love you, liar.

I could be better if you told me to

'cause there's not many people like me and you

and I get tired sometimes but baby I swear

I'll stay up all night if you give me a dare

I waited up till dawn just to see how you'd look

and you laughed sadly- your head frantically shook

so I smiled along, hard cheekbone-stretch

I'll pretend to be normal, when really, you're the best

you're the better of this duo- 

but I think you already knew

after all, how could someone like me 

be friends with someone like you?

Sweet N o t h i n g s

i'm ripping apart and i'm breaking at the seams

i'm forwards backwards falling

and i'm drowning in my dreams

there's blood on my breasts and
a weight on my chest and
when i breathe in,
my heart takes a  r e s t.

it stutters and i struggle
and heave the air back out
for the hummingbird-beat
that I can't cope without.
and so i'm left gasping,
stopping starting  p a u s e.

Scars

i've been picking at my scabs, lately
because i love the scars they leave behind

i want to point at my knee one day
and say
"that blotch? right there?"
"that's from flying away."

i want to keep a record of my life
in a patchwork of skin
etched like tattoos
so i don't forget who i've been
or the places i've seen
or the people and words and things
that've hurt me


it's been going on for a while, now
my arms are mottled with uneven circles
odd little welts
nicks and burns and bites and bruises

i still have an ugly circle on my right arm
(where a big mole used to be)
they thought it might be something bad
so they nicked it away
and afterwards
i picked it away

"to remember" i told them

(they didn't understand)

the pavement was thick
and my boots made
the most satisfying scuffing noises
when I walked up

the brass gleamed
like the lights strewn
throughout the fronds
and the house smelled of pine

Southern Death

It's too bright here.

The south, I mean. 

The white-washed walls and the faded red roofs and the crunchy pale grass- they all start to blur together, after a while, mixing with the stark white of the clouds, until it seems like the entire scene was doused in bleach. 

It's too white, too faded and dull- the roar of the cicadas a constant thrum in the back of your mind, the kind of noise that you hear echoing through the house as you stare up at the ceiling and try to will yourself asleep. 

It's hot here, too- despite the fact it's August and, y'know, Fall should be kicking in right about now. You walk outside and you're drenched, cheeks flushed and breath a harsh pant and your knees stick to the backs of your thighs when you crouch down onto the grass. When you walk barefoot along the hot asphalt, it burns your feet if you stay still for too long. 

So you run. 

You run until the sweat-soaked locks of your hair go flying out behind you, until your shirt ripples in the non-existent breeze of the dry air, until the soles of your heels are stained and callused and burnt and you feel the oddest sense of satisfaction later - when you're in your house and the air conditioning is turning the sweat on the back of your neck into a chilled sheen - you feel pleased when you trace your fingers along the thick, burnt-brown skin of your feet, and you smile. 

It's hot and dry and lazy and after a while all of the gas stations and strip malls and Wal-Marts turn into a continuous line until you have no clue what intersection you're at anymore; they're all the same damn thing anyways. You could loose yourself here, amongst the Spanish moss and tanning oil and the condensation that drips down bottles of Diet Coke. 

It's so easy. 

Just drive and drive and drive until you're at the very top, until the state lines blur and you're 3 states away but it still looks the same. There's a 7-11, a Waffle House, a Publix. 

It all looks exactly the goddamn same. 

And it could kill a person. It could, I swear. The bleached asphalt mazes and the gas stations and the palmettos could become the sort of prison that winds itself slowly around you, the kind of death that is long and subtle and sickly-sweet until one day, your last day, you look around and realize what's happened. 

You could die here, could sink down underneath the palms and just wait until your eyes go unfocused, and the little brown anoles come to perch on your waxy calves, to sunbathe on top of your unmoving lips. 

But maybe that'd be for the best. Maybe I should wait for the tendrils of Southern death to come curling around me, maybe that's better. 

After all, it's too bright here.

Some Pretentious Bullshit for my 90th Post

I'm bubbling over

And everyone can tell. 

It’s obvious in the swell of the chaos inside of me, in how it dribbles from my eyes and creates tide pools that reflect my tired face. The swell comes and goes with no discernible pattern, unlike the tide. The moon is a calming presence that I cannot hope to have, and oh if that doesn’t sting- doesn’t prick barbs into my skin as brackish water comes, soothing, out from the pinpricks up and down my arms. I spend days connecting the scabbed-over, clammy dots, trying desperately to find the hidden picture, but the chaos just overflows and washes the lines away. Down, down, down my arms, salt mixing with ink and dripping black tears from the tips of my fingers. Sometimes I paint pictures with the make-shift brush, swirling my fingers on the blank walls like a child. 

But whenever I wake up, they’ve gone. 

So I stopped making them. 

The water never drains though, and it’s risen over the days weeks months years that I’ve been here. From my scarred ankles to my knobbly knees- it’s up to my belly button by now.

Sometimes I swim in it; close my eyes and drift down to the soaked carpet floor, drowning slowly in the chaos that’s been inside me for a lifetime. 

The Lonely

It's simple.
Really; so, so simple.

Just a few sentences. A handful of words. Strung together to form lines of thoughts, with hidden meanings tucked between.
But she doesn't know the meanings.
Can't crack the code, can't understand when only now does it matter.

Oh God, how she wishes it was in person. Or at the very least a phone call. You can hear emotions, but you can't read them; not when they're wrapped in cold, surgical-like letters.

She's curled, hunched, reading those sentences and tapping out a reply while silent tears form slowly in her eyes.
She'd forgotten.
How could she forget her?