A four-year-old was perched in front of
a boxy TV with eyes only open to
sugar-coated Cheerios and 80’s Transformer heroes
on the screen.
Fast forward to age
thirteen where she flipped through
dusty photography with
eyes searching
for substance
to prove reality from almost-forgotten dreams.
Scrapbook memories aren’t
all that she sees
because,
honestly,
she loses things.
Summer Saturdays and
Fall Fridays and
Winter weekdays spent too wrapped up in her
own head to notice, silently, spring rising
from its deathbed.
Honestly, she loses things.
She
loses
things that should be important
and real, but all she can feel is
the guilt of lost
and faded photography.
Scrapbook memories fabricate times of
color and scent and sound,
of spilled milk and Diet Coke,
of words too far gone to seep from
pen to page because
honestly,
she loses things.

I had a scrapbook deep and thick
I read it in the night
I burned the candle to the wick
A precarious light

In it there were photographs
And clippings by the score
Of every wrong and every shaft
That'd pierced me to the core

I kept my quill at my right hand
And in the margins wrote
My hourglass had lost its sand
My eyes began to float

This book was worn with constant care
The dogeared pages bent
I was constantly to share
Of those I did resent

Time came 'round to find me sick
Ailing from the frost
Of a cold poison dark and thick
I knew that all was lost

I bent closer, smelt the book
It was the book itself!
I'd recover, all it took
Was to place it on the shelf!

And so the scrapbook lost allure
I closed it with a snap
The health of soul I then assured
I placed on pen its cap


Close your books, my dearest friends
And in the end you'll see
Your spiritual health you will amend

You'll finally be FREE!



SoulSurvivor
(C)1/28/2016

The sun-filled corridor
Burns brightly in the heat of
That ephemeral, sweltering season.
She sits at the edge of the hallway,
Looking at the other side wistfully,
Her eyes seem to be reaching out to the other side.
To just be on that side for one moment;
To be nearer to the light, instead of staying in this place
of darkness. Heart filled with despair, the streams from the river
Fall freely down her alabaster colored face.
Her hands reaching out, pleading for a warm touch,
A Valentine embrace; a Christmas kiss under the mythical mistletoe.
People with their eyes hooked to their silicate screens
Ignore her. Even she calls out to them for attention, but they don’t
Hear. Their minds are too far into themselves. They don’t care. Nor
They ever will, much to her chagrin.
The silence kills her the most.
It’s the antithesis of cacophony.
Would she rather a discordant note pervading
the entire room than suffering through silence?
She still remembers the day she lost her voice.
The day she felt that the world was coming to an end because she wasn’t
Good enough for the masses of mainstream people who never lose
Anything but hours of sleep.
This girl can’t lose sleep because she never can sleep.
She can’t feel anything. She can’t taste the sweetness of the chocolate logs
That stay on the table near the Christmas tree. She watches as her old family
Savours every dark, sugary, nearly sinful taste of it. She can’t feel the texture of
The wall. She can’t even see past the house. She can never leave. Not since that
Fateful day. Do they still remember their daughter? Has she become a distant,
yet inevitably ephemeral scrapbook remnant?

I will regret this in the morning
but I will do it anyway
my impulsivity often overpowers my conscience
yet I am almost always fully aware
of the decisions I make
and their consequences
I am not exactly mentally stable
but I am sane enough
to know right from wrong
yesterday from today
love from lust
although sometimes I mix them up
I have a tendency to lunge at any pair of arms that open for me
my mind and body often disagree
my body saying yes to eager hands
my mind saying no
constantly looking towards my heart
thinking how stupid one must be
to fall repeatedly
get hurt every single time
and still manage to do the same
over
and over
again
I wonder
how many times I will have to hit the ground
in order to learn to stop falling face first?
I often say things
that should be left unsaid
I often do things
that should not be done
sleep in beds unfamiliar
make believe love to strangers
get to know people who will not remember me tomorrow
I am gone as quickly as the hangover
I can be washed off the tongue
just as quickly as the liquor
I often believe I am capable of inciting change
I kiss temporary lips with permanence
hoping that I can train them to stay
I love temporary people with permanence
hoping that I can train them not to leave
and when they do
I claim to have seen it coming
I am incapable of forgetting
a scrapbook memory of skin and heartbeat
of touch and moments
I know not to look directly into eyes
for they can be blinding
and I still
do it anyway
I know of the risks that shouldn't be taken
well aware of their consequences
and I still
take them anyway
you could say
it is my own fault
for the way that things continue to turn out
but I can make no promise of apology
instead
I will live momentarily
**** up intentionally
love recklessly
fall unguarded
break enough times to learn how to put myself back together
crash into concrete enough times to learn how to shift a crooked smile
into something worth seeing
I have been told that a life lived in fear
is hardly a life lived at all
so I intend to live every second
like it is the last one I will have
I will write each night as it happens
narrate my own stories
and hope they turn out okay
I will regret this in the morning
but I will do it anyway.

