today my best friend,
who lives 2,000 miles
away (on the other side
of the country to be exact)
messaged me at 2 am
telling me that she was
really really sad and that
no one was up. later when i
woke up i wrote back asking
what was wrong

she told me she drank antifreeze
and that she messaged her old friend
who ****** her over last year
and that all he did was tell her to
call an ambulance and then blocked her
and wrote a post about how he couldn't
sleep, when the girl who used to love him
was intoxicated and vomiting and sad and
dying. and she just kept laughing, like it was
the funniest thing she'd ever heard

and i couldn't stop telling her "i'm sorry"
i'm sorry i didn't have my phone
i'm sorry i was asleep
i'm sorry you live so far
i'm sorry you're unhappy
i'm sorry i can't do anything
i'm sorry i'm being selfish
i'm sorry i'm making you live
when it's the last thing you want
to do.

and she just kept telling me
it's okay, it's okay, it's okay
i'm okay, it's fine, i'll be good
and i didn't have the heart to
tell her that i knew she was
lying.

i'm sorry i love you too much to let you go.

It's the first time we meet.

I can't get a read on that sweet summer smile, or the words that drip like thick robes of gold honey; soft-spoken and seemingly slow motion, a quite complicated question pours viscously from your lips.

You ask me, "What is your name?"

Now honestly, I considered honesty. Truthfully, I prefer anonymity, but it's considered rude to not share some glimpse of identity. Albeit reluctantly, I must decide: Do I introduce myself as "Chelsea"? Or as "A Window-Pane Made of Glass Too Thin"? Well honestly, honesty isn't always the best policy.

It's our first date -
Instead of worrying about which outfit I choose, I worry about the disclaimer I wear on my arms. I worry about the first time your gaze inevitably falls upon the self-inflicted displays of pain that dress my paper-thin skin. I worry, will you see a warning sign that reads "DANGER: Do not touch"? I wonder, will you listen?

Or will you choose to swallow me whole, a bitter pill with a list of flaws longer than the side effects of your favorite antidepressant. Do the benefits outweigh the risks, do you take a trial of me to see if I'll make you feel better or feel worse? Do you pour me down the drain when you find out I'm not good enough?

It's our first kiss -
A moment tainted by guilt that the sweet taste I leave behind on your lips is not saliva, but antifreeze. Drink me down and I'll poison you from the inside-out, and there will come a day that I'll be the taste you'd do anything to erase from your mouth.

It's our first fight -
And then our second, and our third...
The sand is slipping through our hourglass too fast, as we drag our blood-stained feet through a wasteland of eggshells and glass. All that remains is a crimson trail of mistakes, meandering back to the spotless place we started at.

It's the first time we meet, and
You ask me for my name. Silence.
Should I introduce myself as "Chelsea"? Or as "A Window-Pane Made of Glass Too Thin". If I'm being honest with myself, I go with the latter...and you'll walk away to avoid the mess that comes after.

I'm born
Airborne
Forlorn
In war torn
Discord
My ripcord
I pull for liberation
Alienation aviation
Away from a station
Of no relation
Where their elation
Lies in degeneration

The fright fair
Nightmare
In sight there
Is a right scare
But light flares
From an illuminated theater
I dive into art
To fill my meter

I consume
Darkened tomb
Screen in room
Is where I loom
Inspiration blooms
From a sense of doom
My separation reparation
That will lead to veneration

My artistic fervor
Drifted further
Drifter's murmurs
Lifted learners
But gifted murderers
Shifted girders
Of shame and honesty
To my grave of modesty
Where they prey upon me

This plagiarism
Layered schism
Cratered rhythm
Of great decisions
Now I make incisions
With repetition
And the definition
Of words stolen from me
They're all I can see
And I can't get free
Or just let it be

Consumption disruption
At this junction
I can't function
A plagiarist
****** mist
Grips my fist
Makes me wish
I don't exist
I must resist
Before I miss
My chance at bliss

They're ****** me
By aping me
Making me
Shaking trees
Of bumblebees
With rumble pleas
On humble knees
Drinking antifreeze

Nobody cares
What's fair
They bear
And share
Blank stares
Up stairs
Of artistic compromise
Integrity lost in lies
They're not that wise
I hypothesize

My baby
Caught rabies
From Hades
Now ladies
Flock to a thief
Giving me grief
Beyond belief
In my coral reef
Sword in sheath
I drown discreet

Oh son of beginners mistake
Son of pure unclean intention
Son of mothers midnight run to bar
Son of broken swan wing
Son of brokenness
Son of lack of sunlight
Son of ***** laundry

Boy of unknowing
Boy of drinking antifreeze
Boy of missing eyed crows
Boy of missing childhood
Boy of sorrow
Boy of stitches
Boy of afraid of manhood
Boy of afraid

Young God of suicide attempts
God of lying to himself that he ever wanted to die
God of lying to himself
God of lying
God of unholiness
God of shotgun misfire
God of unkempt basements
God of homeless dogs
God of death and life all at the same time
You ain't no God. You are a poser with wings and a capital letter to begin your wretched name.  

