four am

set spinning
by the way
you waken me to say goodbye
like a dismissed child
set spinning
by the drugs i've consumed
to try & get rid
of the memory of you
(& your hands on my body & face)
set spinning
by straining to stay away from you
straining
against the power of the pills i swallowed
to paint a better picture
stretched on a gravestone laughing at the sky
bleeding onto the stone
set spinning
by the lack of clouds
& goddamned beautiful music
& the touch of cold metal on my skin
the warmth of blood
& shitty alcohol
set spinning
by the lack of you
in my days & my nights
like a blanket removed
so i shiver all night long.

they say leave you

behind
like a bad dream
but oh
& it's so hard to let go
of dreams, once they have
taken root & festered
& tangled into my heart
like to still its beating.

i didn't want you to be like the others

your fucking face won't
get out of my head

nine times this morning
i thought of you and
turned that pain loose
on myself like a spear,
squeezed it tightly like
a knot,
where no
amount of untying
will ever loosen
my clenched teeth
the fake smile i give
to strangers when i pass

i make fun of people as stupid as i have been
the kind like dogs, who cringe away at
a blow
and later run back for the attention.

i remember talking, laughing
conversation
the kind about the type of men i like
i said i always ended up liking/loving
the ones who treat me like shit

you said you'd beat me, to keep the spark alive
and i laughed, because it was funny
but i'm not laughing now

masquerade*

welcome to the masochist’s ball
rent your whips and your chains
by the hour –
search down an empty-eyed partner
in a mask, blank –
faceless, smooth
and let her pour her rage into you.

when your stranger makes you scream

your stains will mark the pavement
like a murder scene.

chalk lines
are only found

in fiction.





*in my B.A. senior thesis, also

don't bother

i need stitches.
some things (never) change.

the reasons i couldn't leave you, at the time

kept waiting by the small and silly things -
the way her hair falls
from behind her ears, no
matter how firmly placed -
the way she breathes when she sleeps
curled into my neck
while the world outside
waits for me, i stay here
captivated by her movements
the small rustlings
of the covers as she moves
and yes, i have made a study
of this,
i have noticed
each thing
the motions even she
does not know intimately.

like (almost) a prayer

your voice like a hand over the phone line
to caress my cheek (like an unseen breeze)
love you, love you [not] - oh,
like it's ever a conscious decision - like
i could ever pin you down, and classify
this feeling (pit of stomach, a flutter) feeling
like time stands still - like love and hate -
the same intensity of emotion, simply
different ends of the spectrum.
like time stands still like stuck in mud
whenever our lips touch
whenever we mouth away our sorrows
and our yearnings.
let's say it's love - well
maybe but it's
hard to tell
when your hands touch mine, and
i turn away
(wanting oh so badly, but too afraid to try)
but i'm here, hold me -
make me believe.

i see through you

you can tell everything by the
clothing one wears
by the manner in which one
presents his case, his self,
the abrupt manner of his chopped syllables

public speaking

it's not a subject i tread lightly upon
the repercussions are still raised and indented
on my arm, however slight or harmless (looking)
but who am i to insist you not
broach these topics of conversation?
they broach themselves, insistent and loud
they want to be heard, yes
and sometimes i am helpless
to stop the tears, or streams of words

how to die (when already dead)

take a razorblade
attempt to carve your life story
into your arms
drink too much, and smoke
like a chimney

let your body think
you've given up on narcissism,
then
lash back out
and fail to breathe

turn colors
make the audience
gasp in alarm
wash, rinse repeat - (through the months)
make a habit of sleeping

in the street, praying for trucks



p.s.
this is modeled after a poem by Eibhlin Nic Eochaidh, called "How to kill a living thing"

you'll dance until your feet bleed

does this deep-seated need
become a dream, or simply fiction
alongside life? a truth
somewhat possible, yet
ever out of reach?
her small rustlings in the dark -
dreamlike yet perfectly played
the movements precise,
like choreography
the steps you learn by heart
in a stifling dance studio,
tracing shapes after the lights are out.