Inside my brain
There is a tornado
Spinning to infinity and beyond.
God only knows how fast.
My shoulders ache and my feet cramp.
My wrists click
And my eyes go damp.
Inside my brain instead is a monsoon:
A tumultuous storm that rages on.
Waves froth and smash,
Beating against the backs of my eyeballs.
Sometimes they find their way
Down my soft spotted cheeks.
My lashes float to the earth
One by one by one by one.
Would you collect them for me
Like discarded flower petals
Down the aisle of my soul's chapel
And press them into a scrapbook
Full of twisted memories?
Inside my brain is an H2O tornado
Like reckless rainstorm pirouettes.
My swirling view is blurred,
But every so often
I catch a clear picture
Of the glowing whites of your eyes
And I remember to fill my lungs,
Head above the water,
And breathe.
Twirl, twist.
Wind, mist.
But don't panic,
Because every so often
I catch a clear picture
Of you.

You spent endless time
at your desk in the sun porch.
After your diagnosis we
turned the porch into
your own personal scrapbook room.
I could tell you didn’t
think about your disease
when you were in there crafting
because of how focused
you always looked when at work;

lips puckered out, oblivious
to the commotion of our backyard.
You were granted God’s greatest gift
to see the end of your
days as you wished.
You did just that.
The memory of you lives on
in all those whose lives you touched.

When you left we didn’t
know what to do with
the overwhelming heap
of scrapbook materials
you accumulated over the years.

They took up too much space
that could be used for other things
like furniture and storage.
Plus, they were hard to
look at without being
swarmed with empty
thoughts and sadness. But,
we didn’t want all these
valuable accessories to go to
waste, forever forgotten.  

When it came to deciding
what to do with your
leftover supplies, we knew
we couldn’t toss them out.
We wanted them to carry out
their intended purpose
just as you would have
had time permitted.

The Ronald McDonald House
in Minneapolis had an unused room
they were looking to fill—
we knew that was it.
We donated nearly all your supplies
there and now that empty room
is a scrapbook room bearing your name;
carrying on an important piece of you
so other families can
craft memories into treasures—
just as I carry a treasured
piece of you wherever I go.

Used to be real
Use to be true
Use to feel love
Until I lost you
Now that love
that I remember so faint
Is just a memory
On a scrapbook page

in june I felt the project change
from trying charting all scenarios of your face
to looking to books to blacking out spontaneous lines in found papers
to clearly eventually
be a misneglected omen of your impending collapse.

"I would like to blame this on the weather,"
I said to the sky,
"I would like to stay."


I felt the camera flash stop taking
strobe light moments of our strobe light moments
instead slipped tape recorder in your cereal box
videotaped the tooth brush
ever scraping dead skin while you slept.

I said, "If you wake up I will know nothing."
if you call this a dream, I will shake
and shake.
I said "it is clear now that you are decomposing."
(there's only so much the heart can take.)


stopped thoughts about the bus would hit you
spent time watching the sun through your palm:
little bones will scatter light.
little scars on thumbs.
we are made up only of who puts us back together.
and I could smell the rain.

I said, "It is easier if you stay angry"
I said to the sky.
"I would like to stay."


I put the Starbucks mug on the radiator
ceased to chart your worried looks.
I knew your brow, heavy clouds as you'd undress
but made a scrapbook of frozen dinner clippings
drew a line through where you went that day.

I said, "I want to prove that you meant nothing"
I said to the sky.
"I would like to stay."
I said to the sky.


and then the rain.

(After Lorca)

Now in Vienna there are ten pretty women.
There's a shoulder where death comes to cry.
There's a lobby with nine hundred windows.
There's a tree where the doves go to die.
There's a piece that was torn from the morning,
and it hangs in the Gallery of Frost—
Ay, ay ay ay
Take this waltz, take this waltz,
take this waltz with the clamp on its jaws.

I want you, I want you, I want you
on a chair with a dead magazine.
In the cave at the tip of the lily,
in some hallway where love's never been.
On a bed where the moon has been sweating,
in a cry filled with footsteps and sand—
Ay, ay ay ay
Take this waltz, take this waltz,
take its broken waist in your hand.

This waltz, this waltz, this waltz, this waltz
with its very own breath
of brandy and death,
dragging its tail in the sea.

There's a concert hall in Vienna
where your mouth had a thousand reviews.
There's a bar where the boys have stopped talking,
they've been sentenced to death by the blues.
Ah, but who is it climbs to your picture
with a garland of freshly cut tears?
Ay, ay ay ay
Take this waltz, take this waltz,
take this waltz, it's been dying for years.

There's an attic where children are playing,
where I've got to lie down with you soon,
in a dream of Hungarian lanterns,
in the mist of some sweet afternoon.
And I'll see what you've chained to your sorrow,
all your sheep and your lilies of snow—
Ay, ay ay ay
Take this waltz, take this waltz
with its "I'll never forget you, you know!"

And I'll dance with you in Vienna,
I'll be wearing a river's disguise.
The hyacinth wild on my shoulder
my mouth on the dew of your thighs.
And I'll bury my soul in a scrapbook,
with the photographs there and the moss.
And I'll yield to the flood of your beauty,
my cheap violin and my cross.
And you'll carry me down on your dancing
to the pools that you lift on your wrist—
O my love, O my love
Take this waltz, take this waltz,
it's yours now. It's all that there is.

