I come from the large Texas city Houston. Where prices are decent, and crime is high, that includes death. Spring Break of 2016, I saw on Instagram, people I half *** knew were posting pictures of you, saying you had gone missing. I was baffled. I hardly knew you, but I still did parcally know you from sharing the same first period class. I knew you by your first name, but couldn't tell you I could remember your last. Days passed, your story stumbled onto the news. The same picture being displayed across television screens across the city, attempting to find your kidnapper. Your father had been shot and burned. Reporters said it was possible that you witnessed this. I hope you didn't witness your father's demise, I really do. I was getting my hair done at a salon when my father told me police had found your corpse. They first announced she was shot, then sexually assaulted. My heart dropped, this was the youngest tragedy I had witnessed before, but, again, I barley knew you. I knew when I came back to school after the week long break that the atmosphere would be somber. First period, algebra. That was the only class you and I shared. Our teacher talked about you, with such kind words, choking up, and in tears. The principal and councilors visited, making sure no one was shaken too bad by her passing. I looked from across the room where you used to sit, on the complete opposite side of the room, at your now hallow desk. Funny, how before the break, our teacher spoke of being safe because she knew a teacher friend of hers who lost two students of his, and how devastated he was over it, knowing they'd never come back or step foot in his class room. It's the same for my highschool algebra teacher. One of the last days we had with her before finals, she asked us to write letters to Adriana's mother, that she'd give them to her, she asked in tears once more. I wrote her mother, saying how no one deserves this kind of loss. How her daughter was a good kid. I went off of what her best friend told me in drawing class as a base to Adriana's personality. She seemed bright, and bubbly, and friendly, and joy, and laughter. But alas, I never knew her, and I will never get to know you, because you have been taken, sooner than expected.

He sat down at his desk
With his face buried deep into it
His sweatshirt road his broadened shoulders
Something about this guy interested me
He was new, fresh slate at a new school

We exchanged hellos
We exchanged names
I threw out an invite to chill
And he politely and happily accepted

There was something odd about him
In a good way
Offbeat
Offbeat boy
I gave him a nickname because his real name was to plain for him

I introduced him to my circle and they didn’t like him at first
But over time they became as thick as thieve
We all were
New bonds were made
Bridges built and doors opened

The things he would say
So random
So off base
So hilariously out of place
I loved it
I always looked forward to what he was going to say next

He was a true friend
There was no lying, no evil in him
He was pure, a pure person

He loved nature
His love was Mother Earth
Shedding at tear at environmental ignorance

He was socially awkward
He couldn’t talk to girls, or anyone that wasn’t one of us
He would get into fight we would have to talk him out of
The confusion he gave to the teachers and frustration he gave to the entire student body
He didn’t know any better

Writing a funny speech about what he would do if he was voted for class president
Then having it being taken as a threat against the school thus getting him suspended and having the police search his house for weapons

The complete disbelief of his guidance councilors
And the flabbergasted administrators were all gut busting comedies to us

As we approached graduation news of him going into the navy came about

And we were all in disbelief
But it was true
A boy who couldn’t life a five pound dumbbell was going to serve our country

Good for him

Even now I can recall our adventures up to that point
Staying out late and wandering the streets in the middle of a cold winter night
Cat calling at the mall, trying to pick up girls
Breaking things
Invading private properties
Avoiding police entanglements
Detentions
Suspensions
So many laughs
So many memories

When he left it was as if the once bright aluminous room we all shared was a little bit dimmer
But we were full of pride
We knew he would shine on else where

From Michigan to Texas to California for boot camp and training he went
Our friend went on a journey, his own journey

One year later, we all await his return

He is back, oh the change is overwhelming
He shines brighter, he’s witty
He’s mature, bold and confident

He’s become a man, he found himself

He has claimed his long sought after love

The one who has been walking a difficult path and strides in beauty

He made passionate love to her last night
He woke up from her house and came to mine at 5 AM

I awoke to find him sipping coffee in my kitchen; he had a smile in his heart that was bigger than the stupid grin on my face
I sat and talked to him, chugged my coffee and got dressed

No we were going on another adventure, two weeks
Two weeks with him was all I have
Then he’s being deployed for two years
He speaks of oncoming war with Syria and North Korea
His views have changed
He believes in war
My, my I’m astonished
This is my friend?
The awkward, soft spoken dude in my history class?
Now I wait to see what happens next
With one of my dearest friend, Chives

you're not going to read this, and why would you?*

it would be either
naive
or
stupid
of me to expect even so much as a text;
as if our separation implies the ******* of a proverbial
Berlin Wall* between us,
where less than a week ago we were the same *country,
our landscapes of rolling hills,
city skylines,
and forests
so overgrown
that only
slices
of sunlight
could parse the ever-greened canopy,
phasing into one another seamlessly.

