this is what you wanted and
this is what i got
this is for the things you said
that you thought i'd forgot
this is for the other life
i was supposed to lead
this is for the little girl
who grew up to be me
this is what i wanted
this is what i had
this is how a happy child
grew up to be sad
this is for the other girl
i was supposed to be
this is not the life i wanted
this is not a dream



i have forgotten

our eyes meet along
the seam of my sleeve.
we say nothing.

i have been gutpunched.
it has been a long time since someone
has looked at me like this.
it has been a long time since anyone
has seen me like this.

but i have forgotten.
that is all.
i have forgotten the rules that they follow
this side of the blade.
and i am frightened.
i am easing my way back into a serious disorder
that once swallowed me whole
and what's worse, i am glad
that i am back.

so far there is no
serious damage being done
but i can see stitches in the future
and a gash reaching down to the bone.

but there is no one i can talk to.
there is nothing i can say.
nobody knows that i am back to
being this way.

i am sick with being unable to speak.
i offer up my wrists, muted, beneath
long sleeves.

i think i sleep.



don't touch me

don't touch me
don't touch me
don't

please
please stop it

i don't like this
ungiven invitation to my
flesh
i don't like the feel of
someone pressed against me
when i want to be
alone

please stop it
i can't handle
it
and i don't like it
not at all

please leave me
oh why won't you
please leave me
alone



men only seem to like me when they're drunk

men only seem to like me when they're drunk
when sober they begin to put up walls
i haven't bit my nails since we fucked

my brother threatened me, i pushed my luck
he tried to run you over with his car
men only seem to like me when they're drunk

when i'm upset i make myself throw up
you never knew my problems went that far
i haven't bit my nails since we fucked

the venue was too small, i couldn't duck
my brother struck me down with his guitar
men only seem to like me when they're drunk

my body came alive beneath your touch
i look for you when i go to the bars
i haven't bit my nails since we fucked

but that was weeks ago, now i am dust
there's nothing i can do to make you call
men only seem to like me when they're drunk
i haven't bit my nails since we fucked



things haven't been the same since we were two

i've had enough - believe me, we are through
we used to stand as kings - those days have died
things haven't been the same since we were two

i said too late that i'm in love with you
but when i told you i got no reply
i've had enough - believe me, we are through

i gave you my virginity, it's true
we fucked the day i got hit in the eye
things haven't been the same since we were two

you gave me up in choice of someone new
and in those years i thought that i would die
i've had enough - believe me, we are through

i drew you pictures when you had the flu
i can't forget the day i made you cry
things haven't been the same since we were two

yours was the best love that i ever knew
but you have left and i am still alive
i've had enough - believe me, we are through
things haven't been the same since we were two



i don't know where you end and i begin

my god, i'm at a loss - i stick my pins
you used to decorate my hair with leaves
i don't know where you end and i begin

an older sacrifice for newer skin
i search for safety cloaked in cruelty
my god, i'm at a loss - i stick my pins

you wanted a tattoo of safety pins
it's got to where we're having the same dreams
i don't know where you end and i begin

you understood the trouble i was in
and left me standing bloody in your jeans
my god, i'm at a loss - i stick my pins

when i was lost you found me drinking gin
and picked me up half-dead from the debris
i don't know where you end and i begin

you threw away the way things could have been
i spit whenever i walk past our tree
my god, i'm at a loss - i stick my pins
i don't know where you end and i begin



i cross my heart and hope to die

i scream in anger at the sky
you said you loved me but you lied
i cross my heart and hope to die

the same stars shine on you and i
between us lays a great divide
i scream in anger at the sky

a moth is not a butterfly
i promised you that i would try
i cross my heart and hope to die

so many unsolved homicides
for which you had no alibi
i scream in anger at the sky

remember when you licked my eye?
you promised me i'd be your bride
i cross my heart and hope to die

and now i'm close to suicide
you left me and i don't know why
i scream in anger at the sky
i cross my heart and hope to die



