I'm not a poet.

• 2012-05-15

  We Died

  I know what it’s like to be numb.
  I know what it’s like to be alone.
  I know how to push myself back there - directions carved in flesh and bone.
  For now I’m lost inside the pages of this musty book.
  Deciding to read ahead, or to go back and take another look.
  We decided that those chapters were to be over.
  You whispered, “That part of our story is gone.”
  Now I’m rereading every line again - trying to find where we decided to move on.
  I’m finding it’s not a memory, not even one falsified.
  More of a lesson or a concept; I wanted to say that I tried.
  I hear you trying to sneak back in again.
  I feel you scratching your way inside.
  And I just feel so defeated, even though I know you’re the one who lied.
  I’ll stay back to build up my hope, but that fear - it finally died.
  My fear died.
  It died.
  When we died.

• 2012-05-13

  The Weary Ride

  I WANT TO SMOKE UNTIL IT’S WHITE
  I WANT TO GET NAKED AND NOT CARE
  I WANT TO FEEL SAFE, BUT NOT ALONE
  I WANT TO BE TIED TO YOUR WRIST

  THESE DAYS AND NIGHT ARE NOT LIKE THE REST BUT
  BUT I’M STILL GOING, I STILL CARRY ON
  NO MORE SMALL SQUARE ROOMS
  NO MORE WITH DOCTORS AND HOSPITAL BEDS
  THE POKING AND PRODDING
  THE DRAINING
  THEY DRAINED ME

  STILL I CAN SMELL YOUR BREATH
  FEEL THE FABRIC OF YOUR SWEATER
  NOT THE ONE YOU WORE, BUT THE ONE YOU GAVE ME
  I WISH I KEPT IT
  OR MAYBE I’M JUST TRYING TO HOLD ON TO
  THE IDEA THAT WHAT WE SHARED
  WAS NOT JUST A LIE OR A GAME
  NOT JUST MY IMAGINATION
  OR NOT JUST THE PLIGHT OF THE GLIMMER FROM THE CORNER
  OF YOUR EYE

  I WANT TO BLEED AND CARRY ON
  I WANT TO CRAWL INTO THAT HOLE
  I WANT TO RUN AWAY FOREVER

  YOU FOUND ME

  WE WERE LOST AND COMPLETELY BROKEN
  TRYING TO PICK UP THE PIECES
  TRYING TO MEND OURSELVES TOGETHER WHEN WE
  COULD NOT MEND OURSELVES
  SOMETIMES I THINK I SHOULD WRITE YOU A LETTER
  NOT ONE TO SEND
  JUST ONE TO SAY
  THAT I DID WRITE YOU
  BUT THEN JUST TUCKED AWAY UNTIL
  THE FEELING CREEPS BACK UP AGAIN
  YOU LEFT ALL THESE BROKEN BOYS
  FOR ME TO SURROUND MYSELF WITH
  FOR ME TO FEEL I’M NOT ALONE IN THIS
  THAT YOU’RE THE ONE WHO QUITS

  STILL THE TRUTH HIDES
  IN OUR LOST MEMORIES
  THOSE ONES WE STILL BARELY FIND
  THEY TELL US WE WERE SO BEAUTIFUL
  THEN THEY START TO CRY
  ASK US WHEN WE’RE GOING BACK TO IT
  TO THE WEARY RIDE
  TELL US THAT WE CAN PLAY FOREVER THERE
  BUT THAT’S NOTHING BUT A LIE
  NOW I’M TRYING TO KEEP IT TOGETHER HERE
  AND LOOKING FOR SOMETHING I’LL NEVER FIND
  BUT I’M STUCK INSIDE THAT GLIMMER FROM THE CORNER OF YOUR EYE

• 2012-05-12

  We used to tell each other “not now, but someday.” Those words turned our lips into magnets. I get pulled South, you get pulled North, and we’re trapped for another season - but now our lips are chapped and broken. I feel you linger in my shadow, though never turning to meet your gaze. I fear the paralysis it would bring. Sometimes I remember how you smell and my mind surrounds me in you. I run, but there’s no escape. Your fingerprints are burned in me.

• 2012-05-01

  It’s really hard for me to imagine that most people while growing up aren’t constantly trying to look for ways out or ways to go back and they’re just going forward and keep going forward and can picture themselves going forward.

  And sometimes they have struggles and sometimes they don’t but when they do they keep going on with their lives and nothing stops and nothing waits and life just keeps going forward.

  Still they know about pain and have all felt it in their own ways even though they have never drawn their own blood or stopped their own heart.

  Never been rejected.

  Been thrown away.

• 2012-04-26

  Your voice still resides
  in the back of my head.
  The voice of the boy brave
  enough to kiss my scars.
  Brave enough to look past my
  lost eyes and wandering smile.
  It was comforting having a companion
  with a face so elegantly broken,
  mirroring my own.
  Someone that could hold me together
  when I could hardly stand.
  Our future was so blind and
  we were so delicate.
  And you, so radiant and warm.
  You had a glow about yourself
  that you were too shy
  to introduce yourself to.
  You had seen the same
  caution in me. 

• 2012-04-23

  I want to be
  next to you.
  I want to listen
  to Tool and The Offspring.
  Sing along and blow smoke
  in each other’s faces.
  I would float away
  with you.
  Float anywhere.
  I’d be whatever
  you needed - or wanted. 

• 2012-04-19

  You make me smile at the best and worst times. You tickle me, and I don’t kick, but giggle. You’re all I want. I know I don’t have to, but if I did, I know I’d fight for you. I’d fight to be with you, I’d fight for a kiss from you, I’d fight for you to look in my direction. Here’s to forgetting the past and finding my future. I don’t want this feeling to leave. I hold onto it’s glow every time we part, never with a bitter feeling. I find you again when I dream. Such peaceful nights are had when you’re near. I’m always thankful for you, so happy you’re in my life - that you’re what I’m dreaming of. I’ve learned how to have hope again.

• 2012-04-16

  I can still feel the seaweed covered rocks beneath my feet and the waves crashing over my shoulders. I smell the lake water, taste the fresh air. The only sensation missing is you, cradled in my arms.
  But here I stand, reaching out for you through the fog, running through the green. Looking for the gleam and glimmer of your porcelain skin. You’ll always look like an angel to me.
  I know that you’re lost. I hope to find not only you, but another way to let the thoughts, the words escape from this head. And when that fails to make sense, I will stand reaching out for you through the fog, trying to feel what you mean.

• →

  I will always remember you with twigs in your hair, dressed in an insane outfit like the ones you once draped over your slender figure. You were my pot of gold at the end of the rainbow; The first rain that brought along the spring. You were what I had always wanted when I didn’t even know who I was. You were the only thing that kept me here.

• →

  You would tie me up and call me Baby;
  Tell me I’m perfect and pretty
  when I’m all dolled up.
  Hold me down by the throat.
  Smear my lipstick and knock out my teeth.
  Fold me up - tear me apart.
  This isn’t what I need,
  it’s what I want.
  Teach me a lesson - give me what I deserve,
  even if it isn’t you.
  I’m oh, so wrong
  and you’re never the right one.
  You’re in my sight and out of your mind.
  Ephemeral friend, eternal foe.
  I’ve learned to breathe on my own.