what we call "love"

if i believe your words - and i try -
what then? do i hold your body
closely, do i hear you whisper
and plead

so you tell me why you're crying
and you tell me why i slept
on the floor, before you dragged me
to bed, yes.

make your excuses
and when the abstracts begin to fit
i'll pretend to see the rest of the picture.

endings, beginnings, and obsessions

it's eventuality
we all have our vices,
the grips of passion
around our throats
it never ends

so let control go
give in to temporary oblivion
drug your way through
lose yourself in sex
alter your mind
if this world is mad, why
then i should be mad, also
to join it.

bent paperclips holding you together

the music is going
so you dance your part
you make your wishes
and if you get the steps right,
if the flowers are laid in your arms just so
then you'll be the ballerina
you always wanted to be
then you'll feel the part
of the graceful creatures
you always strove towards,
but always seemed to fall
somewhat short of.

merryfuckingholiday

small children run by, screaming
while mothers reclaim wasted balls
of wrapping paper, take back the
raped ribbons and bows
search for batteries, doubleA
toys and small trinkets lie
forgotten, and this is
supposed to be spiritual - everybody
let's pray to the god of vapid waste
and worship to the tune of rudolph.

anthologies of nothing

imagine the creamy pages
filled with type, my
words bleak against the
blank canvas. we peer
over his shoulder, fingering
the pages - they're a
van gogh smile, an ironic note
with a witty title
and a fucking brilliant ending -
yes, my words held bleakly
up to the light,
rejected punctually.

uninvited, again

a cup of tea
cold, grey skies
the wind speaks
through the trees as i
sit here, feet drawn up
in the familiar positions
left foot numb under
right leg, knees
close to my chest
(an oft - repeated tale
of mourning)
well

outside brings
darkening skies
i leave my hollow,
with wind - reddened cheeks.

history

let me tell you about this girl
i once, she once...
we sneaked out at odd hours
playing rapunzel with
towers, mirrors, and facades.
let me spin tales of our escapes
from families that
never gave a shit
we'll talk over the rain
and the angsty music on the stereo
about how life could be,
if only we could get it together,
hang on long enough to survive.
watch us scream,
look at the patterns.
fake sleep at one,
leave at two,
try to survive
until five finds us
sneaking back in.

darkhaired man

sometimes i can feel it,
over the phone
when you think your face
can't give you away
but you don't fool me,
i hear your smiling over the line
one step closer to a touch
of hand on my back,
a one-armed hug
caress of your hand on my face
i can hear you turn away
and when you speak,
you're smiling.

then i don't want your heaven

you tell me
you tell me about your hells,
and your demons
you tell me that blood
can save my soul - well
if that's true, i must be
saved a thousand times over
i've bled all over my pages
every single time i could -
i've bled to erase everything.
is my soul clean yet?

kiss Mirror day

i've written her countless letters,
balled into scrap paper
by my useless hands.
i have picked up the phone
a hundred times,
only to press the receiver down,
phone call
unstarted.
i burn to hear your voice.

your odes

i miss your curves, your curls
the small hand entwined in mine
like worship, like prayer
your hesitant fumbling
the quickened heartbeat
(your lips on mine,
scared, insistent,
but trembling)
you aren't just background.

rain on me

her words transport me to a time
when the bane of my existence
lay in a solitary stretch of road
my speedometer spelling illegal numbers
tears on my face
rain on the road
as i wrapped tightly
in my jacket and smiled

stupid girl

i love you
i do not say it enough;
i turn my head when you
mouth the words against my cheek.
close my eyes, i
cannot hold my heart in its place.
i hope you can read my mind;
its reasons, hows and whys.

inquiries into nothing

we culled smiles from strange places
from panicked people
whole lives strewn on the floor
pennies in a jar,
living fantasy lives with
the best of all possible worlds
as spiderwebs float across our paths
we stumble on
reeking of cheap liquor
and cheaper sex
girls stumble blindly as
the world revolves around again.