You won't be happy when you die, you are split between so many titles and you do not know which to choose. You are no one. No one. You are absolutely no one.

(Say, do you know the route to the nearest bar? I'm going to drink myself open, flesh off bone, apathetic skeleton, closest thing to happy. I'm going to drink myself away from you, this world, myself.)

You infected me with your praise
A thought provoked and I was yours
Immediately I was weak to your ways
Highly susceptible to your allures

Your virus spread through me like a fire
I was burning with a yearning for more
Your power left me with a hot desire
Churning deep within my core

But like any disease, you hurt me inside
My resistance corroded, my body gave way
I had no defense, internally crucified
No antibodies to keep you at bay

Over time I came to see the ugly truth
You had taken over and you were strong
My love was like candy, and you had a sweet tooth
Your presence was an affliction all along

So I turned up the heat, and starved you of attention
I stopped being your treat, ignored your condescension

Enraged by my defiance, and wounded by my suspicion
You demanded my compliance, and used all your ammunition

But the jig was up, it was too late
You'd revealed your hand
I would no longer wait
I figured out what you had planned

And then I was free
From this illness of you
I could be me
And we were through

Though your pestilence left behind many scars
I am now and forever immune to your charms

And should you try to deceive me again
You'll find this treasure far more secure
I may have been an easy target then
But now I am armed with the cure

My experience led me to the light
A future without ambiguity, and it's so bright

You were a sickness, an ailment, a disease
You were a cold..
And now I'm antifreeze

i.* It’s supposed to be poetic that our matter comes from stardust, but once upon a time we were shining holes in the sky and now I cannot ask how anybody is anymore without getting an answer like “everything is slowly killing me.” I don’t know how I feel about this. I just know it’s huge. A supernova waiting in the saddest pockets of myself.

ii. I got tired of always going postal and bought some painkillers, recomposed my blood: half coffee and half antifreeze. Half NyQuil and half spite.

iii. I hammered my fear into an altar, splintering between the steel pews and jagged teeth of bread knives. I’m so sorry. I burned us both up trying to be the light in your eyes. Let me audition again, I’ll crawl into your bed and rest my cheek on the collar of your shirt. I’d **** for the Heimlich of your arms, looping over my ribs. At least then I can write another poem about the way my heart seizes up like a clenched fist thinking of us like this. They’ll find me fossilized with my thumbs in your belt loops, fingers curling around the loose change and ticket stubs in your jeans.

iv.  I let my tongue swell up with relatable pop ballads, because anyone can write them when they feel so profoundly wounded that no one else will ever feel this way again. I never knew a heart could feel this cold. Don’t leave me here after all this, baby, no one hurts me like you do.

v. I never use the word “self-destructive”, but sometimes I still choke myself for decent poetry. I learn to be so numb I have to feel the gravel in my knees. Getting the words out is like when you force yourself to cough just to feel your eyes water, just to make yourself cry. I won you over with self-inflicted black lung. I’m so sorry. I thought maybe if I hacked up how beautiful I found your fingerprints, I’d end up covered in them.

vi. Here are seven knots. Here are seven sins. Here are seven ways to bruise.

vii. I keep having dreams I can waltz with God and all of his ******-up creations. That I can peel away whatever buried its claws in me and leeched away all the electricity. I keep having dreams you teach me how to dance. That your fingers brush mine and we light up like sparkplugs that learned how to kiss. My throat like a bottle rocket from the cannon of your hips. Plug yourself in, tell me the stars in you are remembering how to burn again.

He'd always leave at 2:53 P.M.
Swoosh fwoump.

It was only a matter of time,
Tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-ti

I wanted to be free.

He'd strap me to a chair and whisper,
sweet stories that you'd coo to *a child,
with sour breath running down my neck,
his greasy forehead pressed against my tear-stricken cheeks;
it'd deteriorate and culture in my ears.

His scent engulfed my mind,
my body, my soul...

He made a grave mistake,
dressing me in grimy socks,
making me dance skin-to-skin,
forcing me to kiss him, call him.

Oh no, you see,
he should have known.

I betrayed his trust, I'd pay the price,
"Isn't that right, Leila?"
That's not my name.

"Now Leila, darling, you're going to be a good girl,
for Daddy, aren't you?"
That's not my name.

