professor told me the chemicals and minerals in this paint could leach toxins into my skin if I let it stay on the surface there
but the way I see it I've picked my poison
either it's paint on my skin or you on my mind

Time remains negligent to desire and necessity, tumbling away, thieving choice.
Absence and plea linger in the vastness formerly home to love and anticipation.
Torment lurks, prowling, creeping, and waiting. Its talons prodding.  
Sickness twists and churns at the mess that has become my core.
Anguished reflections of life or revelation in this infertile void
Fraught inaudible cries like howling winds unable to spin out.
Amassed coveted control.  Now Impotent.  Wasted.
Futility absorbed by unventilated internal infernos.
Pleading for relief that is not to be.
I remain. Barren.

Poem a day, day 12*

Heat radiates through me.
the heat of summer
The heat of an unventilated apartment
The heat of passion

And I love it
And I hate it
The powerful burning
Intense and overwhelming

the strength of the heat excites me.
No release from it exhausts me.
But if I had to choose
I would choose the heat.

It stifles the mind
and intensifies the body
Enhancing every sensation
Making me aware of every part of me.

Rather overwhelming heat
Than cold death
Where sensation is drained
As your body goes numb.

In this heat I am truly in my body
I honour it as I search for relief
Trying to escape it and revel in it
At the same time

But it's ok
The heat will come again.

crystal shards
in ripped leotards
what is worst
than unquenchable thirst

She screams
perpendicular unicorns
with unventilated horns
is she heard?
not a word

She screams
wearing a smile
all the while
with her lips
stitched -
looking pretty
hiding the *****

She screams
inside her spaghetti
larger than a storming Yeti
what is colder
than dreams growing older?

stewing in my own juice
stuck in the box of unventilated heat
waiting for the buzzer to go off
before someone releases me –
and they only do to cut me up
in one-inch cubes