your bibliography

i could speak of love
in multiple tomes
(my words would still be insufficient)

soft small chords

used to think it didn't matter
when i pressed closely to your side
it was a small gesture,
nothing more.
days have passed...i hold
your skin with hesitant fingers
your touch is suddenly new
and nervous hands press lightly

but i don't know who you want me to be
or what

philosophy

well if heaven is your playground...
(then i'm not your kind of toy)

so what

and i've lain down on blankets
under stars, daddy, read my mind
tell me you know who i am now
tell me that everything's okay
like they do in the movies
tell me my world isn't falling apart
in graveyards, where death is the
inevitable beginning and ending
of life.
tell me daddy, why for
three seconds the world can't stay
still and breathe
daddy breathe like gasping for oxygen
under ones stronger than you, tell me
daddy
tell me daddy
if i haven't become you, and the
family is a broken shell of lies
and i don't encapsulate my mother
in her breadths and widths, or mind
then who am i

to speak of secrets

- i even
do not know how to unravel
my inner desires
a nameless conundrum
set by the gods
a small puzzle piece
impossible to fit into the picture

(i do not fancy myself useless
only ill-fitting)

second sight

as i lay on the carpet
the world undulated around me
so long, goodbye
i could feel it coming
i could taste it on my lips

i cried, "i feel dead."
tasted blood where i had
smiled dully and
cracked my mouth

and i do
(feel dead)

paint it black

these scars aren't new
been there for years, now
but it's useless to wish to
change the past
(and oh i've tried)
i've been attempting to scrape
clean the skin, and start over
with new patterns
i've painted my outsides
with the insides carefully
peeking through -
black ink mars my blank canvas
my scarred canvas
if nothing else, i can
attempt
to turn myself into art
and ignore the rest.
(my eyes catch in the mirror
at the unfamiliar lines.)

3,000 miles

i thought i saw you today,
close enough to touch.
my surreptitious glances,
my inquisitive stare
fruitless in eventuality.
i could have brushed you
with my fingertips as i
walked past -
but my hands his shadows
and all i have left
is a vague promise
of december
and hope

i lied

i did not dream at all
i spent the entire night encircled by strange arms
a warmth that seems to leave me
the second i leave, these days
these days


these days
hands touch my skin, teeth
tear me apart. i am no longer
who once i pretended
was the real me, the
beautiful facade scarred and bruised
by my terrible need to escape.
i do not know who i am.
i have become the shadow
seen in the night, the movement
your eyes notice, but when you turn
i fade into the background, unseen.

heart stopped

simple letters on the page,
three words, all focused
upon me.
i gasped; i must
have held my position
for over a minute
staring at the screen.





(i love you)

emails left on the telephone

needle marks in my skin
faint knives and razors
in place of blank canvas
i have not stopped
looking at my arms in years.
my fingers are worn
my head hung
against all the shame
associated with my (past?)
profession.
i cannot apologize
enough, or
repaint the picture
with a smoother
type of paint.

snake bite

my hands, on her thigh
moving the night through
close in sync, i held myself
together, the beat goes
my heart won't quit
she enigmas her past
and leaves me guessing
while we dance closely i
hold her hands, her
belly her face her
legs wrapped around me
we refuse to return, these days
to the past we tried to scrupulously build
(has no idea, they will never know)
can't ever imagine what they do not
want to see.

nothing to die for

get real, i said
nothing to live by
nothing to put your trust in
i said she never seemed to care
and she always walked away
when i needed to talk
i said she was never good enough
she always tried to keep things simple
and what the fuck was simple
in those days.
we walked as though undead
through unchanging moonlit nights
we wandered the streets in
desperate attempts to live
before life sucked us under.

no answer the machine picked up

i listened to her voice
over the speakers
cheerful, leave
a message
i'm lost in
my own world.

i could hear the piano in
the background. the phone
is faulty, i know she's there.
she plays the familiar chords
over and over in the afternoon
the sun penetrates the curtains to
spotlight her sheet music
i cannot enter this world anymore
i have no invitation, no ties left.
i cannot be sunlight to
enter into her sanctuary and i
cannot merely be the wind.