endsville

i dig at my skin 'til my arms are raw
i wait by the phone but you never call
these are the things i can't forgive
they call it endsville where we live

if you look at the sky you can see the moon
the newspapers say that she died too soon
there are cracks in the mirrors and holes in the streets
there are lies in your eyes, there is blood on my sheets

nothing was said that was ever done
in endsville you can't see the sun
the playgrounds all are poison cracked
where houses stood, there now stand shacks

these are the things i can't forgive
they call it endsville where we live
the air is wasted, no birds sing
they fly aways on broken wings

there's nothing lost that can't be found
these days i stand on sacred ground
with arms stretched wide, i scream to pray
that someday i'll forget your name

where trees once stood are gnarled roots
i fold myself in solitude
these are the things i can't forgive
they call it endsville where we live



juliet rising

i pluck out my eyelashes one by one
and scatter them out to the sleepless gods
in hopes of living my life in the sun

i fold paper cranes till my hands are numb
and even after my fingers are raw
i pluck out my eyelashes one by one

i think it's the desert that i came from
when i rose from the dirt i stood in awe
in hopes of living my life in the sun

there are delusions to which i succumb
but i didn't die and i feel like a fraud
so i pluck out my eyelashes one by one

as i try hard to alter what i have become
and discredit these terrible things that i saw
in hopes of living my life in the sun

and so here is my offering, here is my gun
these bystanders caustically applaud
as i pluck out my eyelashes one by one
in hopes of living my life in the sun



july 2007

time and time again i stay up too late
stalking msn and listening to french pop music
as my eyes grow heavy and the sun peers behind
the garbage bags taped to my window.

it won't make it's way through.

my contact lenses dry out and you don't show up.
i bury myself in the suicide of teenagers
who were born in the 90s
as i stand here silently, and cringe at my age.

medication is not enough
to bring me back to better days.
time is doing something funny, it goes by too quick,
and i don't get a summer.

i don't know how to live.
my hair grays.
there is nothing to say.



down here we float

i've been run ragged coast to coast
when i hated you, i loved you most
he thrusts his fists against the posts
and still insists he sees the ghosts

an empty pocket, ragged throat
you never liked the things i wrote
you'd hold your hand up, then you'd quote
"don't you know, down here we float"

don't you know down here we float
some safety pins, a leather coat
he thrusts his fists against the posts
and still insists he sees the ghosts

he thrusts his fists against the posts
our every fight would end in blows
though it's been years, i still suppose
that he insists he sees the ghosts

it's all my fault, the things i chose
have meant our end is coming close
i'm fucking stupid, this i know
but i take solace in my growth

don't you know, down here we float?
i've been run ragged coast to coast
he thrusts his fists against the posts
and still insists he sees the ghosts



from the west

she is calling me from
the west,
without words.
i can feel the draw of her
in my skin, and

oh, my bones
they ache with a
hate that
dates back to when i was twelve

no words.
and i can't shake the feel of
being enclosed in the walls
of someone else.
it's been too long.

now i stand outside myself,
third-party desensitized and
i can smell you in the closed ward.

hair,
hair gripped in my fist and
resting on the floor.
my stress technique
like i could pull you out of
my thoughts.

the threat of someone else
is always there.



i stand with friends but walk alone

i am not calm, i don't forgive
i once was dead but now i live
reborn and made of sticks and stone
i stand with friends but walk alone

i rose up dripping from the sea
when i emerged i skinned my knee
this time around i start to pray
and turn my face to better days

i look to you to tell me why
it did not work, i didn't die
despite the drugs that i was on
i don't forget, i am not calm

these are the things i've never told
now i'm alive and i grow old
completely gray at 26
reborn and made of stone and sticks

the love i had was not enough
what now is smooth, one time was rough
you wanted more than i could give
i am not calm, i don't

i burn my bridges one by one
and turn my face up to the sun
reborn and made of sticks and stone
i stand with friends but walk alone