"Leila, sweetheart, I can trust you, can't I?
Hmm? This will be our little secret,"
That's not my name.

"Aw, don't tell me, dear, beautiful Leila,
you aren't scared, are you?"
That's not my name.

I knew him well,
after a few months,
and his smell was musty,
only when I let it be.

He always liked sweets,
like me.

He was disgusting,
and my wrists ran red with incisions;
he'd lick them clean.

He'd always leave at 2:53.

"Oh Leila, sweetheart, I expect dinner when I get back,
won't you be a good girl,
and do as Daddy taught you?"
That's not my name.

So I did.

This kitchen was charming,
as much as his worn dining ware,
lined with cracked roses painted by Chinese overseas,
wondering when they would be used.

This was the first time I'd seen him genuinely smile,
"You look especially beautiful, tonight, Leila,
perhaps it's the sparkle in your eye,"
That's not my name.

He took a sip.

His glossy eyes hovered above his glass,
and his gaze drifted over to me,
in my grimy socks and brown-stained apron,
my long, dark hair drapped over my shoulders.

Another glass,
another glass,
another glass,
glass,
sugary sweet,
sweet,
down his lips,
lips,
lips,
teeth,
throat,
liver.

He liked sweets,
sweets,
sweets,
dripping, sipping,
sweet,
sugary sweet, nectar,
cool, smooth,
antifreeze.

He'd always leave at 2:53.

Silence.
Tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-ti-

2:53 P.M.

Silence at 2:00-
2:00
2:00

I'd heard him cry,
"Leila, Leila, Leila,"
That's not my name.

He'd always leave at 2:53,
2:00,
silence.
He would never leave at 2:53,
2:53 P.M.

*I left at 2:53. Silence.

You were my cross eyed Mary
I was over on the end
We used to meet clandestinely
Anywhere we can

You fingers froze antifreeze
Always a cold shock to me
My hot hand poured
Out in ecstacy
You Said ,"Set my liberty free"

Your smoke swirled around your aura
You blew into the breeze
I blew a shotgun into you
You coughed and then you sneezed

You were my cross eyed Mary
"But Mary's not my name"
As you slid in frozen fingers
I heard you drop your ring

references :
"Cross Eyed Mary" is a song by Jethro Tull from their legendary Aqualung record/cd

Ecstacy is a drug

Shotgun is to reverse a joint and inhale and then exhale blowing the smoke into someone's else's lungs

sneeze is anything snorted up one's nose

ring is a form of birth control where a plastic ring is inserted over the cervex

Last night, a thump.
A body hurled, third floor.
Second floor doesn’t do that kind of thing.

It’s 2 am.
That time of night when people when wake up anyways.
Blue-dark like antifreeze.

I was hard trying to go to sleep.

My bank account’s been throttled by loans,
Bills, Coronas, Blunts, Girls.

They shut off the water.
I walked to the store and saw a friend.
Ashamed, I laughed,
Said I liked water. “Water like liquor
like Koolaid like fun. “

What I really meant was:
“Water like survival like broke like stupid.”

This girl operates in ideas,
Dances like a ballerina,
Acts like an actress,
And will probably get bored soon.

There’s one across town that knows her way
around a lollipop, calls me sweet,
wears red just the way I like it,
***** **** with both hands
and doubles over to her tiny knees to laugh.

The actress is less sustainable,
but I sustain thoughts about her more.

The thump, it interrupts,
Distorts a globular fantasy into a brilliantly skewed
Pixelated awakening.

Pixels drain out. Room
Clears of smoke. Velvet embalming begins, purple night quickens,
Halogen streetlights invade in battalions.
**** me.

There’s a girl with a rancid *****
I still love.

The electricity thrums.

I’ve never been humble;
Super-conscious.

I can hear second floor:
footsteps light like *** fear,
tipping to the nexus. To the spot
where some hurled
lies,
above even them.

Third floor gets down like that. I can’t be a hero.

I used to think it was second floor.

But they don’t get down like that.

If we shut off the power,
You’ve gotta pay.

I know, I know,
How much?

180.

Carlos used to live on third.
Wife took the kids and dipped,
That elephant footed baby,
And the mouse-footed teen.

Carlos brought all kinds up after that,
Muffin women with huge, roach eyes,
Emaciated blondes with seamounts running their spines,
Thick, buggy black girls with ***** I wanted to stick my **** all the way into.

Then he quit. Broke one day. Told me everything was mine if I went up there,
and he was gone.

Third Floor was there in two days.

Bruh, they caught u stealing.

How much?

Don’t know, they were just talking about it at work today.

****.

I watch way too much ****. Tonight,
I get ***** enough to burn holes in my palms.
Maybe it’s the fear and anger.

Third floor is not my problem.