panic

it was nothing special...just a cloudy night
shot through liberally with stars
we sat on a cement sidewalk
we took walks
architecture hunting and visiting graves
the moon was with us
followed unseen through the darkened skies
as we lay
trespassing on labyrinths long covered
in layers of time and guilt
we spread out in
grim imitations of the past
i don't know how to recall that night...
in a glimmer of panic
a warm feeling
cool wind brushing past my face
blowing my hair into my eyes
i can't remember a time when
everything made sense.

dragging

last night
was a beautiful dream,
the kind you wake up from
and wish you hadn't
you curled by my side
a blanket to shield me from the world
i'm fragile today,
and yesterday
i put on personas like hats,
and watched mirrors
for the right reflection.

bohemian rhapsody

words are in vain when
trying to describe this
volumes have been written
upon less - a mere touch
of skin, a scent, a glance
yet i grasp your entirety
which leaves me speechless
we are more than this
we fill our spaces with each
other and fall asleep,
lonely, in empty beds,
when apart.
(my face cannot drop its smile,
which warms my heart
so that i could not be cold
in even the most sub-zero weather)

she's not here

and as i turn to tell you...
no one answers
the doorbell never rings
your lingerie refuses to hang
over the shower
and i see shadows
of your coffeeshop logic,
of you scribbling
frantically
we are split like
rotten fruit.
the basket's empty,
we spread
over the continent
butter, cream,
the game is over,
the players are gone.

admissions

the phone rings and
no one answers
the phone rings, buried
under stacks of papers
of last year's dreams
in the pile for the shredder.
the interns shrug and
let it ring. the
receptionist's
leaning against
one of the
counselors outside
sharing a smoky kiss
in the haze
of marlboro light.
last year's dreams in
small strips flutter
to the floor.

only imagine

i dreamed of pearls in mexico
buying the things we never could afford
trading parts of our hearts for tangible objects
but it was okay, okay,
i was with her.
we danced together in the clouds.
and as i knew that the bit players
would soon fade
i would stand in the spotlight
alone.
i can only imagine
a world such as this, where
i stand up alone
dancing for you

the same either way you look at it

i imagine if i stretch
my arms out, squeeze my
eyes tightly shut, grasp
the pillow
legs gripping the sheets tightly
i might be able
to smell him, to feel
his arms hold me
as i turn.
no amount of comfort can
feel like his presence
it was a mistake;
i stretch and flounder
against the wall
i imagine his excess of pillows
beside my body,
now dismally absent in this
new reality
the bed is cold;
i am alone.
i have not been alone in years.
now even a twin bed is
acres too big for my
fetally shaped sleep
devoid of warm limbs
intertwining with mine and
stealing the down comforter
which threatens to engulf me
in its mass
with his absence.

it's been a year

imagine that
a year
twelve months of....nothing.
and if you don't know, then
you never meant anything
you weren't worth any of it
not one single smile
or a tear
not a bloody caress
and the understanding that came
with mutual love of razorblades
death, rebirth, wanting to
die so badly that we lived...
no, if you do not read this
if you do not understand
then it was never worth it
everything was lies, pure
nicotine to keep me holding
onto your useless breath.

bother

and there was only
what i wanted.
love sex and god were
no more than background.
i reached,
never considering once
his side
thoughts, dreams,
whispered promises
to be unmade and broken in a single night.
i was a useless goddess
wanting my immortality back
and i took my worship
with harsh fingers.
i lost the importance of love,
and small moments
in his acquiescence.

sometimes, wings are only signs of former flight.

it was just a picture painted
of happiness
we both lay inside the frame
and let this facade go up
around us,
over the top
we put on a show
fooling all the right people
and weren't we full of shit
in those days, the
farce of it all.
we almost even believed ourselves
we lied
hoping that if everyone believed
it would be enough.

seduction 101

no longer innocent - simple
clasp of hands
turns into your face
gasping as you reached for me
holding my hands in yours
clenched so hard,
you trembled
your whole body
with a tremor
i stole that innocence,
slowly
the shaking faded.
but oh your face -
i see the vision
every time i close my eyes
feel your hands
a simple stroke of thumb
across my side and down my hips.

sickening

i'm not supposed to be
your perfect little slave
but i strive,
with alacrity.