Father, this year's jinx rides us apart
where you followed our mother to her cold slumber;
a second shock boiling its stone to your heart,
leaving me here to shuffle and disencumber
you from the residence you could not afford:
a gold key, your half of a woolen mill,
twenty suits from Dunne's, an English Ford,
the love and legal verbiage of another will,
boxes of pictures of people I do not know.
I touch their cardboard faces. They must go.

But the eyes, as thick as wood in this album,
hold me. I stop here, where a small boy
waits in a ruffled dress for someone to come ...
for this soldier who holds his bugle like a toy
or for this velvet lady who cannot smile.
Is this your father's father, this commodore
in a mailman suit? My father, time meanwhile
has made it unimportant who you are looking for.
I'll never know what these faces are all about.
I lock them into their book and throw them out.

This is the yellow scrapbook that you began
the year I was born; as crackling now and wrinkly
as tobacco leaves: clippings where Hoover outran
the Democrats, wiggling his dry finger at me
and Prohibition; news where the Hindenburg went
down and recent years where you went flush
on war. This year, solvent but sick, you meant
to marry that pretty widow in a one-month rush.
But before you had that second chance, I cried
on your fat shoulder. Three days later you died.

These are the snapshots of marriage, stopped in places.
Side by side at the rail toward Nassau now;
here, with the winner's cup at the speedboat races,
here, in tails at the Cotillion, you take a bow,
here, by our kennel of dogs with their pink eyes,
running like show-bred pigs in their chain-link pen;
here, at the horseshow where my sister wins a prize;
and here, standing like a duke among groups of men.
Now I fold you down, my drunkard, my navigator,
my first lost keeper, to love or look at later.

I hold a five-year diary that my mother kept
for three years, telling all she does not say
of your alcoholic tendency. You overslept,
she writes. My God, father, each Christmas Day
with your blood, will I drink down your glass
of wine? The diary of your hurly-burly years
goes to my shelf to wait for my age to pass.
Only in this hoarded span will love persevere.
Whether you are pretty or not, I outlive you,
bend down my strange face to yours and forgive you.

I'm an olympic housewife.

My mantlepiece of medals
is perfectly folded washing
arranged in mahogany drawers
with calm elegance
like swans on a lake.

I’m an elite athlete of the mundane.

My scrapbook of 1st place ribbons
are surfaces that sparkle
a masterpiece of purity
zen arrangement lust
like Ikebana in an empty room.

I’m an extreme sport star of domesticity.

My list of world class honours
gluten free bake-offs  
blogging my parenting tips
a domestic online celebrity
like an effortless Demeter.

I made your misery my home. It has become a part of me. A rash on my skin that itches when you're away. I'll never stop scratching.

You have no idea of what you destroyed inside of me. You have no knowledge of the light you took from me


Nothing feels okay. All the walls are closing all. All I think about are my sins. The pain doesn't end, it only begins.

I want to rip my heart out my ******* chest. Anything to stop it from beating so painfully from old memories.

I cried for you, I cried for us. I cried for what I thought we had. I cried because I was so wrong. I cried because there was nothing left.

How could you deny me? How could you turn your back on what we had, and all I had given you? You left when I needed you.

Maybe someday you'll come back and treat me like the person who gently held your heart. And not some stranger you cruelly tore apart.

The dull public ruckus of the afternoon train filled the gaps between us.
We could have been part of it,
Drowned so deep in a conversation we could gladly call our own.
But our past selves have already taken invisible
B
R
O
K
E
N
Steps away from each other.
And tucked ourselves in the tight pockets of this companionable silence
As dangerous as the trigger handled by my emotions,
A gift for your forehead.
I will shove all my pain into your being
And watch my reflection crumble to her knees with a familiar cry of agony.
Mauled into frayed flesh in a crimson rose bush
That we had woven friendship wraths from.
And yet, my rasp throat still delivered smoothly.
“How are you today?”

Your usually anticipative eyes
Watched the scenery outside,
Disappearing just as fast as it came.
Did you think of the first day of school?
When we first approached with awkward greetings?
And from a wave and a smile
You start to attach them with questions
Questions that you should be asking me now
Things like
“Do you think we will end up in the same sec 3 class?”
“Do you want to go to ORA with me?”
“Can you save your game? We already hardly bond in class.”
“Are you even listening?”
I was.
I answered every last one,
From the beginning when we stepped into homeroom.
Even the ones you’ve never even asked me.
But now that I come running to you with my stained envelope
Are you still there at your seat?
To tell me
“You know what you need? A good cup of frozen yogurt.”


Now every glance that met
Will be snapped apart like a crisp twig.
Every walk down the corridor past each other,
Will be like two freshmen models on their first runway.
Every move, breath, laughter,
I will always be aware.
Perhaps because your voice
Will always make up for your height in the crowd,
Audible from the opposite side of the hall.
And its only until I let the quietness sink in,
When I have decided to treasure listening to the way you delivered my name,
Leaving your loud mouth like some exotic font.
That till today I still cannot decipher.

What was my height in your crowd?
164cm tall with probably less than half an inch, I guess.
You never noticed how my eyes would wander unconsciously.
Just to wonder
If you still remember I existed,
Somewhere in the pages of your scrapbook,
In the crowd,
Still searching, listening attentively.