“Love is short, forgetting is so long.” –Pablo Neruda*

close your eyes, keep them closed.
take an ice pick
and blind yourself to any reminders
of his flyaway hair or wrinkled jeans.
pour antifreeze on the memory
of the way he used to stroke your arm
before the kiss, and the cauliflower soup
he brought over when your dog was hit by a car,
and your eyes were swollen shut from crying, and
you wouldn’t get out of bed.
Keep a bottle of ***** nearby
to numb the area as you carve yourself
into a shape he hasn’t seen, skin
he hasn’t touched.
don’t breathe
until you’ve lost enough brain cells
to feel something again.
when you no longer see him in the face
of the cashier at the supermarket, when
you no longer recognize your reflection
in the tinted windows of an all-too-familiar white
sedan, you’ll know that you’ve finally done something
right.

the meeting point between antifreeze and rot
undiscovered worlds in a stupid sheet of ice
i rake my leaves and ***** a flurry
from that strange backed-up faucet, my mouth.

I have this antifreeze in my veins
I have icicles wrapping around my kidneys
and you thought you were the only one with a disease

I’m ******* the air out of your lungs
and nothing has ever tasted so sweet on my tongue

and I’m just trying to breathe you in

and sometimes I’m scared I will eat your skin
sometimes I think I'll cut my eyes on the glass in your smile

they say Betelgeuse will explode someday
and yet it is the brightest star in the sky

This is super secret loving
Like when my foot accidentally touches yours over coffee
I ask if you want to play footsies
And then move my foot away to make sure
The whole thing isn’t weird
And you tell me I don’t have to move my foot
So I then rub my leg against yours
Like a one legged cricket who’s sure
He’s found the set that plays his song
Only your face turns red
And the song doesn’t play

I look to my super secret decoder
Mood ring that tells me what you’re feeling
Only if I can touch you long enough for it to change colors
So I hold your hand like a zipper
And you shake mine away like a stove linger
I half expect you to **** your finger like a cigarette burn
The ring looks like antifreeze
Caught in the glare of sunlight
With no definite answer
And I don’t know what to think

This is super secret heartbreak
As I apologize
Even though I was being myself
Like a man who never knew a mirror
Like a boy
Who wanted to say something like
You smell really good
I know I should have learned
To keep my hands
And feet to myself by now

But this is super secret loving
And the storm swirling in my super secret decoder mood ring
Is fading to green like envy
And now blue

Super secretly
I say
Let’s try this again
As you stand up to leave
After reading a text message
About how your dog died

Super secretly
I say
stay

Goodbye dreams, you have left me for the last time
Phantoms in the boxcars of my mind, screeching down track
This first taste of cold is biting at my back, and I can't run fast enough

I understand (to the best of an 18 year old's respectively limited understanding) how the heart works, and I know how manipulation works. I'm damaged..I don't think I know what true love might be like, but I know what it feels like to receive it. I know what soulful intimacy is like. I know what it's like to trust someone with your life, but I only know that because I didn't have a choice. I know what it is to lay my mind and body down in submission in the lap of a mad man, and bow to whatever he wants, because you know it's not him, but the "other guy" talking. I know what it's like to think you can save someone if you sacrifice yourself. I know what I thought was love.
I also know what it is to grow up and leave. I know what it is to turn around and bite the hand that fed me poison. I know what it's like to rip out and desecrate the heart of the one who thought he owned mine. I know what it is to be looked at like prey. I know what it is to feel the presence of hot breath on my neck, and have cold chills run down my body and have my stomach turn; legs twitch in anticipation of frantic flight. I know what it is to uproot my future-- my life, wrap my new tender roots in rough burlap, cram them into a small plastic bin, and run.
I know not what it is to stop seeing his truck around every corner. I know not what it is to stop looking over my shoulder. I know not what it is to not be in fear in my own stomping grounds. I know not what it is to not think every set of dim headlights on the dark, unpopulated roads riding too close behind me are him. I know not what it is to breathe easy. I know running away once is not enough.
I know
I know
I know
I know
I know
I knew what I thought was love.
I knew what I made were excuses for inexcusable actions.
I knew I was wrong
I knew he was wrong
I knew
I knEW
I KNEW
I knew he was poison..I didn't want to believe it..he was antifreeze..he was so sweet..honey and molasses and syrup and sap I was STUCK TO HIM LIKE A FLY ON FLYPAPER OH HOW I REGRET EVER SEEING HIS FACE OH GOD, and I when I left, part of me ripped away from my bones, and I'm bleeding out..
No. NO NO NO NO N--
He was a long, slow inhale of mustard gas; burning my lungs and cutting my breath short and sweet. Choking me. Choking me. Choking me.
I know what I thought was love.