it's just history

i'd burn the pictures that make me want to cry, but
after i was done
all i would be left with would be
a pile of ashes at my feet
scores of useless negatives in my hands.

sex and suicide

it's a sudden, rash decision
your body coming to collide against
the sharpness of a sudden
bang or burst or stop

and you know
you have to live with
the consequences.

gradation

i look back;
i am not the same.
a patchwork girl
pieced by time and by pain
ended; begun.
all these photographs i thumb
the memories locked away
in a receding wave;
memory as an ill tide.
the girl in these images
is not me.
she smiles and my mouth moves
in memory,
but no more
do i claim those freckles,
the sinuous curve of lashes and brow.
i am little more than mist
following images of home.
i sit
mailing envelopes full of
good news and cheer
announcing dates that seem
mere fantasy.
i fold them inside them
images of a girl
i do not recognize.

morning coffee

she has mercy on everyone,
like it's sunshine outside now
with clouds dripping away
into oblivion.

and we search for meaning
brilliant fragments we
delight in claiming
like the strangers
love us
need us

fuck us under the grim city lights
rape the ideas with
exquisite taste

stilettos and lace
morning coffee
and what you can make of
the hidden meaning
derive

night falls upon my face.
it is eleven.
we drive on.

slicksatin

if you could describe
the sweet agony of pointe,
as you stand there
admiring the shiny
pink satin,
i would respect you.
if you could tell me
of the pre-show blisters
and bleeding toenails,
i would sympathize,
tell you
my own horror stories
but quit
gushing over my shoes
when all you see
is a pretty silhouette.

waiting to run

he is ending me, slowly.
he smiles in the morning
a ghost of the emotion
a ghost of my father.
perhaps once, it was real.
maybe years ago, before
my breasts
my legs
the puppy love of
middle school
he looked at me,
really looked
and liked
what he saw.

homecoming*

leaning
on the sink, surrounded
by fuchsia tulle in my cramped,
pepto-bismo-pink-
tiled bathroom

i sponged concealer over
my wrists,
the makeup caking ineffectually inside

the raw, red weals. i

gave it up for a
lost cause, spent the night
hiding
behind
three jangling
silver bracelets




*in my B.A. senior thesis

masturbation in E# *

you string me out
like dirty hotel linen
where rooms go
hour by hour





*also in my thesis

infer

pain sharpens pleasure
brings me into you,
into me as we lie
entangled with
half-lidded eyes
caressing pain points
with soft fingertips
pressing bruises
harder, teeth
scraping necks
soft gentle thighs
with grasping hands
insistent lips
clashing teeth
so beautiful
shivers.

wishful thinking*

just once, i would love to stare
into that abyss of pooled silver,
that mirror, and see nothing
but myself. no imperfections or
indiscretions, simply me.
nothing more.






*this poem also made its way into my thesis.

"not bad for something completely unlike you"

my hands are
jagged, rough
peeling from
the way i treat you
like i push you
aside
some things
always reflect.
my hands have become a mirror,
and i do not like the reflection
that i see.
my soft, gentle hands -
how i miss them
it has been years, and
i am tired of shoving you away
of palming and pushing
while longing to pull towards
me, to be embraced.
of course, the city
enfolds me in its comfort
the bars, the lively darkness
lights leaping, yet i
am utterly alone
so alone.

alphabet the exercise

all buried, cold, dead
equilibrium frozen, gone.
heat immigrates
joy, kataclysmic
loved much, now omega-ed.
posed.
Quiet.
resting
Silent.
terrified, undying
verified while xactly
yourself
zero.

nothing more, i swear

she startles in front of me,
and i find myself trying
not to become her past.
i overcome emotions
with mere iron will
swing into place
the deadened smile
i will not languish
after you.

she comes to brush my shoulder
with her fingertips,
telling me she
saw me from far away
uneasy smile
beautiful skirt, face, body.
i turn and walk away.

disappointment

she sits in silence
thoughts pour across her small face,
as an open book.