Do you understand now?
We are standing at the extreme ends of Newton’s pendulum
Spiked from the illness of our broken bonds.
And I would swing an end so hard I would skewer you
And then the pain will come
Flying back
Stabbing me just as gruesomely.
But it’s so much better
Than disobeying the laws of reciprocation.
My friend, its unfair to be the only one.
Why not requite this one heaven of a pain?

People have pet the conflicted pain like dust off me,
And ignore the bruises that I have willingly punched myself upon.
They taught me
That the heart is a 2-room residence.
Happiness
Sadness
And if you are too happy
Don’t celebrate too loudly
Because you’ll wake the neighbor.

But could it really be helped?
This 1-year worth of what you have given me
You have left 2 party animals as clueless tenants.
Did you understand?
The fact that no matter what silly things we’ve done,
You will always be welcomed home.
And we would continue to drink
Till we are tipsy enough
To walk on the edge of the bridge we have built,
And fall into the hungry rivers
Into the places darker than black
Drowning the air out of our lungs.
But what reason should I be scared,
When you have always been the best swimmer I’ve ever known?
Forever a winner to me,
No matter how many competitions you have paddled out of the pool in disappointment.
It has always been you,
Who would slip over a note to my table,
My hair spilling over its surface in defeat.
Telling me that everything’s ok.
It’s you
Who understood that I was more of a listening person.
Your missing piece to fit your outspoken personality.
You,
The one who could even challenge me to a dance-off just to have the loser ask for the ketchup.
You,
Who could go on forever about a guy you obviously like,
But only say you ‘don’t stand a chance’.
I
The diplomatic one who would arrange you,
Like files in an office drawer.
You
The one who tried to hold us together till the end.
I,
Who failed to treasure your efforts, and share this burden.

And now that you’ve turned down the volume,
And walked out of the door without a goodbye
How am I supposed to handle the next morning, when being sober is an absolute nightmare?
Left alone to wonder what I have done
While we’re drunk, carefree and
Crumbling at the seams.

My dearest friend,
Have I ever told you,
How the number 1
Has always been our own funny little number?
Now if you just take ONE step closer…
Yes, I promise this time I’ll keep my earphones away.
I would point at the signboard above the door
And muse over how your stop,
Is ONE stop before mine.
How your birthday,
ONE day after mine.
Yeah… just like how we are ONE world apart in personality.
Isn’t that why we became like this?
SHUT UP I KNOW I’M A TERRIBLE CONVERSATION HOLDER.
I CAN NEVER PUT MY WORDS INTO THE APPROPRIATE CONTEXT.
BUT YOU KNEW THAT.
You knew.
Now go ahead.
Laugh.
Like how you always do, with that wide grin that reflected nothing but forgiveness,
Stripped down to reveal absolutely no grudges.
Because I deserve it, don’t I?
Because it was my fault,
I was the one, who willingly caused this silent war,
Fraying this thread that I mistook for a hiker’s rope.
There can only be ONE survivor in this meaningless game.
Scold me,
Because there was never such a rule.
I have decided who would be standing alone,
Long ago.
The loser,
The flower that will never find its way back from its ashes.
A.
B
R
O
K
E
N.

M
E.


(hi there. Look I tried ;w;)

I used to believe in love
at first sight

I'd always trusted that fate
would bring me to that boy
that I would fall in love with
and one day I thought I had found him

I was with my friends at school
we were talking about the upcoming dance
I was going to wear pink
my best friend Tegwyn was wearing ocean blue
and my other best friend Lily was wearing red

Two boys came up to us
we had no idea who they were
when they were near and we realized
that they were headed in our direction
we rated them
the brunette was an 8.5/10
and the taller brunette was an 8.5/10
as well
us three thought they were the cutest things in the world.

"Hey girls" said the shorter one
we were giddy and afraid and all just said "hi"

The taller boy made the move first
he went for my best friend Tegwyn

The shorter boy went for me
we soon found out that they were best friends too

I felt sorry for Lily
but she had said many times that she had no interest in boys
at least not yet
no matter how many times Tegwyn and I tried to convince her

Us four went on a double date
I knew my boy was for real
I didn't know about Tegwyn
I'd ask her later

After I met my boy
and that first date
I decided then to believe in love at first sight

He was amazing
he was so sweet
so caring
and he told me he loved me as much
as I loved him

We continued our relationship
from that grade 7 January
to the July after our first year of university

I stayed in love with that boy
for all that time
I never thought we'd separate

I had scrapbooks,
scrapbook after scrapbook in my room
with different themes

Our wedding
our baby girl
our baby boy
our honeymoon
our twins (if we had them, boy boy or girl boy or girl girl)
our retirement
our jobs
our vacations
our home

I had it all played out carefully
in my head and those scrapbooks of mine
he didn't know about those though
they were my secret

And one day in that July
he said he didn't love me anymore
that spark had disappeared a month or two earlier
he said he couldn't see me as beautiful anymore
he couldn't see my glow anymore
he couldn't see me anymore

But of course
he couldn't see my broken heart either

I had kept in touch with Tegwyn all these years
Lily had a boy to herself too
Tegwyn couldn't believe it
but I couldn't believe it more than she couldn't believe it

It was all so sudden
but of course, nothing lasts long

I've seen cops
way too many times,
too many times
to go through my ****
ripping apart pillows
with switches
and against my better judgment
I did nothing
as I heard the glass of
my grandmother's picture
being tossed around
in the back.