you give me butterflies
butterflies made of antifreeze
butterflies made of fish hooks
    i don't like you
       i don't like you
    i need to throw up
  i think i love you
but i really just don't like you
    because you twist my arm
           with heavy wrenches
    but never break the skin
    and i have
      a thing for blood
     i guess
           'cause
i'm too ******* lazy to
      throw myself off a bridge
   in front of a train
           on fire with smoke signal
            "*******"s trailing behind me
but who cares
who cares, really?
           love is all fish hooks
       in the eyes of the devil so
         i'll save
              the last waltz in hell
                           for you, honey.

have you ever felt
empty
have you ever felt
shattered
have you ever felt
wrong
9 days ago
I broke
9 days ago I decided that I wasn't worth it
I was shattered and empty and wrong
I woke up that day
I faked it so well
Laughed at work
Dressed up for a wedding
Then I sat in my hollow car
My thoughts echoing from window to window
I just needed to escape
my head
my car
my life
I couldn't fake it anymore
Antifreeze and sleeping pills
then it gets blurry
Hospital for a week
I don't want to say I attempted
because I failed
I am trying to be grateful for this second chance.
Waking up everyday
choosing to live
choosing to fight
Attempting was the most selfish
thing I have ever done
It wasn't for attention
I wanted to slip away
disappear
escape
fade
I am getting better
I am finding reasons to live
realizing that I am not nothing
I think life is worth it
It's going to get better

Almost blue
like some stained-glass Christ
that never felt the saving sun burn
his caulked stigmata soft like
cinnamon toothpaste in the creek
bed.
Were his robes Robin's Egg, or Giotto
like the clergy wanted?
And when their fake pearl bracelets
rattled, fishing out cheap change
from brass-clasp purses,
did Christ stoop to gather
the sixty-something-year-old pennies
from in-between the arm rests
while they sifted through
the silver?

Almost blue
like a southern / western overcast
that never calls New York in advance
to schedule time to sweep up
the sky, standing on cold water flats.
Buys a Southwestern ticket straight thru,
walks past Madison marketing
her ***** underwear to anyone—everyone—,
buzzes in, third floor, apartment B-6,
but the door's locked, and the canary
curtains dance out the window like a house
fire.

Almost blue
like the Dawn dish soap
glass I neglect to rinse well.
But more like a lazy oil stream in a gas station
parking lot beneath the perforated banners
yakking in the still-cold March midday
about $12 sheet pizzas or unlimited
free coffee for $1.19 a refill.

Money better spent on a pack of Marlboro
Blues saxophone squeal by the plastic-
wrapped firewood by the almost-
blue wiper fluid and the antifreeze peaches.

This is not a poem of woe
I'm in the zone... the writers flow
Where I'll stop I just don't know
I can't have a cup o joe
It doesn't seem to want to slow
I'm up all night and can't let go!

Oh! Dear God. .. I ask you. PLEASE!
I'm so tired my brain might seize!
I just need a moment's peace
Somewhere where my mind is freed
My motor starts to choke and wheeze
I need some help... get antifreeze
Rid me of this poeteeze...

... I just want my vitamin Z's!!!

True love is a broken cane, duct-taped
a Barbie, head twisted back
It is silence in a crowd
clothes snagged on branches
a blindfolded walk in rush hour
the sweet taste of antifreeze
Love is the worst poetry
Love is nothing, everything
probably the only thing

i like the word epicenter
heard it one night all cranked out trying
to get drunk the juice like water
my nose sweating
amped like hell
wanting to disassemble the VW
bug
find what that sound was,
took apart the carburetor first,
sniffed and stood for half a second said, nah,
not the prob
looked into the glovebox
was sure the bug was in there,
a few screws later
the dashboard was on the porch
and still I had no idea what
that ******* sound was
walked in quick circles
thinking , almost,
it had to be the radiator
or a fanbelt or the tires!
Yes !
I took them all off, carefully snooted around their
hoses the perimeter of the fanbelts circumference
the radiators fins
the pressure
got to me of the tires was perfect,
had to be the ******
I sniffed down my throat went that
chemical taste like antifreeze
I took her out
the transmission
inspected her tip to toe
the servo thing the
valve body
went full bore into the
torque converter
it torqued
converted
now I was getting worried
it was the mirror was loose of course
I took her off
it was coated with a white powder
did a line straight to
AutoZone
for a mirror cleaning
fluid , they looked at me funny.