august 2008

when i was fifteen they put me away
because something in me turned
and i couldn't sleep or do anything
but feverishly write in a blind panic

i am twenty six and things
aren't going well at all
i twitch and i twitch
and i think of slit wrists
and the glory of a noose and a string

i've gone mad with medicine,
i've been medicated and it still
didn't stop me from slicing at my skin
and going around empty and unable to speak

i put up a good front
for all it matters
i make it seem like i'm okay
but i fake and i fake

and i'm running out of money
i'm running out of one good reason
to keep it together
i must get out



in this cold (january 2009)

in this cold
i could almost be someone else.

from the red spot on my neck
where my scarf didn't tie through
to the graying skin that callouses my right hand.

it could be someone else's coat.
this isn't the hat i've had for twelve years.

the gloves are new.
i bought them that way -
fingerless.

it makes it easy to smoke.
it makes it easy to pretend i'm in the 1920's
and that my weight is acceptable.

these days i walk as far as i can away from my house
because i want to be somewhere else.
the cold does not bother me.

it's the trees, stretching across an empty sky
that do me in.
it's almost obscene

the way we walk in the snow and avoid each other's names.

there is a hunger in me
that can't be filled.



i don't grieve anymore (january 2009)

i don't grieve anymore.
i have brushed off the dust of an old love
and put it back.

my shelves are still full of books.
there are flowers dried with age residing in these broken spines.
i cannot throw them out

but the letters i wrote and never sent are gone.
i've trashed the lot.
there is nothing in them i want to remember.
that girl is dead but i still carry her
and there are things i can't forget.
spring comes and she
wrenches her cold hands around my heart.

this is the only thing left about us that hurts.



triggers (may 2009)

i hold my triggers in my hands
my triggers, words that could cause me to fall
at the drop of a hat.

i am overly sensitive. i know this
but i still come back to where i am not wanted
to where these memories cling like dusty curtains
on a broken window.

these are the things i don't want to see
so it's easier to shove them away.
this is the root of my illness.
this not wanting to face what i should be able to
stare straight at, this sun
that warms my room.

i have been away for too long.
i have been away and nothing remembers me anymore.
oh, i am old. i am not sixteen anymore,
nor seventeen, nor twelve.
i am not the same girl i used to be
and this change aches in me when it rains,
i can feel my bones tighten when i read the wrong words.
i shy away from the books that used to be my friends
and i lay, petrified wood, stone girl,
but i do not forget.



it came as quite a shock (may 2009)

it came as quite a shock
that when i woke up all the doors were locked
and though i tried to scream and shout
there was no one to let me out
i stayed inside for seven days
i did not eat i could not pray
i broke my nails on the wall
i clawed the door i tried to crawl
i was only twenty three
and when they came to set me free
instead of hair and graying skin
they found instead a skeleton



are the bees asleep? (may 2009)
are the bees asleep?
is it safe, clarice, for us
to go outside?

i know you are not dressed well.
your socks are worn through
but i can see they are clean, clarice,
although your dress still hangs
unravelled at the seams above skinned knees.

this is a time of gathering.
i scoop flowers into my arms.
my wrists, my hair,
nothing remains unadorned.

but i could not go out today.
the bees appeared when i approached,
small warriors nudging against the grass.

see, they say it's hereditary
and, having never been stung,
i don't know if i'm allergic
and i don't want to find out.
so i backed away.
i backed away and let them
vampirize the pollen.

now a rosy dusk has descended.
the air hangs cool against my cheek.
is it safe, clarice, for us
to go outside?
because every year i say it,
that i will pick the forget-me-nots that cluster,
blue against white, in my backyard.
i never end up doing it
which is why i tried to today.

but are the bees asleep?
or, when i go out, will they catch me as i pluck the first stem
and sting me into some hazy, summer coma?



no man's land

in the space where tree meets sky
there is a place where dead men lie.
it is not slack, the rope is taut,
no one survives the ten foot drop.