and i know it impossible
for her mouth to tongue the affirmative
to kiss the yes of her lips

for katherine

she sits and shreds the napkin slowly.
it is noon.
she has waited for an hour.
the bottom of the cup
with its dregs of coffee
seems to wink up at her
saying, he's not coming.
but she knows this.
her book lies on the table
accusingly. she has not touched
it. she knows what she will
find in her own handwriting
in its pages.
the coffee shop door tinkles
and she looks up, not
really expecting to see
him. she is not wrong.
she looks away.
even the shop clerk knows
and she fingers the
print on her shirt.
"Dump Him."
the napkin lies in a
pile of finely ravished confetti.
she grabs her book and leaves.

peering in

the image is fuzzy, revealing
smiling faces - flushed and dazzling
one solitary moment
anticipation
and it has been so many years
the grinning people changed and
worn by time
worn into caricatures of the
portraits they once were.
like so many ancient photographs
you peer in, trying to make out
that pivotal moment, what
were they thinking?
were they as happy
as they seemed?
who are they?
searching the backs and corners
for a date, a name, a clue -
wishing you could dive into
the paper and experience
the moment,
become a smiling face
inside a photograph.

timing

10:19iamthinking
about a house, around a mile
away, with a comfortable bed,
(butmostimportantly) you
sleeping, blissfully ignoring
the rest of the world.
10:20ithoughtabout
skipping today, coming
to see you but i knew
i'd get caught so
10:21i'mwatchingnumbers
on a wall
glowing red death
ticking away the hours in
10:22hell.andthis
whole day has been one
giant trip
the entire school's on drugs
and i'm caught in the middle
10:23listeningto
Pink Floyd
what a mindfuck in these grey cinder block walls
the carpet filthy, ancient
depressing settings
10:24i'vemanaged
to create something
in five minutes.
voices laughing in the background,
yet no one speaks.

capture

your face stares
out of the 4X6 page
speaking foreign languages,
your face
is a riddle.
a year
after the moment, i can see
what you were feeling,
that exact moment you faced
an empty camera lens
my face, eager with anticipation
of capturing the photograph
of a lifetime.
you knew our future,
you turned
never bothering to hide
the pain you felt.
you knew it was inevitable.

that morning

and i am simply a fool
to be here; i'll regret morning
when it comes. but your fingertips
trail shapes in the darkness
pierced only by candles
and i feel your touch on my skin.

and yes; my skin
has missed you, i have missed you. i was a fool
to stay away so long. the candles
burn tiny flames into the morning
trying to stave away the darkness
but in the meantime - your fingertips

as the song sings, "your fingertips,
- anyone will do..." but not for my skin -
i need you - your face in the darkness
smiling, and my own smile in return; i'm not a fool
to be here after all, and the morning
is a brighter aspect lit by the flames of candles.

the candles
drip wax onto your fingertips
as you pinch the flames in the morning
leaving charcoal on your skin
but you don't mind; you're a fool
still smiling at the thought of the darkness.

i lay entangled in you. the darkness
encroached, and the candles
didn't help at all. "was i a fool
to think at all?" your fingertips
traced the beat of the song into my skin
and i hated to leave in the morning.

and this morning
is not a welcome change from the darkness
we so enjoyed, your skin
and mine together under the light of candles
as you trailed words with your fingertips
and the song is wrong, i'm not a fool

not in the morning, with the candles
mere nubs; the darkness and your beautiful fingertips
caressing my skin; oh no, i am no fool.

guilt

she still loved him
waking up in the night
to ache for his touch
and he was long gone
but she refuses to live with regret, vaguely
hoping to one day never need the tears
she says she will be happy
for the time she received,
but she cries at night,
soaking her pillow in bitter salt.
she pores over his pictures,
trying to interpret
the look in his eyes,
in her own.
was i happy, did he
know that one day,
i would leave?
she wonders,
tracing the line
of his jaw
was it meant to end this way,
was the entire thing
simply a mistake?