Just got back from a little trip
wasn't planned, down the mississip
started out from just one sip
of a drink I can't remember

went on down to the land of cotton
woke up really feeling rotten
I can't remember the drink i'd gotten
but, I needed one again

head was fuzzy, vision blurred
one more down, and i'd be cured
instead, now my speech is slurred
but, ****...that drink was smooth

chose to go down to the river
my brain not working, nor my liver
my eyes were closed down to a sliver
I had to find that drink

I saw a re-enactment of a battle
I didn't listen to the prattle
the armies were just led like cattle
to their deaths without a chance

I knew that I saw lots more men
than were actually there right then
my vision saw five score times ten
while there was only twenty two

I relaxed and I loved the feeling
this drink had set my mind a reeling
I feel I could dance on the ceiling
all of this from just one drink

no matter, I swore I'd behave
no comments made about a slave
or I'd be in a shallow grave
and would never drink again

I searched around for near a week
my throat was closed, I could not speak
I hadn't eaten and was weak
but, **** I needed more

i'm sure it had some blue cacao
I need to find out, find out now
i'm not sure when, but I know how
I'll go back to the start

I flew on home and went to where
i'd had the drink on someone's dare
another one of the dog's hair
and i'd start it all again

they told me that the drink i'd drunk
was just some automotive gunk
they moved it cause it smelled like skunk
and I chose to drink it down

some oil and some antifreeze
was the drink that brought me to my knees
they thought i'd die, or at least sieze
but, I guess I proved them wrong

so next time when I have a drink
I think i'll take some time to think
will I notice if it has a stink
before I choose to drink the brew

before I go some sage advice
don't be like me, at least think twice
if you want a trip with added spice
order up one drink from me.

i am
legally blind
blind like the blindness of love
when you're driving in the summer,
windows down,
breathlessly scream-singing
the warm air almost stinging
and him
sitting next to you
his smile so bright it
blinds you to reality
and he puts his hand on your thigh
and you don't think about
the germs
or any logistics
you're just
thinking about him
and what you could be
and you don't want the summer to end
but you always remember
that it always
has to end

and you're blind in that car
unable to see the future
the end
anything but him
and the road
racing towards you and then
flying away
and the trees
chasing your car
without slowing
or stopping
and you're blind about the past
ignoring everything telling you
this won't work out either
because it's gone
puffing out the exhaust pipe
draining like the antifreeze leak
you've never bothered to fix

i am legally blind
i can't always see everything
and i realize that
but
when i'm with him
i can see everything
so clearly
i forget to remember
i can't even
see

The President closed the post in Vologda.
There's one phone in the whole city.
On the big doors of the clinic
Boards are stuck in the fifties.

From the open windows of the hotel
The birthday girl screams.
In the shops near the station
Run by the Turks with the Vietnamese.

The traffic light hasn't worked for a while.
On him gloves clap.
Passing horse and cart.
The machine gun is under the birch.

Whether festive, or everyday,
I made my way between them.
Antifreeze, tangerine
The lantern was green and crimson.

She never really thought she would do it.
She never really thought she would be sitting here with a bottle of antifreeze in one hand and sleeping pills in the other.
Shaking
Debating
Panicking
She got to this point
Destroying herself
Suffering in silence
Hiding her mind
Hiding the cuts on her arms
She feels so selfish but she can't care
She has always destroyed herself
But now shes destroying others too
She hates herself
Anxiety
Note
Death
Tells people
Don't worry worry don't don't worry okay don't I'm fine fine fine okay I'm good
If this doesn't work
Life
Disappoint
Hell
****
But if it does
Done
Disappear
Alone
Empty
She doesn't know what is going to happen
She has now been sitting here for 2 hours
On this mountain
All alone
Phone off
Her mind is killing her
Chug
Gulp
Water
It's done
Now she just has to wait 3 hours
Anxiety attack attack anxiety who will find me it's going to hurt
Acute kidney failure
How she's dying.
She is crying
Crying
Vibrating
Questioning
Turns on phone
Phone on
Call someone
Someone anyone anyone
She wants to die
But her family will hate her
Her family will be heartbroken
10 texts
4 missed calls
Wait crying bawling
Her asking
Why can't I just disappear?
Why can't I slip away with no one knowing?
Why do I exist?
Why do I hurt everyone?
I wasn't thinking think
I was freaking freak
Call
Someone
Now
No
No
No
No.
She whispers to herself
"I just can't do it anymore"
Wipes away a tear
Reclines her seat in her car
And falls
Asleep.

the bartender poured
a double of something
"drink this," she said
"just don't smell it,
and definitely don't sip it"
her light eyes looked at me
and for a moment reminded me
of what I wanted to forget
I downed the shots but
they never made me feel better
I briefly contemplated my options
a one-way ticket to Manchester
or drinking on-sale antifreeze
my silver jacket buttons
holding cold in their heart
I took a drag from a cigarette
dangled it between my fingers
"I don't even smoke", I laughed
my words hung in the air
like a foreign object out of reach
and it smelled like you
watching ashes and smoke
getting lost in the crisp air

