It's like I can see it in my head
As you're texting the words to me
I can see how stressed you are
Your head in your hands
Pounding with frustration
Constant wheels turning
I can only imagine how exhausting it is
And I squirm and struggle to sit here
Because I can't do anything about it
Oh how I wish I could take you away
Teach you how to relax
Slow down time
Count each breath
Feel it
Fill your lungs
Feel me
Seize your stress
Let me work those knots
Lay you down and straddle your body
Kneed your skin and play with your hair
Ease your mind off those headaches
I can make the pain disappear
Dissolve away
I'll mold your mind into a warm balance
Nothing but my hands on your mind
Forgotten the outside world
Feel me
Awaken forgotten nerves
Feel it
Relax your muscles
Please
I beg
Let me take you away

i am not pretty because
p   r  e    t   t   y
isn't an adjective worthy nor suitable to be applied to me
Pretty does not make good
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Pretty is an inanimate unfeeling thing while
i am a life force--- a tornado or hurricane whipping through the air with riotgrrrrl gale force winds in the background, leaving pretty behind me in refuse
Pretty isn't synonymous with worth or good hearts.
Pretty isn't getting up in the morning and making breakfast for your  hungover friends
it isn't giving someone flowers just because you care
it isn't women in in trenches digging irrigation systems for villages
or building houses for strangers in another country
it isn't the first breathe of a baby in a midwife's arms
or the sound of women being liberated.
It has no sound at all.

I'd like to think that I am that feeling you get in the summer before a large thunderstorm rolls over the mountains
and pretty
                     isn't
                           that.
And in sparse occasions that I am deemed worthy enough a piece of meat to earn this verbal badge of honor-- 'pretty'
that feeling will never outweigh the hate and anguish my body went through to earn that
'compliment'
it will never outweigh the meals skipped
laxatives eaten
amphetamines snorted
or times my fingers have been shoved down my throat until the tips of them stung from stomach acid
my body is weary of me punishing it for someone Else's ignorance and my need to hear this silly word & my throat hurts from putting my fingers inside it
& i will be ****** if i spend another second of my life hating myself and hearing women hate themselves because we weren't told we were 'pretty' as often as we would have liked
So no, I will never be 'pretty' -- I will be much more.

perhaps I will bundle up
and read some Bukowski
and listen to the rain falling
-
perhaps I will daydream
of falling in love with you
of you falling in love with me

At this moment,
a candle burn.
For everyone that has been harm.
This flame of light represent the life,
that was ended through stupidity.

It's at this moment.
where racial hate seems to end for a second.
When people seems to come together and pray.

It's the right thing to do.
And it's the thing God would want us to do.
At this moment.
While the candle burn.

They stand in a bubble,
And everyone sees through,
But nobody sees in.
Their eyes only on each other,
See nothing.
They whisper,
things to make each other smile,
to make him sigh,
to make her blush.
Fingers teasing,
About each other’s wrists,
Grip each other’s hearts.
Sight; glazes, focuses,
In each others eyes,
Fusing in their minds,
Shivers down their spines.
Butterflies,
Flutter, sometimes flicker,
Often splutter.
Tease each others smile.
Skin; brushing, touching,
Straying, learning,
Each others faces, bodies, minds, lips.
Kiss.

The stars stare down from the heavens,
casting their judgmental glares
The heat of the night clings to my shirt,
making a drop of sweat,
send shivers down my spine.
An inhale of breath,
still sweet with summers smells,
Lights flicker in the distance.
Cities,
Homes,
Cars,
Wandering down the rocky path,
Sitting like we used to...
Memories strike with sudden vividness,
another night,
shared with her,
still smelling of summer,
hands wound tightly together,
lips sharing a soft touch.
Finding a place in the world,
even for a few minutes...
Trying to remember the beginning,
Avoid the ending...
Broken hearts,
Losing a girl,
Losing a friend,
Someone who understands...

Not feeling loss,
just lost.

It's almost sweet, the way she says
"Oh, no, we're not dating."
But all the while, a wink, a smile,
and over the lines we're skating
that separate a dinner from a date,
until she restates:
"Oh, no, we're not together."

But neither have we, since the start,
ever really been apart.

There's so much more that we could be,
but instead, I just hear you say
the same things again,
  and again,
and
    again
until possibly we find a day
when we come to believe
that the words on your heart
match the ones on your lips,
which you've repeated
until they became true.