Too many times
asking me questions
about this
and that?
Him or her?
If you help us out,
we'll help you out,
understand?
in their rooms
where no love is grown
and no help is on the way,
their eyes were filled with the fire,
they were finally
gonna get this ******,
make him pay
for crimes he didn't commit.

Too many times
when i was asleep
in some old sewer,
and rolling up
asking me if i was on drugs
or drunk,
and if i didn't leave
they were gonna shove
a nightstick up my ***;
get me used to it.

Too many times have they slowed down
at a light
and turned slowly,
keeping their eyes on me
like I was a wolf,
when they had blood in their eyes
and teeth
in their holsters.

"Where you going tonight?"
as they surrounded me,
another inmate
inside the bounded
bars of an external prison.

Cops never helped me,
never asked
how I was doing,
or why I was doing it,
or why I felt trapped
inside my own body;
all they saw
was another ******
making problems
for the civilized people.

God will remember them,
just as I can't forget.

And most of the time,
it was other black men,
some fruit bred strong in them,
to hate them bottom-rung *******
because they had escaped
and remade themselves,
apparently.

In truth,
I have killed many of them
in my sleep,
but when I step back,
I see that they are a product
of the same system
that says the guns, drugs, and violence
are part of the ****** condition,
that only shows a ****** on tv
when he's *****, or killed somebody,
another mugshot for you to put in your
scrapbook of fear.


So, no I don't hate them,
I hate seeing people that look like me
getting killed
before they come to fruition.

I hate that
:"black"
is used as a term
meant to engender
fear.

I hate that I walk down the street,
and a white girl
walks ahead
turning around
to
check for me.

I hate that when me
and some of the homies
walk down the street,
our hoodies pulled over our heads,
people look behind us
for the grim reaper.

There is hope,
but without
it being fostered,
The fruits
die on the vine,
noosed up
in a new way
as they drop.

Drawing little tears
I trace around lines
small oval shaped drops
I cut away from your eyes
pasting them in a scrapbook
for the hurting to see
Inviting all to look
how sorrow is set free
tear out the paper
fold into a plane
crease down the corners
and fly away the pain

Among dust bunnies collecting on the carpet of her bedroom are lullabies, matted into the seashell shaped ridges by eager toes.
Other mothers sing Rockabye Baby, but hers crooned the crash of ocean waves and the ballads of mermaids.
Memories like those sent shivers down her spine, cold fingered fairies dispatched to walk the tightrope of each nerve, triggering flashbacks of moment after moment.

Beneath a quilt of fallen oak leaves he found a baby hedgehog, infant bristles damp and lonely.
Some days, when it meandered curiously across half-written papers, its paws writing notes in a script he couldn't decipher, he regretted rescuing the handful of spines with the pale, inquisitive nose.
Leaves of muddied paper, though, became pages in a scrapbook, dedicated to moments more beautiful than he could fathom.

Following them were snapshots of sunsets over the lake, the first phrases from a concerto he adored, a polaroid of his fingers interlaced with hers.
Her palm met his without hesitancy, and the joy she felt reminded her of the mermaid's musings heard through the sleepy ears of a child.
On all sides it was warm and safe and fantastically real, simply because they decided it should be.

While she did say no the first time he asked her to marry him, it was only because to her marriage had grown stiff with age and its rusting hinges complained when she tried to add her own swing to its meaning.
He asked her again, of course, because she was the only person he'd ever met whose heart fit his jigsaw edges so perfectly, and this time she said yes.
Waits for the love, her mother told her; a fearless woman waits for love to ask twice.

On the winter solstice their son was born, whom they named Martin, because he thought it sounded courageous and she thought it sounded furry.
Distant waves tumbled as she sang her little one to sleep in the only way she knew how, and gave him hedgehog kisses with her eyelashes because butterflies are too delicate.
Dreams always came quickly and lingered in his mind, fantasies of whirling woodland dances and salty kisses from the wind.

They documented the unassuming; they tracked coincidence; they remembered the weight of every footstep and the cadence of every whispered "good night." They knew that even though they were obscured by the smoke of normality and stench of the future, every moment was unique. Among other things they found everything.

It was 4:22 in the afternoon.
He had gotten out of work late
Because his boss decided to wait
Until the last minute to drop an atom
Bomb of files on his desk to be sorted.
His fingers burned from the cuts
Like residual radiation.
His coffee mug, emptied
Except for the last few, chilled
Drops, rested on his lap.
He hadn't been able to make
It to the public bus stop in time
So he jumped aboard the nearest
Subway train, found a seat in the
Middle of the next to last car,
And eyed his route on the
Map like a pinball in a machine.