there are no stars to wish upon.
you're always right, i'm always wrong.
the grass is dead beneath my feet.
we meet along a dead-end street.

the hollow ring of empty bones,
the silence of the telephone.
all of the mistakes i've made
are balanced by how much i weigh.

i've never been that thick of skin.
i've always been too sick and thin.
no weight is ever low enough
so i throw up in paper cups.

a rotting bag of food resides
beside the bed in which i lie.
a hundred days of hunger pangs
this is the way that all men hang.

there is no light, just broken glass.
it's spoken that all things must pass.
i have no eyes, now here i stand
on bloody feet in no man's land.



these are the things i don't do anymore

there is the obvious, of course.
this is why i don't keep razors
in my bathroom.
this why my mother has them
carefully locked away
and why i have to ask
before i shave my legs.

i own six pairs of scissors.
the light shines on them in
an odd way when i'm not right
in the head.
there are knives in the kitchen.
i try not to look at them.

tweezers, thumbtacks,
broken glass.
anything can make a gash.

after awhile, you start to get creative.

i used to buy certain pens because
you could snap a part of the plastic off
and that provided a sharp edge.
things like that.
anything plastic, you can snap it in two
and cause some real damage to yourself.

i nearly bled out one day because of that.
i had to leave work with blood dripping down
the sleeves of my best shirt.

i have memorized the floors of
all the bathrooms of all the places
i have ever been employed at.
i would leave my cubicle so i could
cut myself in the toilets.
i had to memorize them.
cleanup is essential in the workplace.

i had it down to a system.
if my shirt was dark, i'd cut my arms.
if my pants were black, i'd cut my legs.
i'd cut and i'd cut and then i'd
frantically clean myself up and
go back on the phones.

there were times when i'd cut too deep and the blood
would seep through my clothing.
i'd be typing up notes and i'd feel something warm.
i'd look down and blood would be pouring out
from under my sleeves and onto my hands.

i was an occupational hazard and
no one knew it, even though i was clean.

even now, i know at all times
exactly what i can use to hurt myself with
no matter where i am.
i became an expert at makeshift bandages

but i was never one for peroxide.
i never cleaned my cuts.
i hoped for infections and i got them.
i would grit my teeth when my
sleeves brushed against my cuts
but that was what i wanted
and that was what i got.

every day i want it more.
the urges never go away.
i didn't know that when i started
it was something that would stay.
how could i have known?
i was sixteen and looking for a way out.
i was sixteen and i was in pain.

i didn't know it would get out of control.
i didn't know how bad it would get.
by the time i found out, it was too late.
now i am twenty eight and i would give anything
if i could only go back and rip the blade out of
that stupid little girl before she began
what would ultimately become
a series of hospitalizations, stitches,
and an inability to wear short sleeves
without people looking at her in
sheer, stark horror.



body dysmorphic disorder

i make myself sick.

there are days when i am
ashamed to leave the house,
i hate myself so much.

i am pretty on the
inside. i know this.
but my insides don't match
my outsides and i am
ugly on the outside.

i don't deal well with that.

my arms are made of scars.
i am fat and have no clothes.
it's little things like that.
for a year, birds lived in my hair

but the worst is my face.

i have taken a pleasant expression
and pinned it up into a smile.
metal rings cover my lips.
staples bridge the gap between my eyes.
barbed wire covers the rest.

i am tired of being the amazing scarred girl.
for once i wish i was a beauty queen
with a lopsided tinfoil crown.
then, people would smile at me
instead of backing away,
completely and utterly repulsed
by what i have done to myself.



wreckage

the shopping-cart apocalypse
was where i first saw you,
huddled next to some
garbage cans.

you were wearing stolen rags.
i know because you stole them from me.

when i left the house
i left for blood.
i left looking for a
good use to put this razor to
that wasn't myself.

my arms bear the brunt of ten years.
i left looking for something else
like a clean slate
like a blank canvas i could re-create myself on.