We may have been our own provinces,
but aside from small street signs declaring
Welcome to Jen
and
Welcome to Kyran...
aside from separate cognitive centers of self-government
between
your shock-blue eyes and fleek eyebrows,
between
my navy-blue irises and grey,
sunken sockets,
we were a willing confederation of persons,
impulses,
                dreams,
                             ambitions,
                                              anxieties,
                                                              lo­ves,
                                                                ­        and betrayals---

In our past, and provisional separations,
it was your betrayal that pushed us both
into the doldrums of love-lost confusions
and self-hatred;
not that there would be much value
in assigning a blame
with hurt still attached,
because the point,
it seems to me,
was that we somehow made it through everything together.

There wasn't a personal adversity we didn't learn to conquer
---until I began to fade away from you--
lanky, thin, often broke, and depressed,
I retreated.

I cocooned myself in studies of the past and the present;
for some reason, despite my overwhelming love for you,
despite the unspoken commitment I had made
to you
in my head
so long after your second infidelity
when I realized I was finally over it
and that I loved you more than I'd ever loved anyone before
--and in ways I never could have foreseen--

I backed-off,
I fell back,
I disengaged,

and

I essentially abandoned you.

After your impulsive infidelities,
when you admitted you hadn't been
nor were you in your
"right mind,"
you promised you'd get better.

You saw councilors, therapists, psychiatrists,
and psychologists... and you did.

You really did get better.

You overcame all that had been pulling you so low and so far into the darker vicissitudes of irrationality.

And yet, when it came to my own faults,
inadequacies, and disengagement,
I lacked your courage.

I didn't even try to overcome them.
In my self-imposed screen-gazed solitude,
I often thought of how much I loved you;
of how I hoped you might just wait out my confused disengagement
like I forgave you for your betrayals which had,
in their times,
hollowed me out emotionally for months on end.

The thing is, you wouldn't have blamed me if I'd left you then.
You would have understood, and let me go,
regardless of the heavy pain in your solar plexus
and the hollow feeling in your heart.

Though it never came to that,
I now have the chance to do for you what you'd have done for me.

I don't blame you for leaving.

I understand,
and regardless of this heavy pain in my solar plexus
and the perceptive hollowing of my heart,
I will watch you as you go,
        I will wave,
I will live with the weight of regret and memory,
and remember what you wrote in a poem once
when we parted ways after your first infidelity.

Sitting in the university library, reading on Moses,
what went thru your head was

"closure feels more like i can go on without you, i’m glad i met you, however an emptiness drenched in self-regret will always remain."

sages and brethren
gather, and share
and slowly souls
are bared
their tempered voices
and quiet eyes
reserved of judgment
with passing smiles

moments blend
in current trends
opinions wide
and reflections deep
the concepts
and irregularities
once murky
now clear

they prioritize
and familiarize
that staunch resolution
of generation net
will remunerate
and illuminate
through the checkpoints
and formal reviews
through the purple curtains
and open stage
nothing tainted
or bitter
left for taste

cause its they
who’ll plant the seeds
the captains of commerce
healers and jugglers
the coaches and councilors
negotiators and compromisers
the kings and queens
hustlers and hellcats
(who've all found their way!)
let us tip our hats
and salute them

Please take time to read this <3

Few people know that I have come close to ending my own life, at least 4 times. At the time that is what I wanted, to die. Mostly because I thought it would take Away the pain and suffering I felt. I never fit in, kids at school would find any reason to make fun of me. When I was eight years old my sister and I were sent to a foster home. I was told on many occasions that my father wanted nothing to do with me. So I became depressed and lived by a label known as emo. One night I felt extremely depressed and I took a razor blade to my wrist. I watched as the blood ran out of the wound I had made and at that moment I realized I was addicted. Not only to cuting but to the feeling I got when I saw my blood. I knew I had a problem, I would cut every night just so I could feel something I could control and that I knew was real. My friends in middle school saw the cuts and tried to get me help but it only made it worse. I was put into therapy but that doesn't help unless you talk, in which I didn't. I didn't feel safe. The foster home my sister and I were living in was not a very good one. The guy was a creep. So we were forced out of that home and got adopted by my uncle. We tried many councilors and therapists but nothing seemed to help.
I eventually got an 18 year old boyfriend and I was only 15. He got me drunk one night and took advantage of me. He stole my innocence, and gave me something else in return. A baby. But that baby died. Know matter how much it hurts I know that baby is better off with out me. I was so young.
To this day, I still think about hurting myself but I am proud. I have gone a little over 4 months with out self harm, and with every day I grow stronger and stronger. So to those who took the time to read this, thank you. And if you are going through the same struggles, find a clear path and stay on it. Doesn't matter if you're an alcoholic, or a druggy, or even a *** addict. The only way to get better is through steps. Start with a week and slowly move up. I believe in you. Every single one.