For the first thirty minutes,
He stared intently at his mug,
Studying the smudges around the
Opening where his lips had been
Pressed into like a soft kiss.
It took him back to a time when
Kisses were like currency between
Him and his ex-lover, and each
Were more than generous.
Just as he began to imagine
The way her silk bra felt on his
Fingertips, a foul odor passed by the
Tip of his nose without saying excuse me.
His eyes searched the car until they
Fell upon the teenager sitting just six
Seats down, a white cylinder fitted between
Her fingers like a pencil tucked behind the ear.
"Excuse me, miss. You're not allowed
To smoke here."
His hand waved absently in front
Of his face in an attempt to
Dissipate the smell while her hand
Waved absently in his direction
In an attempt to dissipate his presence.
"I already know this."
His brow furrowed as he
Watched her take another hit,
Blowing the smoke out her nose.
"Then put it out, please."
She lifted her eyes from the novel
Clutched in her other hand
Before replying.
"I don't think I will."
If it had been any other day,
At any other time,
He would have
Dropped the
Subject.
But his mind was
Warped with toxic fumes,
And his vision was cloudy,
His legs were shaking.
He slid down the conjoined seats
Until he was only three spaces
Away from her annoyed posture.
"Now listen, dear. This is a subway,
A form of public transportation,
Not a coffee shop where you can
Just flick your ashes onto every
Available surface.
There are families aboard
This car, families who shouldn't
Be forced to inhale your second-hand smoke."
He took a deep breath, eyeing her expression.
She flipped a page and continued reading,
The cigarette hanging from her lips
Like a diver poised to jump.
"Excuse me, miss, but.."
Just as he had begun speaking,
She tossed her book on the empty
Seat beside her and leaned forward,
Resting her elbows on her knees
As she gazed intently at him.
"I don't imagine you're one of
Those self-righteous types who
Boss people around on principle,
So I'm going to explain this to you."
She held up her cigarette in front
Of her face, forcing him to look,
Despite his stunned expression.
She pointed to the padded,
White area where the
Imprint of her lips resided.
"You see this? I call this happiness.
This is every boy I ever kissed,
Every apology I didn't mean,
Every argument I won,
Every smile that ever
Stretched across my face."
She pointed to the dark,
Crumbled substance at the end.
"This is what I call misery.
This is every heart I ever broke,
Every dollar I ever stole,
Every cut I ever
Inflicted on
Myself."
She held
The cigarette
Loosely in her
Fingers as she spoke.
"If you notice, as I smoke it,
The misery goes up on smoke,
And the happiness remains."
She tossed it across the car.
"Some people have scrapbooks
Where they keep their memories
So they can refer to them as
Often as they please.
Some people go to therapy
To hash out every feeling they
Refuse to deal with. But I
Live with my memories,
And I carry them with
Me, but when the
Miserable ones
Seem to overtake
The happy ones. I simply
Smoke them away. So if you
Are so insistent on taking away
My cigarettes, then I suggest you
Burn every scrapbook and pencil
And pill bottle you can find,
Because this is my escape."
She leaned back in her
Seat, staring authoritatively.
His lips parted several times before
He reached into his pocket and removed
An orange bottle with a white cap.
He twisted the top off and
Poured a single pill
Into his empty hand.
"The yellow side is
Every girl I fell in love with
Every vacation I ever took
Every baseball game I
Ever watched.
The red side
Is every girl
Who broke my heart.
Every day I see my boss.
And every evening I
Sit alone in the dark."
He tucked the pill back
Into the bottle like he was
Putting a child to sleep.
She eyed him curiously,
Watching as he fondled
The bottle in his hand.
"This is my escape."
His eyes lifted,
Meeting hers.
"I'll trade you."
Pursed lips met
With indecision
Until she pulled
Her pack of cigarettes
From her leather purse
And tossed them on his lap.
"We're all dying slowly anyway."

One more time to check on one more key
and a dollar for the man who runs
a check on me.

A penny for the boy, who thinks he'll save a
hundred, joy, buy some drinks, more fool him,
more schooling?

I'm in my bed not armageddon, although quite sure
that follows on behind the blind and docile of which I'm one.

Open to suggestions, any questions but
no answers here I fear.

Jehovah, supernova star is never
very far from me but
if it's heaven that I see
I'll be ******.

Load your ***** clothes. Separate your colors from your whites. Try not to linger too long on the shirt you first met him in.

2. Add detergent, only half a cup. Fill with cold water, watch as cerulean galaxies form right before your eyes. Realize just how much of you is not you.

3. Fill with warm water. Start spin cycle. Press your ear against the machine, hear its prehistoric roar rumble through your bones(now your shakes have excuses)have it envelope your senses until you assimilate into history and star stuff.

4. Jump when the buzzer goes off. Brush yourself off and hastily transfer loads into the dryer. Persevere when the wet clothes weigh down your arms more than thoughts of him, of his smile, of his laugh(****)

5. Set the dry cycle for another hour. Try not to think about your homework, remember that he's in your chemistry class, bite your head off. Sit on the dryer, close your eyes, pretend you're on a space ship shuttling through the atmosphere, through the Earth's orbit, on your way to the moon or Venus(****, you think of him again)or Pluto. Salsa on Saturn's rings, fall through Jupiter, turn stars into sticker on your skin, add pulsars, neutron stars, and quasars to your scrapbook(even if you don't scrapbook)

6. Return to Earth when the dryer shouts beneath you. Fold your shirts. Try not to think about the way his cheeks and face folds how he buckles over when he laughs, or how you did that first when that stupid statistic about how people like to mimic the habits of their love interest(***** science, if i can't explain my feelings, neither can it)comes to mind. Don't even look at that ******* shirt, toss it to the back of your dresser. Tuck sleeves left over right. Shove away thoughts of tucking stray tendrils of hair behind his ears, the feeling of his soft hair beneath your fingertips, how he cradled himself into your arms when he gets embarrassed.