my ankles are worn out and
my heels are worn through.
there are tears along my skin
from going barefoot.

i don't have any shoes.
you stole those from me too.

but when i closed my eyes, you vanished.
when i opened them, you weren't there.
all i saw was metal
smoldering against a blackened sky.

there are no words for when
i will find you.
i will rip the head clean off your neck.
you are in every crowd but i
can't find you.
you disappear and i am left here
with ash in my mouth.

ash in my mouth,
copper.
the hate of seven languages
fills me when i am
in danger of forgetting
who i am running from.
my bones, ripping through my skin.
i am fourteen again and
alone in this world.

it will be two years until i meet you
and you pull me out of this wreck.



survival

they say that in order to survive
you have to get rid of the anger
that brought you there
but i don't buy into that.

it wasn't anger that brought me here.
it was a chance encounter that left me
shaking and unable to eat.

when i think about it
alarms go off and my head starts to
put up the locks.

therapy isn't really helping with that one.

but for a long time i wasn't angry.
i didn't know how.
and now that i'm finally accepting anger
i am being told i have to put it away.

this is called being put back into a
restrictive environment.
this is called healing.

this is bullshit.

there is no box to put this away in.
i have lived in one for too long.
i have been brought back to life but
the pieces weren't put back the right way.
before i was a shell of a girl but
now i am flawed.

i don't know what's worse.
not being able to feel,
or being able to feel,
and being told that it's all wrong.

i just want to keep what is mine.



secrets

the stench of secrecy is as familiar to me
as my own skin,
scarred as it is.

the ache in my wrists -
my arms cry out in a peculiar way
and there are things that i am not supposed to say.

one day i slit my wrist so badly
that it took weeks to heal.
ever since i have taken to
wearing my watch around my right wrist
because the left was so infected
that even the brushing of my sleeves
against the wound made me ill.

when i was in the hospital i would
curl up on my window-sill
and look out at a city foreign to me.
i stayed up writing poetry at a
frantic pace.
that was when i was fifteen and
i had no choice. i ended up
five hours away with a
threat to keep me there.

for twelve years i blocked out
the details of my first
suicide attempt.
when i remembered i was
so scared that i turned white with fright
and i shook all night with the
memories.

i should not be here.

these are the things i've never told you.



if i am star

if i am a star . . . . .
but i am not.

i am only known as
someone else's sister.

i am not me.
i am words, words, words
and too many thoughts,
but not flesh.

no, not flesh,
although i bleed like any other girl.

if i am to be anyone i would be the girl
seen through your eyes
but i am not.

instead i am cleverly disguised, hollow,
and completely without a purpose
to see me through.



i am tired

i am tired
and i am tired of being tired.

i avoid going out because
it drains me.
i am slowly severing my ties with
the outside world
with the anticipation of leaving
it behind.

quiet.
all i want is quiet,
surrounded by silence and
without the obligations of
speech.

once i thought i was
strong enoug to beat these
demons but i was wrong.
you cannot outrun what is
rooted inside of you.
all you can do is hope for
a distraction to help ease the
transition from sick to well.

but i am not well anymore.

i am not anything.

i am flesh, all flesh,
with a heart that will not
stop beating no matter
what i do

but i want it to stop.
if i can only still the quiet
inhalations that show that
i still require air to breathe
i will be happy.

i cannot last another
fifteen years like this.



you touched me and i can't forget

i thought i had gotten rid of
every picture i had of you
but i was wrong.

when i opened my book
there you were.
i slammed it shut but i
cannot get away from
your eyes.

i can still see them through
the haze of your mask.
"what do you see
when you look into
my eyes," i asked.
you had smiled and said
"myself."

i don't want this anymore
but i still want you.
i don't want these feelings unless
you will let yourself have
the same ones for you.

i haven't heard from you in days.
this is what is called friendship.
this is what is called staying in touch
in an electronic age.

