I wish my heart didn’t get juiced from the sight of you

It’s been too long since I have really seen you for that thought to be true

It’s a memory, fair enough
Memories can’t be trusted anymore than Donald Trump
Though we never discussed him
I know you’re disgusted
The same way I was when I realized that you loved him

Not Trump
but someone I despise just as much
Well that’s the past
What’s passed is past but what hurts so bad is the fact that it’s happened **** near
every
day
since

Still I see your still photo and
every
muscle
gets
tense

You’re a reflection on a mirror that contained all of my dreams
I would have let you be queen
You would probably be as happy as could be

You probably are happy as can be
But even if you aren’t there’s no way for any of us to see
That side of the camera phone
That shows you’re all alone
Or how it took you seven tries to get an angle you can show
To all of your friends

Let’s not pretend that we will ever be friendly

I thought you were my best but a test proved you we’re no friend to me

Now I don’t believe in love
And I never believed in destiny

But if I ever fall in love then let destiny take the best of me

As for the rest of me
I know he dies when I meet her

I’m still the same old *******
You left behind an evil creature

That’s how I know I never had
an angel at home

So I let you go

A little dirt on your feet is okay if you know
that your life will go on

With this smug grin across my face,
I sit NEXT to the Breakfast of Champions

The Black Tie Affair occurring above my crown,
A cacophony of sounds occurring near me,
Providing I sound I love, but a sound I’ve yet to be seasoned enough to mimic
And the veterans that sit at the table,
Look down upon us,
Happily supporting us, supporting me,
With their “Good job, son,” and their
“Here’s looking at you, kid”  
But The ruckus of their laughs and cheers preventing me from hearing them
Assuring we princes and princesses have a chance at true royalty,
And the warm light emits from above their table
Unable for me to see, backlights them,
So that the shadows deter me from discerning the support on their faces,
.

I Feast on a synthetic chocolate cake,
Straight out of the Easy Bake Oven,
While the princes and princesses amongst which I sit
Eat their convenient store cookies whilst looking towards me, and admire.

I drink my Citrus punch out of a glass,
But my royal peers are degraded to quenching their thirst out of a cardboard box,
While the princes and princesses amongst which I sit,
Drink their grape juice whilst looking towards me, and admire.

And foolishly they do,
Because only my throne is high enough,
To see the meals we could be dining on,
The elegant and prestigious silverware we could admire,

And only my throne is high enough,
To realize how low we truly all sit.

Where I was blind, you touched me and I saw
That my Body is an intercity Map site and I see my bright night-lights
Red lights of a thousand backlights glowing like a wash of neon blood down the streets of my veins
I am Dark and I am Lovely
My safe havens are illuminated for the tired of Life, the hopeless of Living
Huddled in my corners are parts of my Soul I let no one else see
Each one is a little lost girl whose outstretched hand you take, whose small
Clammy fingers you clasp as you lead Her
Like a guiding moth to the buzzing brightness of the streetlamps.

An Exercise in Love*
     ~for Jackson Allen*

My friend wears my scarf at his waist
I give him moonstones
He gives me shell & seaweeds
He comes from a distant city & I meet him
We will plant eggplants & celery together
He weaves me cloth

                   Many have brought the gifts
                   I use for his pleasure
                   silk, & green hills
                   & heron the color of dawn

My friend walks soft as a weaving on the wind
He backlights my dreams
He has built altars beside my bed
I awake in the smell of his hair & cannot remember
his name, or my own.

my social skills are painted by bubblegum lipstick and the ash of my lucky cigarette in a pack I found from a few weeks back
one more pill, one more line, another sip
another white lie, stale cigarette smoke filling up the back of my throat
buried in the depths of my backpack along with old makeup that makes me feel made up,
made up of small talk and old inside jokes
i thought would last longer then the last drag you took before you used it to finish the masterpiece you call a night out with people you think you need the most.
but they're just as made up as you.
made up just like the taste of that bubblegum flavor that lasts as long as the last drag.
as long as it takes to paint yourself into the crowd of the social scene.
the socialist you thought you could be under the lowlights and backlights where even darkest whites could've bloomed in the corner of that crowded room, where the lucky eventually ended, and the lights eventually dimmed, and the made up small talk fades into the faces you won't remember in the morning, along with the polished insecurities you learned to forget forgetting that you painted yourself to fit in.
fitted into that party that didn't even matter a few weeks back.

the backlights next to the large bottles of forget

and they are appealing on the surface

but behind them there is dust

fleeting, window surfing, window shopping

judgments quickly make you stuffed

you think you got it all figured out

but then you're left in the white room with your dark pencil, again

scribbling frustrations, oh the strategies never end

is it the chase?  the chase can be fun

is it fun?  the fun can be dangerous

is it the danger?  Perhaps

flip a coin, you win one

flip it twice, win twice,

flip it three times, and the chase is fixation

banging pots and pans together, tin  to block out the noise

the coins, the metal, seeping into the skin,

wash the hands, start all over again

I imagine you standing there, flicking your hair
and the red glow of some sign backlights you
so your silhouette is dark, moody
like the leather jacket you always wear-
but to be ironic
because you're like that
My eyes can just make out the flicker of your pupils
under spidery lashes
and you give me a smirk
because you know I'm watching
I seem to be always watching you
You're leaning in that funny way again
like up against a wall, only there's not one there
your head cocked to the side
as you wait for something to happen
I am the one to make the move,
because I always am,
and you don't hesitate before grabbing my elbow
and we race off into the night
the puddles soaking your scuffed boots
and the cuffs of your jeans
You smell of smoke and that cologne you always wear
and I am desperate to keep you with me
because you are the closest thing to perfect that I know
I imagine you grab my waist
and you tell me all the things I have always wanted to hear

and it isn't enough.

my love language is silence
written into the script:
moments of lapsed conversation
where all is tranquil and serene.
or when we forget our lines and sit
in hushed reverence,
allowing one another’s stage presence
to wash over us like the backlights.
invisible audiences hold bated breath
waiting for a twist, a shock
but a twist, we have not rehearsed
instead we allow the unscripted silence
to wash over us in reverent bliss
our conjoined souls just content
allowing our minds to diverge
as long as we are together in the silence.

I
It’s not what you and I expected
The opposite actually
Nights are a lot darker out here
The dozen spindly legs of insects crawl
Across my foot to prey on some poor roach
But I still talk to you when you aren’t listening
Out past the fields of nothingness and livestock,
Where the car headlights freeze Armadillos
And crack their shells like eggs in a pan
I will wait for that day
The day you come to me and I tell you
That dream still waits for you

II
I can’t drive without grimacing
The roadkill piles atop each other
Deer, boars, Coyotes
When it's all done
They leave the same red mark
You probably don’t see this in the city
The black eyes of an animal punctured
By a white gem-like dot shining
Before sunrise, the body is coated in fresh dew
I’ll stay where I am, waiting for you

III
There’s a dysfunctional couple
that fights upstairs above me
Nearby the cars race for their kind of high
The backlights behind the building of a restaurant
Makes its way around the corners of my walls
I thought I saw you, again
Looking from outside my window
Walking past me on the sidewalk
Opening the door from within my closet
Listening when I wasn’t talking
Did you see me break glass at my feet?
The hydrogen peroxide sting reminds me
To remember you once waited for me