An ode to all the boys I have loved,
even just for a night.
The words would never escape my weathered lips, but loving you on those nights was more
than just a trip.

Pt. 1
you were my first kiss,
the first boy i felt i have ever missed.
like most people since,
the night our lips first met
was also the last.
with shaking hands you gave to me
those half melted chocolates and that
stupid teddy bear
your mother helped you buy at the store.
with nothing to give
i leaned in my 12 year old head-
you half missed
and ran giggling away

Pt. 2
you were the one who made me stand tall
but i was too afraid to fall
the only boy whose words were true
i almost let myself love you
wrapped in your arms
the world could not exist
we made plans & plans
so naturally i let
my bad habits and gypsy soul
take me away
to darker days

i can't remember the color of your eyes
and it kills me
2 years later i saw you again
it was dark in a room of a hundred people
and unknowingly i stood next to you
you talked of old times & i swallowed your words
along with that cinnamon poison.
we danced until oblivion knocked us down
and on that floor
i opened hell's door
exploring your mouth
like i've been lost for too long
your hands did the same
to my 17 year old body
and it brought to us notorious fame
i told myself it was just unfinished business
but really I needed to relive your kiss

Pt. 3
stuck in my old ways
i craved an escape
you were there that night
and my morals took flight
dancing in the dark
my mind fell apart
and i found myself kissing you
like i had been missing you
my messy eyes and liquid lies
told me i might as well die

Pt. 4
with you i tried again
to let myself go
your words seemed so true
but never did i know they could sting so cruel
in that old bed
with our old friends
you showed me what butterflies were.
drowning out the other ones
your shirt left sight
and you gave me another bite
too fast it seemed
i stopped to plead
because this is the first time
we've met
and your lies told me
you wanted to know me.
alone in the car
we kissed again
i never knew that would be
the last time
i felt i could fly

Pt. 5
to me you felt like a dream
every summer with you was atop lake serene
never sober
never closer
those drunken kisses
got me high every time
but i still wanted to climb
burned by the others
my heart still fluttered
i poured my soul out to you
over my grandma's old *****
and you never got my last name
for i feared one day you would say it in vain
that last summer i saw you
you told me you loved me-
i've haven't seen you since

Pt. 6
for now i almost have no words
you threw my heart at such a curve
always, from afar
i wanted you near my heart
and one day you made your way there
but let's be fair
you were drunk
and your mouth how it stunk
you were on those substances i could smell
you saw stars in my eyes
so i led you towards my sky
you kissed me then and there
i loved you like air was a foreign concept
and thought how wonderful it would be
to be the one you were thinking of

Pt. 7
I found you lurking at the bottom
of the ocean and I  let myself drown just
so I could kiss you but
they never tell you how it feels
to realize you are the wrong person and
I'm wishing I could
drag you back out to sea

Pt. 8
By this time I knew I had a problem
And you came out of nowhere-
Just in time to watch me tumble down
You grabbed me and instead of falling to the floor I fell into your lips and it felt so wrong I wouldn't wish it upon anyone

Pt. 9
I think you deserve more than a verse but darling we know time and there's no time for that
Shaking legs and shaky breaths in that old room with the furnace burning way too warm
You were everything in that moment and I haven't stopped thinking about it since

I would tell you I can't go to bed because
hell is loving you in my sleep and
waking up alone
and that i'd rather never sleep again
than to live through that

I would tell you that every time I open my mouth
I want you to shut it
with yours

I would tell you that you have
the kind of glance that could crack
a ribcage
and make it feel
like heaven

And I know it sounds cliché but
your breath is the water that floods
into the roots of my stomach and grows
the daisies being kissed
back into you

If I had a lover I would call these
nauseating churns
"butterflies"

If I had a lover I would think of this
infection in my head
as "you're the one I can't live without"

If I had a lover I would tell you
being lovesick
doesn't actually make me sick

And if I had a lover
I would need to learn not to **** myself
in the process

You are the sun
And I am the moon.
I will chase you around this world for eternity-
*But you will never be caught

I don't know what I'm saying but it's 2:04 am
and I just dry swallowed the last
of my sleeping pills.
I'm not sure if I want you here
but I'm not sure I don't
I wake up with glimpses of you when
I close my eyes
And even though I think I
I left you in my dreams
You're here-
Sometimes I wish you would stay there
because I can't stand waking up and feeling
your absence when I never had you
in the first place.
I'm driving in circles and
screaming out your name
FEEL IT
JUST FEEL IT
Tell me if you thought of me when you saw
your father smoking his cigarette and
if you laughed when your glass hit the floor
or if you stomped all over the broken pieces
until they became a part of the ground.
We're lying in the basement and
I'm unfamiliar with the anatomy of
falling for someone
but I can hear the way your breath
is shaking and the uncertainty
is strangling me