once you've known something
it's hard to get back to the
person you once were
and i wish i could go back to
being myself

but i cannot.
you touched me and i can't forget
the way you touched me.
i felt like i was finally worth something
but i was wrong.

and i am always wrong.



i am trying to

i am trying to take
care of myself but it
seems like everything
i do is wrong.

over and over again it seems
like i am disappointing the ones
i love best when what i am actually trying
to do is protect myself.

you seem to want someone who will
do everything you say and at first
i said, okay, we still have fun
but now i am tired. how can i
drag myself out to bars when i can
barely drag myself out
of bed?

this isn't the way it's supposed
to work.

there is more that i can't handle
than what i can.
there is more that i can try to say
and fail every time in getting
my words across.

or maybe it is symbolic.
i seem to be disappointing you
the same way everyone ends up

disappointing me. i've had enough.



this masochism

this masochism
is not new to me.

nor is grief,
the inability to scream
although i grieve.

you see,
there is a hole in me
and i am a person consumed by need.

i do not eat.
instead i feed on the attentions of men
who leave after a week.

when i was three i admitted defeat
to a world not big enough
to hold me.
what happened at twelve was put on a shelf
but i sneezed and it came down
with a sob and a shriek.

there was no one to look after me
so i turned to self-injury at the age of sixteen.
i did it quietly
so no one could see.

i have dreams where she comes after me.
hide and seek,
i do not sleep.

instead i rage and i rage
because what i want is to
open these veins.

i am a fake and
undeserving of praise.
braids, braids,
of braids i have eight.
i don't eat, i don't sleep,
i've been here for a week.

i don't know when i'll be released
or how to kill this thing in me
this masochism is not new
i used to cut but now i puke
i got away at age fourteen
i'm twenty seven
now i grieve.



i have tried
i have tried for
much too long.

i adjust my personality to match
whoever i am with at the moment
so that i am never at risk
of being that quiet one who
does not say word

although
god knows that i've been her for long enough.
shining takes a lot of out you.
sometimes i want to stitch my mouth shut
so that i would not have to own up
to the responsibilities of speech.
v i thought that being nice was
enough to get me noticed
but it all ends up to a one-sided
conversation where you don't
get to say a word.

i am angry at my mouth.
it has betrayed me too many times
so i pierce and i pierce and i pierce
away at the flesh in some sort of
awful sacrifice - o let me appease
the gods of the larynx and
keep my little girl voice.

i try as hard as i can to
be somebody else but no matter
how much i throw up
i still stay the same size.
our lady of the rib cage has
only passed me by and i
wish i was emaciated

but i am not.
i am only this thing that tries to crawl out of me
and succeeds.

since i cannot scream
i write.
i write because writing is the only way i know how
to survive this mess of a
girl i have become
but it's still not the same.
it's just as easy to turn the page as it is
to tune someone out
even if they happen to be
screaming at the top of their lungs

i am mute



there is a hole in me

there is a hole in me

i understand my reasons.
i am perfectly aware why i am
the way i turned out to be

i'm the kind of girl who will
spread her legs for the
first person to show a
little bit of attention

this is why i fall so hard when i do
i mistake lust for love and
inadvertently set myself up for disaster
every fucking time it happens

my ego knows no bounds
i am well aware that i am the
best person who has ever
walked the streets of this
godforsaken town

they say that there is
someone for everyone but
if i am as great as people
say i am how come
i have never been in a
relationship with a boy

there is no one for no one
and there is plenty of nothing
to go around for the girls who
never get what they want

it fucking sucks

it fucking sucks and still
i lay awake at night remembering
that i had perfection for only two weeks
before it was taken away from me

oh i am flawed



stone girl

it has been five days
since i last heard from you
and i have turned to stone
with this waiting.

no word,
no word.
i have no idea what is
going on.

there is a war
inside of me.
parts of me that i
never knew existed
are rusting.
something in my stomach
turns a screw
and i am tight
and unable to move.