I miss you
I miss you like hell
My chest aches in physical pain
The sadness
Its fiery cold grip
It been two year
Two freaking years since I had a taste of your lips
Sweet like antifreeze
I'm trying to remember what made you so special
How I ended up loving you with ever beat of my heart
I said goodbye to you
I regret not holding on harder
You were poison
But you were full of exitment
My figures brushing your skin was enough to send sparks flying
I have some one now some one I love
Someone who is my whole world.
So why do I crave you
Why does it still hurt
Dear John please tell me

Playing pool at 5am,
see the sun rise and seep
between mouthfuls
of double choc-chip cookies,
Mountain Dew cooling our throats
like antifreeze into a car.
I gather up your laughter for rainy days,
everything dripping in colours
that haven’t been christened.
Your fingerprint wriggles
form an island chain on the piano,
wet symbols, bathroom carpet
where you got out the shower
in a sky-blue towel;
I hid under the bed.
I tell you you’re messing
with an amateur,
kisses are pleasant glitches
but I’d miss and trip
through the open window.
My hands become flappy utensils
when I explain years months days
of apple cores piled up
behind wardrobes,
my portfolio of fiascos.
Faults are found like Easter eggs -
squeezed from toothpaste tubes,
top shelf of the oven.
This is a dark one here,
a miniature pill.
You only bring mugs
of youthful exuberance to the table.
A click. A shlock.
I turn my head,
the game lost
within a blizzard of minutes.
It’s OK I say,
I wanted you to win.

Oblivion should be a disease
Water vapor and antifreeze
Pool on the inside of my chest.
Do what's best
Not what's healthy;
Around everyone, be stealthy;
Build a metal barricade:
Mantras like a blaring cannonade
Teach me what it smells like to never listen
The only thing I wish had stayed
Was your smile, a glimmering glisten

hellopoetry.com/poem/1106978/witherspoon/
witherspoon
3/7/2015

I've met a few good men,
a few good men, this is why
I am so vexed.

The springing pantomines
of careful youth rings around
the green, as it always has

the campus store sells
cigarettes and muffins and condoms
as it always has, and

although the mood is different than
the one on early semester Halloween
night,

The grass is as green as it always
has been.
I need to learn to let people

and things go, but it doesn't help
when you live, when half of those memories

happened in towns where George Washington and Witherspoon got
drunk off their *****,

and Madison lied about men in the woods. Sitting dully alone in the stadium

the vast Powers,
I am one in 23,000
and I do not know how I feel

about that and the lost
days when I used to chain smoke
voraciously in the parking lot

in a car that smelled like
burnt tobacco
and run through

the rain in Murray dodge,
write on the walls at the Pyne
arches and smoke

drugs with friends
in the freezing rain on Wilson's
grave.

This is all gone now
and
I need new trivial distractions

now that all of mine are gone
and I see the summer sun getting
closer to my bruised memory.


i've met a few good men
key word:
few.

the quivering ghosts of our
salad days runs around the green
do you remember? are you sure?

i ran through the campus store
laughing til my liver hurt
posing with antifreeze, asking friends "anyone want shots?"

i don't know, wouldn't know
what princeton's like now
because i haven't been in six months.

i do vaguely remember
strips of it, the cheesecloth that wrapped around
the ides of april, freezing and shivering under my arms.

i still haven't learned how to let people go.
it is difficult when
you live in a town that is made by its history.

what town or person isn't?
constant talk of Stockton, Witherspoon and Washington's
crossing damns my existence.

i used to go down to the stadium
freeze my fingers off or pop open bottles with
White

i remember when i lied to Lacava about my first time
smoking cigarettes that is
he bought me my first pack

i sat in the front seat of the car that january
trying to coolly inhale
begging to god to not let me cough.

i didn't.
i remember i ran through the rain with someone i loved, once
through murray dodge

he'd told me he never forgot the way
i looked with eyeliner dripping down my face and
my soaking hair slowly curling into snail shells.

i'd written on the arches at Pyne
then i'd written on the walls with our spit
joking - why's it called PVNE?