7. Hang up your dad's formal shirts, your brother's tank tops, your mom's blouses. Blane your fatigue on the time of day rather than your depressive disorder. Blame your depressive disorder on your tendency to box yourself in and hold your own head underwater and struggle to breathe.

8. Accidentally close your eyes too long but just long enough for your mind to project  slideshow presentation of him standing off to the side, lingering for someone you wish was you (but it'll never be you, you know this like you know how two opposite symmetrical particles annihilate each other upon impact, a fatal encounter)

9. Throw back the tearstained shirts, socks, and boxers into the dryer. Set for twenty minutes. Almost forget to change the lint filter.

10. Stand there, numb and wet-faced, as the machine rocks, focus on the shaking of the tumbles to remember where you are, who you are.

11. Realize how often you lie to yourself(it doesn't take a genius to recognize a pattern)(remember Matt, Jamie, Julia; all fatal encounters, the stray neutrons in your equilibrium)Realize this is self-destruction. You are matter searching for antimatter, the particle searching for your antiparticle. You love the pattern(you're a routine-loving virgo, after all; you live for periodic patterns)love the cycles like the seasons. Like Persephone taking summer and spring with her every year, you are both Hades and Demeter. Cherishing new companionship, mourning the loss of your heart and soul.

12. He is the bull, you tell yourself, and bulls trample. Bulls stomp and wreck and dance and fly, but bulls are wild and untamable. Bulls don't belong with China-shop girls with scorched tongues and thumbs and an affinity for loving supernovas and jackhammers.

I am going
to disappear--
stay awake
until 6 am
when everyone
begins.

They will
look for me
under the
covers, but I
will not be
there.

I will evaporate
into the secret
air of all the
people who
cannot sleep
at night--we
fly into darkness,
because it does
not hurt our
eyes and all
our dreams
cannot die while
they are still
unhatched eggs.

We do not
have to love
anyone, except
from a
distance--they
are perfect there,
held in time
as all the good
things and good
smiles we remember
them as.

No one has
to love us.

Love hard, my friends. Love noticeably.


Love does not deserve to be shoved under the rug, to be disguised, or to be quieted. Love does not mean conforming to the idea that genuine affection is “sappy,” “cheesy,” or “cringeworthy”; instead-- love loudly.


The world wants to tell you that relationships are to be silenced. That posting multiple photographs of each other is tacky, uncomfortable, and something to make fun of. That devoting time with your favorite human being is disgusting, overbearing-- especially when you are young and the future does not exist in your hands.


Too bad, future. And how unfortunate, world. Because at the end of the day, the world does not own love. You do. It is yours to have, to keep, to share, and to do whatever it takes to hold onto it. It is mine.


When you find love, shout it from the rooftops and frame a million photographs. Post selfies of the two of you smiling wide and unwavering. Wear its colors on your face and shamelessly declare it to the whole universe and beyond: You are in love. You are alive.
And likewise, this is my philosophy: Love intentionally, fiercely, tirelessly.


Love so hard it makes people dizzy. Take it as a compliment. In an exhausted world that spins with violence, hatred, and monstrosity-- praise its joys. Snap those pictures.Tell your friends. Scrapbook it, publish it, make art out of it. Laugh about it, display it, live it. Put an end to the grotesque concept that something so beautiful, perhaps life’s most magnificent, should be sheltered. Let it grow.


This is a declaration. I am boisterously in love. There is no quiet here.
One day, you will find someone or something that your heart will never be able to shut up about. And that’s okay. Let it scream.

i staying this hostel in amsterdam,
less glorifying than ginsberg
to be a czech fool king wording
self-praise about spinoza,
two germans (who decided to take
mushrooms watching american dad:
i tell you, hallucinogenics
and television - plato's cave -
equate to plato's deepest caverns),
i spent the first day with the germans,
i didn't smoke ****, i just drank,
second day i spent the day
with the egyptian (architect student,
nice scrapbook of doodles), who was cradling
a bottle of the potato elixir known as *****,
in one of the cafes he gave me a blunt,
then gave me his hearing-aids from which
music blasts, he chose to play me
le trio joubran's masar (https://goo.gl/4vcBE1),
there and then i opened my mouth and
in oh oh oh surds imitated a woman's ******,
all ******-active drugs are a release from
thinking, ******-active drugs don't like thought,
indeed i was thoughtless, and in ecstasy bold
enough to attract a dutch girl's curiosity
at my mouth turned in O and my eyes closed
being fed the agarwood trembles of horsehairs
tied either end for a song,
it felt... it felt like a unison resound of
solomon's harem... i turned marijuana into
a ****** because of the music...
these ******-active drugs don't like thinking,
they disperse thought into a semi non-existence,
less carousel more dodo (extinction),
active ingredients of such a nature restrict thought
and reveal an intoxicated self, or self without thought:
a "true" / "undiscovered" self.
and now looking into something resembling
a library, but actually a graveyard...
you tend to do that, keep company with the dead
scribblers, given your position of demised
appreciation numbered less than expected
filling a quarter of the imagined auditorium,
you turn to the dead ones...
among the tombstone crucifixes a few are still alive:
will alexander (poet), fady joudah (poet & physician),
jim bradbury (historian specialising in accounts of
philip augustus), norman davis (historian,
author of god's playground, competitor
with paweł jasienica about the history of poland),
there's also an addition by will self and irvine welsh,
but that's about it... the rest of the ******* are dead:
and this makes me feel nearer to what's intended:
a brick, on a shelf, a brick in the heart layering
of first 20 years, and subsequent life after till
promised anno mortum 60 with the world's age
of civilisation aged 2052 (e.g.);
hence too the exhausted day filled with sleep
awaiting its completion,
but that memory stitches me up into a whole of
the puffy duck-feather teddy bear's abdomen content,
as i parted the egyptian with laughter
once a single drag of the blunt started to wear off.

