactly what you want from me
I feed your ego
you never loved me
you just loved the
attention
and this is not about you.

I almost wrote a poem
saying it would be
the last one
I ever write for you.
                   I almost meant it.
But I reside in a forest of words
I long to lay upon your feet.
You are the only tenant.
Though I have already seen you hunger
for a wood more abundant with beauty.
You yearned
for the abstract; the colorful.
This is where I failed you, love,
for all I have to offer
is the pattern of my handwriting
against a bleak sheet of paper.
How is that to contest
a canvas
that turns heads
with its baby pinks and powder blues?
So I lay here
in the woods
that swarm with lost things,
longing to see the sun again.
And I am always reaching
      and reaching
             and reach i n g
But I am never quite there.
I lay still in the forest
with an abundance of almosts.

I pretend your name looks the same as the others
that your eyes don’t make my heart flutter

I pretend your words
aren't lines I’ll memorize tonight
that your smile isn’t a ray of sunlight

I’ll pretend to laugh at your jokes the same as the others
but with you, you make me see luminescent colors
What they say about red rose rims are true
and that’s not all I even feel with you

I sleep seeing daisies, dreaming about
ways you make me crazy
I smell orange blossoms everywhere by
Imagining that you simply care

I pretend that you are just another ***** page wedged inbetween the lost loves
the almosts
And the fakes
but

you’ve made pretending a dichotomy
a contradiction to the feelings I say
the truth is
my red rose rim glasses get brighter everyday

i will always associate back flips
with my first "boyfriend" in the third
grade who has probably now grown
up to be the type of guy who takes
pictures of himself shirtless in the bathroom
mirror and tells his girlfriend that she's pretty
but not quite as pretty as he is.

i will always associate playgrounds
with my elementary school sweetheart
and hearing my favorite love song and
him walking five steps behind and defending
me when he thought i needed it.

i will always associate the rain
with wet tables and standing up
and laughing with friends and talking
and being wrapped in someone's arms
for the very first time and hearing "i missed you."

i will always associate "almosts" with the guy
i never really realized i wanted until it was too late
and seeing him walk around holding the hand of the
girl who wanted him when i didn't and seeing him kiss
her the way he wanted to kiss me once upon a time
and with ******* up really really irreparably bad this time.

i will always associate short time periods with the two weeks
when i belonged to someone I never expected to want,
when he kissed me like i mattered,
when he held me as though he would never let go
and then told me we should "take a break" and
come back to us when the "time was right."

and i will always associate happiness with these times
when i was loved and wanted and needed for just a little while
and believing for just a moment that i was special.

and you know what else?

i will always associate failure with the entrance of something better
i will associate failure with a narrow escape because if it were meant
for me to have then i would have had it but it's not so i don't.

i will always associate life with beautiful complications.

No. I cannot say that it's okay...i wanted to be the one to say that, but i let you in...let those scary unrehearsed parts of me dissolve into the dark of your three a.m. bedroom...allowing you to be close to me...believed in an us...trusted and had faith you wanted this, me...

No. i cannot say that i am okay...i came in looking for you to reject me... gave you every chance to take it back...constantly checking your temperature to see how much ground i stood upon, unsure if tomorrow was too uncertain for plans...your lips stamped reassurance on my forehead and hands tugged at my waist reeling me into your bed...

No. I cannot say that i understand...with you i felt joy and peace...you sliced through the silence with your early morning exhortations grieving for the pain you already knew you would deliver...raw passionate vulnerability...you ****** me so tenderly and moaned my name...smiled and met my gaze telling me your stories...i fell in love with who i am when i am with you and you cannot tell me why i won't feel that again...

No. you cannot tell me why you made a fool of me...connecting so completely disarming my heart with false pretenses...betrayed my self preservation and doubts to feel you closer to me...you watched me glow and giggle, sigh and shiver, kissed me long as if i belonged...as if to say "here's what you can't have,
lovely isn't it?"

No. I cannot be angry with you...i am aching with the salty sting of your tears as i held you to my breast...i do not want to hurt you or be painful for you...this is not who i am...i want to be the girl who lashes out with six hands and no hope to contain herself exploding into sobs when you say in cliche that you just want to be my friend...you told me when i just couldn't fall apart...

No. i cannot say that i will be the strong one...you will maybe talk to me a while out of guilt or self-esteem garnering reproach...and then disappear into the ether of somebodies i used to know...from whence you came...

No. you cannot tell me that i do not have a hole in my heart...dejected, replaceable, unlovable me...i doubt i'll ever know why, how you could do this to me...thought that i was coming home via chicago...traveled eight hundred and twenty three miles...you broke my everything down...

You are all those words left behind...the haunting almosts that were caught by my heart on their way to my mouth...
I am everytime you hold your breath... exercising patience and terror simultaneously...

The weight of almost thoughts sink my legs into the Earth

While the almost words balloon red in my cheeks and ears

Because this ****** Doo quicksand ***** at my torso but not any more than my desire to go under

I'm going to a doctor soon, or a counselor, or a friendly stranger, or whatever, and I worry about the verdict to be passed over my head

Like the pills they prescribe will meet in combat the almost thoughts that turn my brain to a battlefield that just wants to go home but already is

Like my serotonin vocal cords that softly saunter siren songs should be given a megaphone to tell all the almost words that their echo chambers just got nuked from orbit

The fingers that send daily update texts are the same ones that want to let go of the steering wheel, not because I want to die, but because I don't want to be the one responsible for hurting you

So I'll bludgeon the sand with my two left feet until I turn it into enough glass to build a shade-stained stairwell back into my regularly scheduled programming

"I'm not there yet", I say
"Ah, but almost", I think

Is there ever a greater melancholy
than permanent second?
Second best,
Second choice,
Second family.
All these things I am,
A second-hand human being.

No matter how hard and harder I try,
I remain inferior till I die.
A second-hand human being,
Not worth the greatest form of praising.

So as I stand above this bridge,
I recall all my 'almosts',
All my 'what ifs' and 'could haves',
To decide once and for all:
What if I jump a second time?

Purple Plush

it’s a me thing,
because of you.

There’s a once over glance now when they approach me.
Having to analyze them before they are allowed to speak.

soft,
the way you tainted me.
Slowly let the ribbons bleed out until I couldn’t stand by myself.

lavender lines painted on my walls,
attempting to soothe my innermost thoughts,

of you.

Of what we once were,
Plum lines dancing in an infinite sky.

These lavender lines fade now,
to be wrapped in silks, fine linens of serene purples.

it’s a me thing,
because of you.

There’s a slow cry in the background now,
a symphony of a dying plum, drifting into a lavender that consumes me.
it’s comforting,
the way your toxins brought me ease,
a plush love, a cocoon of decadent almosts.

What am I to do now?
When the plums are bruised and the lavender fields stop growing.

Temptation hinders her perception
blinded by beauty
found in locked eyes
Nothing is there
except the hunger
a craving so strong that the atmosphere loses meaning
dissolves into the background
All is lost to admiration that lacks
courage and voice
Full of almosts and should'ves
the relationship sits still
no progression
yet they both know whats there
Afraid to admit it
inescapably aware