this is why i have
always hid my needs.
i am only allowed to need when
that need will not get met.
it sets me up every time

and i still follow through these
same old patterns that always ends up
seeing me curled up in a ball
in the middle of the floor.

the worst of it is knowing
that this is my fault
because i know what my choices are
and i'm chosing the wrong thing

but i do not want to let go.
i had what i wanted for two weeks.
that's longer than what i had before.
and i do not want to give up the
promise of more because the
promise of things is all i have
to look forward to.

i never get what i want.

my skin is still but there is a
blind panic inside of me.
it rages and changes
who i am.

small girl,
stone girl.



my need

there is something inside of me
that does not let itself be known.
it is buried deep.
even i can't find it
half the time.

this old need aches in me.
and it is this -
i need to be known.

where i came from i
was not allowed to say those words.
she pushed them down my throat
to watch me choke on
my own needs.

i was never allowed to want.
i was always supposed to be the quiet one
and out of place in everywhere
i was.

i do not know how to fight against this.
oh it has tried to let itself out
in a hundred different ways.
when i was younger i tried to
starve myself out of this world
but then they came with their
bitter pills
and i grew fat.

as i gained weight i gained a rage
that hummed in my veins and that
whispered for pain.
for ten years i listened to that
scream i kept company with.
i paid worship to those
masochistic gods with
anything i could steal.
you show me five, i'll raise you a thousand
and tell you how each one came to be.
it's amazing

how the skin mends, but it does
not forget. nor do i.
i wear my reminders on my arms.
i wear my reminders and strangers
never shut up about it when i'm walking
down the street.

i have pierced my ears until there
is no room for anything else.
i have hoops in my lips and
studs between my
eyebrows.
my hair is now blue.

and still i cannot admit to myself
that i need to be noticed.
such stark cries are anathema
to the way i was brought up.
whenever i go out, wherever i end up,
people stare at me.
they yell to me from cars
and whisper behind my back.

but this is not what i need.
i need something deeper.
i need one person to always know where i am
and to need me back.
i cannot be who i am supposed to be
when i am with anyone but you.



this is a study in silence

this is a study in silence.
this is seeing how long i can keep
my damn mouth shut.

i don't know where you are,
i can only assume
and stay quiet.

but oh the doubts creep in when i am sitting here
and there is no word from you.

i remember i
shivered
when you ran your finger up and
down my spine.

but i worry when there is
nothing to worry about.
the way i worry now.

but, oh,
if only i could talk to you.
i do not know what you see but i know
that i have a problem of falling too fast and
not having anything to break my fall.

lay easy, little one

lay easy, little one.
do not expect and the universe
shall come to you.

i know that you are uneasy.
i know because i can hear the hollows in
your heart, the empty pause between thumps - a silence
in your chest.

oh there is a silence but
you must keep it on your end,
shhhhh. do not speak.
do no breathe, do not listen,
stay still.

you do not have to worry.
something's watching over you.
the only thing left to remember
is that sometimes you just have to
shut up in order for
things to take their natural course.



this is what we do

this is what we do.
we get back up and
tie our shoes.
i promise not to make a sound
what goes around will come around



oh i am mute

oh i am mute with
waiting for you to say
anything, anything,
to let me know you are here.

days pass and i
worry that i am not important
to you or in your thoughts.

i fall. i feel myself fall
off some unforseen edge.
although i should have saw it
at the very beginning
i have always believed that
things will change and i
will finally be the
lucky one.

i so rarely am, you see.
some blackness hooked its
latches on me and clung with
every step i took.
i could not shake free.
i could not do anything but
keep walking
with this shadow across my back.

i thought it fell off.
i thought i lost it along the
paths these years have walked
me through.

i was wrong.

i am still the same,
on the mute end of the phone
waiting for another you.



what?

what?
i hear you cry but i cannot remember
who you are.

i remember a long fall.
a long fall, and then, for the longest time,
nothing.

my eyes are wide open
for the first time since i
was twelve.



Flesh Memory