Tears in nineteen sixty two
and more in sixty four
I sometimes wonder to myself
what all the crying's for.

We move on through this life we think we own.
hone the skills we learn
then throw it all away
as the tears we know so well return.

If only we had known in sixty four or laughed
in sixty two
If only we could go back there
and change the things we thought we knew.

Well
I don't know, I never did and it pains me so to say
I wouldn't work back through the time
no matter what the pay.
I am happy what today has brought and didn't think that it could be ,that the year of twenty thirteen
is the best year yet for me.

Why do we insist on smiling in all our pictures? We hide our emotions and thoughts behind our baring teeth while our eyes show the truth. We use social media as a virtual scrapbook. All we're doing is lying to our future , reminiscing over forgotten memories and "look how happy I was".  Its okay not to smile.

You don't belong somewhere
Average.
You don't belong with someone
Ordinary.
And right now
Your life is grey and white
Not too dark and not too light
But I'm telling you, darling,
Don't let your life be newspaper clippings-
Born, Married, Died-
In cheap grey ink.
When you cut your ties and discover every color of your sunset
You won't have the patience for anything less than breathtaking.
I'm asking you not to have the fear
To settle for less anyhow.
I'm asking you to risk for you
To be selfish
To try the stormy seas instead of sitting in the harbor because
You are not a two car garage with a beige house attached
You're a castle, stained glass windows throwing rainbow cut outs of stars on all the floors.
You are not a November drizzle,
You're a summer hurricane.
Even if you never choose me
I'm begging you not to let your love be mediocre
Not to let your life be.
I'm asking you to go for what you deserve
Instead of what you fall into by accident.
You deserve the moon and the stars,
The sun and the planets.
You deserve the richest, loveliest of lives.
Please
Find your adventures, find your passion.
Just cause it's here
Doesn't mean it's good enough.
Don't let your life be newspaper clippings
In some old scrapbook under a bed.
Don't let yourself get caught in a practical, faded existence
Just because it seems like the safe thing to do.
You are not grey and white,
You are every spectrum, like a prism,
And it would be a crying shame
To let this life
Contain you.

Draw like you want to beat the **** out of God for limiting the colour spectrum to something finite.

Write like the ******* paper is on fire and your pen is kerosene and it’s burning and you’re screaming but it feels so ******* good.

Realize you’re a ******* *****.

Realize everyone’s a ***** and the sun is only going to explode and the world is only going to burn and we’re all going to die in fire, but it’s only going to hurt for an instant.

But you love the pain, that’s why you beg him to paint you black and blue and make you bleed so you can see how disgusting you really are.

Remember that god has abandoned us all and Jesus died for your masochistic tendencies.

So, crucify me on your parent’s bed and **** me like repenting can save us.

**** me like you want to save us.

But what’s salvation to bruised knees and praying to the tune of incoherent screams and begging and pleading and Yes Sir and Thank You Sir and an ****** so hard your body joins your head in the clouds.

Learn languages and **** his **** in all of them.

Turn *** into art the way he turns you into his masterpiece.

Live like your biggest debate is whether or not to drink a pint of beer, or a pint of blood – and choose the blood every time.

**** yourself every second of every ******* day and remember that you’re alive and you’re not so well and never look your grave in the eyes until he tells you to.

Scrapbook every bullet hole you've kissed, keep mason jars for the dirt he rubbed your face in, plant a cigarette **** for good luck, always ask permission, remember you’re disgusting, remember you’re dying, remember you’re alive, remember love, remember passion, remember anger, remember this.

Ask me about my past
I'll unstitch every seam
Tear everything out and lay it all on the table
A scrapbook pulled from a house fire
I'll romanticize every bruise
I'm interesting

Ask me how I've made it this far
I'll show you every "I'm fine"
How I've welded it into an armor I can't take off
I'll turn every "I wish you were never born" into the reason you fall in love with me
I'm a liar

Don't ask me who I am
I'll try to tell you something from the heart, I will
But if you close the scrapbook and look up
You'll see that there's nothing left
I'll try to be something I'm not for you

But I'm nothing