I sat serenely with my friends one February day
that year, i must specify because one  has passed already.
smoking bouges on Burr's grave, so bougie.

i got new distractions
i don't have any way to keep them, though
i'll find a way in the summer

or maybe not
maybe.
maybe.

i dreamt i was shot in the throat by a man who loved me.
he cradled me gently, nestled beneath his quilted wings
in the dim lampshade light of a Scottish hotel room
when he put the steel in the notch above my clavicle.
i dreamt i was shot more frequently in my younger years
by an older man with jagged stubble and antifreeze eyes
and a chilly smile, but the man who loved me was sun-soaked.
my mother often tells me my throat turns red when i touch it.

praying towards the roof of the mouth, cathedral hallways
you said
on my knees elapsing
towards a response from you
but you’re carving out your tonsils in the kitchen
you said
i said
think of the excuses you left on the floor
roll them at me in between eyes
You can smell it
you said
You can smell it on my mouth
mopping the floor with your sight
it’s frightening
waking to
shattering keys
leaving keys in
locks and bed and shelves and waking to keys in loopholes and
a headache
like the swelling of a wave before
he crashes back in
to himself
back in to the shore line of
his face. his face of uncertainty,
uncertainty quivers
the tip of this wave
into a sea of uncertainty
flinches at outstretched hands
fingers readily echoing the ******* of mothballs under the sink
until the pipes are collapsing
upon the cloud we fell in love under, ripe and ready  to rain
when we thundered, and we did, it was not a
drizzle, a collapse, a clap from the gods but a murmur
but nothing.
"Nothing under this sun could hurt me,” I tell myself
(other than) myself,
With my counting numbers,
counting colors,
counting potassium,
iron,
ounces of water
like
128 is 1
8 ounces in 1 cup
1 oz, maybe one and half, in a shot of:
reflux, knee **** reaction, temporary relief
from scrubbing the sickness from beneath your fingernails
with nothing to gain
but body like a jackknife
but my spine cocked like a gun
a body thinning like winter
changing before my eyes
I realize
I hate things that change instead of falling apart completely
humidity picking scabs from the walls
and the rash on your neck.
brown skin running from the blonde of your hair
I miss untouched spaces on your body
the things that touch you but aren’t me
things that change you but aren’t me
like sea to sky, there is no definite line,
between what is
and was,
the first dream I had of us
fingers tracing fingers and I awoke to life-
a fantasy ever since.

But now,
I am sorry for
lashes that drizzle
their whippings onto your cheeks.
minute counts,
minute wishes wasted
Hammered away at my self
, wrapped in sheets unfurling,
peeling apart form my body like
snakes shedding skin,
the coil of his tonuge like
the coil in a car, burnt.
tar, gas, antifreeze drips from
words. Words.
I always get stuck
on words. a word, the words,
let me return—
While eyes silently ran the maze
of your arm, you tell me
“this is too beautiful to be an accident, katie.”  
but if this is not an accident,
then it is changed,
but not by me.

1/12/2015
"There is no woman living that draws breath
So sad as I, though all things sadden her.

Alas, Love, what is this thou wouldst with me?
What honour shalt thou have to quench my breath,
Or what shall my heart broken profit thee?
O Love, O great god Love, what have I done?"
- Algernon Charles Swinburne

Utility boots set down stolid on the asphalt
of the Powers field
by the power vested in me
as I sit in stadium seat 547B

In the cold, bathed
in the antifreeze holding
it steady in my mouth

a fat orange plum on the metal
mandible.
as soon's the safety's off with the
fork it's a

crack light, crack light as my
friends would say
and I think who the hell would
ever do drugs?

You've come a long way, Baby
the box says
and all the ones serious about
their tar intake

make fun of me
girl things, girl stuff
where's your love for camel?
but really. cancer isn't a competition.

it is cold and colder.
i think of ******, i think of you
most importantly

of how i probably wouldn't be staring
dully at the bright orange paint
PRINCETON

and throwing stubbed out cigarettes at
the turf.
the next field over was the one he kissed
me in that night

and i'd thought of you then,
thought of you always.
and why the hell?

it is funny. I know why i do this
i told myself i would never smoke
because i get addicted too fast

procrastinate far too much.
i throw another dead little Virginian girl
at the grass chambers of hell below

and I look at my frostbitten fingers tips to
see if they are still there.
because it is my fault,

and it always is;
debauchery's been my best friend for
so long

and i do not know why these boots are
so broken in,
so sturdy and so very "here"

when procumbent you'd
say to me i don't know what will happen
but the future's going to make us happy

and i guess it worked out for one of us.
i haven't talked to him in three weeks,
the almost father of my almost child
(thank god. . .)

the sire of my sense of
restlessness
his words of "i'm 16 going on 21"
ringing on to me

and making my tongue bleed
as i reach for the bottle of tea
i had dropped somewhere in
the "B" seats

but where was i?
oh yes, where you are  not
and i'm going down the stairs to
where i'd throw down the goodness

on saturday nights in november
and i can't feel my toes now too
so i go down faster

my head reeling
and the marlboro boys and the
camel boys tell me that virginia slim's
supposed to not make you feel anything.