we have changed so much

how bitter it is
to watch our smiling faces
three years ago,
caught on tape
with our hope
etched into the negatives

commitment[problem]

please
do not doubt
the depth of my feeling
for you.
know instead it
is my scared heart,
running like mad,
so afraid of being
ruined
that it never begins
to live.
know that i hope i never run.
why do you think
i hold on so tightly?
in the middle of the night,
i am just as scared of me
foolishly leaving you,
as you, leaving me

apathy amounts to

i used to keep journals,
jotting my days until they seemed
to bleed into the paper.
you never realize that you
are dead
until someone tells you -
and you go back,
poring over the entries
one by one - i swear
i am alive...
when did it change?
when was i finally pronounced
DOA
when walking these halls...

numb

is it bad
when you can't feel yourself
at all?
i am beginning
to believe
i don't exist.

pear scent

here, these days
a touch is too much
my skin crumbles at the sight of you.
i can still see the scars
thin white lines we share.
you mean too much to me -
one Whisper and nothing else matters.
cold fingers pryed you away
they were mine, they were yours
anybody could have taken this.
our bond - too precious to last,
too painfully eloquent
with nothing but wistful smiles.
i wished and waited for time enough -
one long night to say goodbye.

while you were trying to mold me into someone else

and what a blasphemous
prophet am i
tripping out my destruction
in softly rounded letters
bitter regret for future
circumstances
and what was i thinking
who was i kidding
the dysfunction, tears
and angry silences
could never have constructed
a marriage.
i never could have played a
housewife right,
no.
you always knew who i
was, and i'm angry
yes,
so goddamned angry
that you never accepted
what you saw.

home

you were beautiful, leaning
against the barre - your
old home - how could you
ever have left?
and i suppose we all
wish we could be you -
to have a second shot
among the stage lights -
for it not to be too late,
for the injuries to
disappear...
to go home again.

Aphrodite Mourning

if it matters how many
years it has been, i care not
years are mere minutes, it
only happened minutes ago
his dark head bowing to the ground
blood pooling to create the windflowers -
and they are everywhere this season,
like cheerful reminders of my pain
beautiful stabbing heartache.
i am no more what once i was
my beauty lost and torn
among his final bloody breaths
in his death rattle and descent
into the underworld.
my tears have poured, trying vainly
to heal the eternal open wound.
ay, Adonis, lovely creature
you did not even hear me in
those final moments, you were
too far gone
to feel my lips caress you
for the final time.

self-reflection

i don't bother
looking in the mirror much
anymore;
i know
what i'll find.

tell me dear

tell me
pull me
pushing fingers
into my belt loops, hands
guiding my hips to look
straight into your eyes,
"i love you,"
the way we play
with grownup words
and infatuated glances
lips insistent
and oh-so-gratifying
we'll make love,
we'll lie together
and say "don't leave,
just stay for a while."
we'll be perfectly content
to be discontent
with the small amount of time
we have -
we'll gasp our goodbyes
with laughing eyes
and flushed faces.

escaping

it's a drowsy freedom
the early a.m. hours
low lights low on gas
low on everything else
low on life
we escape temporarily
stretching the hours
to fit our needs
wasting ourselves in
drunken bars
for meaningless hours
we drive to leave -
we should just keep
driving, we'd forge
something out of
the nothing we left behind -
but we return every morning,
sorrows half-drowned
in the night.

self-fulfulling prophecy

i seem
incapable
of becoming
anything other than
the jaded bitch
i've always
claimed to be.

you know it's over when

coming to the park,
searching vainly for the graffiti
that held your names, promising forever
only, you can't find it -
it's covered by more years of love, loss, and
cock jokes
you no longer remember the precise spot he carved it;
the blade is a distant memory,
the split a recent one.
you only want the evidence
to remain, you want everyone
to remember:
once, you were deliriously
happy together

is this it?

close my eyes...
my whole body shakes
dried blood morning,
broad daylight dried blood
on my arm. i didn't
bother washing it off.
my whole body
shakes i can feel it
close my eyes lie down
i can feel it, like drug
withdrawal, can't stop trembling.
as i'm curled here
on the couch thinking,
how sad would it be
for him to find me
here on his couch in
broad daylight,
i didn't take the pills with
food, i took too many.
give me an hour
i'll be...fine.

i'm okay, then.