Here comes the feeling I thought
I'd forgotten
Steadily rolling in with gray skies
and crunchy leaves
My hands they shake
My head it spins
Engulfed In a circle of nights I don't
want to end-
but the moon is always here
A clear head is something  out
of a fairy tale
And nothing is stopping me from picking up my poison
and back tracking
I know everything you don't want me to and
you make hell
feel
like
home
Welcome back depression-
it's been awhile

I'm finding it rare to breathe
with ease and you see
it's nothing new-
  my days with you have flooded into every dream and every word that I speak.
I've never been good at math and I hate
that I love it in the way
the curve of your back
is congruent
to the angle of your mouth
and it fits perfectly
into the ellipses of my beaten lips
r u n n i n g
only gets you so far when the world
is round-
I'm sorry I have to leave
because my words don't form
when those rousing fingers
are tracing secrets into my thighs
and you don't know this but
writing is the world that wholly
consumes me
and maybe it's kind of
an esoteric thing-
But I must live without love
because they say
if you can't be the poem,
B E  T H E  P O E T
besides,
haven't you heard
all the greatest loves
are the unfinished ones?

They say I'm too young to be this full
of the world
but really, I have no room left
because you see
I fall in love a thousand times a day-
I saw you double take the leaf getting
crushed under your fathers feet and
I think you felt sorry for it
The breath cut short before a laugh
And the quivering of a mouth when you don't know whether you should laugh or cry.
You might as well slam me into a brick wall when
I hear someone sing
and today I walked by a man with a guitar and
felt the wind get knocked out of me//
it was the most heart wrenching thing-
he had your hands
and lately I've noticed
when you see me you no longer have
to catch your breath and if you want me to say
i'd do anything to make you stay
you'll be waiting
the rest of your life

I remember sitting there
with your hand
resting upon my leg  and
the warmth beneath it
was enough
to heat the whole city
And I thought to myself
this is it, this is it, this is it

**that was it

You see I haven't wanted to write
Since you've been gone

You had the kind of glance that could
Break a neck
And with that you dug into my soul
And drew words out of my lifeless chest

And now I am sitting here
Against your cold cement wall
And I don't know where to start

I find myself holding onto the phantom hand
That had so often found a home
Resting on my leg
I look for your ocean lined eyes
Everywhere I go
And I think of you
With everything I do

It's not fair that you're gone
And I have to live
But
S l o w l y
I
Think
I'm
Forgetting
How..

Your name is pulsing  through my veins but
I've lost the ability to bring it to my lips-
ten thousand people wouldn't care to say
it right out loud and
I'm watching you walk away knowing
my life could be so much different
**if I could just ******* say your name

Don't ask me why my hands are shaking when
the rain just put out the last
of my cigarettes and i can't find my
keys because i misplaced them while looking for  the dark green lighter i found last night
in the wet grass of the house you said goodbye in.
I'm becoming shorter of breath the
longer I stand here
and these cobblestone skies are closing in on me and God knows this is the last place
I want to be stuck
Pick any house on the map
and I'll tell you what's happened there
and how many beer cans I crumpled
in the musty garage
or how many times my hand has grasped the doorknob of a bedroom
I'll tell you that the yellow house on the left side of 163rd had me laughing until I no longer
thought I was in my body
and I'll tell you that
the yellow house on the left side of 196th
had me wishing I never existed
at all
Inside white walls I took too many hits and
the smoke built up on the walls so thick
I had no choice but to stay
the night in your arms
In between wooden panels and a seemingly impossible staircase you kissed me
up
every
step
and going back down seemed like a sin
i absolutely
could not commit.
By now I am in an all too familiar place
to be feeding off old habits
so I break away from those bitter lips
and I run out to the same woods
I've seen a million times-
And I know that this is what makes this home

1.Writer’s Block: “the condition of being unable to think of what to write or how to proceed with writing”
2.Writer’s Block: “a consoling phrase to get sympathy from others, who actually don’t give a (****) about your editor’s deadlines”

I’ve told you before I’m a night owl
It’s the longest part of the day and it was when I got to be loved by you.
I always wanted to try new things with you, but I didn’t have a headboard.
Maybe that was the whole problem.
I told myself the puppet strings would guide me,
But that’s not their purpose.

Where you’re going I can’t follow you
take me where your ocean finds it’s blue
But where you’re going- I can’t follow

i’ve sat here so many ******* times with a pen in my hands and
for the past 2 years i’ve been writing with invisible ink
They say writer’s block is temporary and as I’ve learned,
Everything is-
And I’m sorry.

To Whom It May Concern: the next 10 (?) parts never ******* mattered (besides you)
Sometimes the editor won’t be able to see the piece for what it really is and you see deadlines are a funny thing-
When you finally reach them,
they’re declared dead

But like they say,
Love is colder than death.