"are you okay?" she asks me.
"define okay," i say.
"breathing."




what does it say about me,
that i live through being
close to death?
that sickness, pale flesh
is welcome?
death is becoming an
answer to the problem
that is posed by you?
go on, tell me what a SICK FUCK
i've become.

i don't do drugs, i just abuse myself

you know what started
the entire problem -
you never accepted me
as myself.
you painted portraits of me,
and made yourself believe
i was not the strung-out creature
you saw...
you refused to see me
as i was, scars and all
you pasted cover-up over
my wounds,
and fed me, built me up,
knowing all along
i was sure to fail.
when she pried me away
from you,
you just stood there, watching.
you knew all along;
i knew all along
i could never be your perfect girl.

trust me, there's nothing to believe.

my pain could do me in
or so could my blade.
two sharp jabs and long
draws up the arms
paralleling the veins.
bisecting the angry scratches
- my mutilated arms -
don't you think they're beautiful?
god
damn
fucking
beautiful?
call me selfish.
call me a poser.
i don't give a damn.

"happy"

i covered it all up
so i seemed "safe"
and if i'd had any idea
i would have tried deeper
harder
i would have been
perfectly sliced to pieces.

2 pills i took to keep from destroying myself

And i know this is fucked up
but now it's you i'm bleeding for
and if i were you i'd wear it like a badge.

romancing the blade

you're such a quiet companion
you only demand what i want to give
you need only what i desire
and i would give anything
to be alone with you now
we could let the blood out together
create beautiful slashes
colors i love...
red on white
i can almost feel the sweet agony
and i've gone for far too long,
ignoring your call,
my precious razor.

Liar*

i hold (or try) the twisted tissue
under my splayed, sticky fingers,
subcutaneously grasping
the slicksharp edge agony

sprawling in
a cemetery, waiting
for the flow
to slow
to walk back to my room, wrap
up in tight-tourniquet tape

have
no idea how
it happened, must have
accidentally hit
something, didn’t notice
when i did it
(god, that’s big)
at work, broken glass,
the cat scratched my arm…
scraped it
on the sharp metal trim
in my car, falling off. really.
i swear.





*also in my senior thesis. unlike many other poems also in my thesis, this went under extensive revision, whereas other ones i used mostly in their original state. i noticed while revising and re-revising my thesis, that it didn't seem to matter how old a poem was; some poems come out fully formed, and others start an idea that you later have to bring out of the original poem, and expound upon. no one hits perfection every time, especially without revision.

only just

i want to hold you
touch your hair, brush it
from your face
to see you,
knees drawn up in agony
i want to kiss your scarred arms
that took the blows for you
and hold you, in mine,
but
you don't know this exists,
that i can touch your secrets
from time to time,
and wipe your tears
as you sleep.

well

come on, then
say something
that doesn't sound like
you nearly choked
on the words.

you might

just a simple bloodshed argument.
a simple (ex) friendship
a lonely (half-)existence

i said you might have been the one
if only for a few different reasons.
and if my stomach didn't clench
when i saw you in the arms of another...
maybe then
maybe then i could lie
and say i was over it

repainting the pain

if it doesn't feel like a storm
a caked-on cherry mess -
a wristful of mental case -
i don't need a reason anymore -
i need to be alive, be here,
i need to feel pain to feel anything
i'm not sure i can feel anything else.

an intruder to your solace

i imagine that by the time you discover
what i have taken (many months later)
it will not matter that
i sought my broken pieces
left your refund money
and took them back...
i do not think you
could feel anything
but a rush of relief
one less thing to hear (feel)
consciously beating -
soft thumps that kept you awake at night.
you were too conscious of the trust
i once held in you
no. you will be all too glad to see them gone.

somehow

you've been gifted with the exactlyright way
of making me feel insignificant
stupid
(hardly worth the effort)

like bouncing off a wall

"forgive us, o life
the sin of Death"
- e.e. cummings



And forgive us, o death
the sin of life
blasphemous breath.

i can sleep when i'm dead

i was wrong after all...
i cannot give love
(since you will not take it)
but it remains, retreats
into my inner corners
shivers
(tries not to die of hypothermia.)