They pretended not to notice how much you had changed
But they did comment on your thinning face
And how much healthier you looked
How much better
They pulled you to the side "Oh my gosh, how did you do it?"
Quizzical looks
They didn't know that the weight you lost
Was unintentional
A compensation for the heavy load inside
You tried to somehow shake off
You hated your jutting rib bones,
Losing your sanity along with your "baby" fat
You lost what made you a woman

No no one noticed your gaunt eyes
and the sharp angle of your cheekbone
Like pain
and the way you started drinking
(Although you never stopped)

They didn't notice the new scars you kept hidden with makeup
Meticulous
careful
calculating
So unlike you
No no one noticed how your eyes shone a little less brighter
Especially when you smiled

Apart from that ex-boyfriend you left a winter ago
Standing in the cold
Because he was an *******
But ******* can be right
And you saw the way he looked at you like-
the way you used to look at a broken mirror
Wondering which piece to pick up first
And start gluing back together
The way you looked at your own blood flow from your wrist's
A little scared, amazed, numb..
Like "Where do we start first?"
And "What happened here?"
Thats how he looked at you
*Atleast someone noticed

Our shaking hands,
See they weren't made for  
cigarettes
And all these words, flowing through our heads
Weren't meant to let us
sleep


We were only 16
Scarred, but beautiful
Like broken things sometimes are
Rarely are
Young, nicotine stains
Lungs full of words we drowned in
Choked on
Burying friends we had grown up with

How sad
How sad

A year later

Another funeral
We all look older
Wrinkles on our foreheads
But were only seventeen
Too young for crows feet
Unmistakable
Unshakable
Grief painted in our eyes
And we couldn't even look at each other
A year later, shaking hands
Same nicotine stained fingers
On our baby hands as we threw the dirt
On his casket

Another year
*Another friend

You bathed me in a bath
Full of shards of broken glass
That glimmered and swam
So beautifully bright
"Not all beautiful things catch the light" you said
Such cynical views for a patient man
Such awful thoughts of blood once shed
"It doesn't mean they're not there."
Then you ran
ran
ran
Like the coward you were

I bathed you in roses
But forgot to take out the thorns
See my beauty wasn't intended
But neither was yours

"Sometimes the smallest things, can hit the hardest."
Another one of your wise saying's

No wonder you were guarded

Now I bathe him in feathers
And ashes
and death
But the dead don't speak from their coffins
And blood wasn't shed
From all the things that we said

Like our words could fix
what was broken somewhere else
You said that only paper clips
And broken strings

Could undo the damage
One does to *oneself

My dad, he saved a child
Almost two summers ago
Beat on his lifeless chest
Until he got up and started breathing on his own

Whilst I, in this empty house
Make promises I cant keep
And feed my blood to sharp razor blades
Because I know its a luxury to weep

I wanted to be the one to tell them
That Grandpa died
To summon up human reaction
But as soon as I watched their faces crumple
I wanted to take it back and say "I lied"

Just like how he battled to keep that kid alive
I wanted to stop him, shake him, say
"Dad, leave it, hes better off, you see this world is a filthy filthy place,
its a ******* ***** world daddy, you'd be doing him a favour.
So Save your breath
Save his grace."

But I didn't, I stood and watched and felt
nothing

While his mother pounded on my fathers back
Screaming words like "God" and "Please" and "Son."
As if there are such things


As I, in this empty house
Carve my wrists
And paint ****** pictures on
white hairless canvases
and think about that little boy

That my father saved

Blood is not thicker than water
Just harder to wash out

Me the perpetual messiah
Trying to fix
all broken things
The never-ending, savior complex-

Like that bird we found in our backyard
When I was five;
And I had to learn that
"All living things die-"

I wish mom would've taught me that
"You cant save everyone"
Instead.

You are not a bird
You don't suffer from broken wings
Your wound's are internal
Invisible

Forever perplexing the mind of
thousands of
boggled doctors

Like I was supposed to pick up
What an X-Ray couldn't.

And inject you with some secret serum
That escaped from my lips
I spent so much time
Trying to clasp your wounds shut
So much energy
But you bled out
Right in front of me

You aren't a friggin' bird.

And I cant save you.

Stu-stu-stuttering
Under those beautiful shadows
Near edgar street
Halloween, light lamps
pumpkins
Sh-sh-shaking hands
You looked so
broken
shattered

"You haven't been yourself lately."
"Well maybe I have."
"No no no this isn't you."
"Maybe it is, maybe im just sick of pretending."
-"Have you been eating?
When's the last time you had a goodnight's sleep?"
"Why does it matter..."

I wanted to remember how the light illuminated your cheekbones
But made those shadows under your eyes darker
They seemed to taunt your face
Dancing around producing fearful images
I was surprised you were still awake
What a beautiful mess you looked...
What a beautiful mess you looked like

"Y-you-you think the world is a beautiful place dont you?"
"I think It can be." You looked haunted.
"Yeah, for those who sleep."

"I feel sorry for you."
His voice was never one to mock.
It was always gentle, non-judgemental. (where's the catch?)
It didn't stop me from laughing anyway.
"Why?"

"It must **** to go through life too scared to really give a **** about anything."
(no really where's the catch?)

I admit, I lost my wit, there was nothing I could think of to say.
My tongue rolled around in my mouth looking for lost words
Checking behind every tooth to see if they were hidden there.
I managed to cough once to see if any were lodged in my throat.
But all I could think of was how
beautiful
he looked in the moonlight
the only thing giving light to his eyes, half a cigarette
I wondered then If the burning stump gave his eyes that red tint
or maybe
he was born with it.
******* on his cancer stick.
Maybe that's were he got his words from
I should start smoking too.
Maybe
"The world isn't so black and white, you know?"
He had a way of making the truth sound poetic
Like it did on that hill, by that creek, under that moon
By the burning cigarette
all I could think to say was
"The truth is only pretty in certain light"

Your fingertips danced to the echo of your own brokenness
Your pain so pure in the form of shivers
    too heavy
           Intense for a mere tear
and what words I could hear from your mumbled mess
    and skipping heartbeat
   As you looked off into that deep dark sea
    that was just scary and I thought
You had every right to be afraid of just about
everything
because there is so much to be scared of in this horrible
awful
messy
place
children go missing
and molested
and little girls like you
get *****
and all they remember is the strange hum of police sirens and an officer that was
a little too friendly
and now they look at people with empty frozen eyes
that I cant look past or through
Like insects trapped in nets
Or **** stars turnin' tricks
I feel awful to think that paedophiles
and molested children
have the same kind of hands
if you look somewhere in the past
its hard to think they were children too
who maybe liked chocolate milk
and hated the way a neighbour made them feel

You told me these theories with a steady voice
Resembling your own destruction
somehow detached from your own ****
what
was
taken
from
you

Sam told me about how you came home bruised
broken
and he took a wash cloth to your cuts
and that filth that monster left in you
      you told me how Sam cried as you tried
hard not to make a sound
(you ended up comforting him)
you ask questions to an un-answering god
about how this could of happened to you
too many times..

I watched your beautiful mouth tell me
awful
awful
things

I watch a sunrise behind an old abandoned church in my home-town
I haven't slept for two nights
the crystal clear beauty of the sleep-deprived
the jaw aching beauty of the pink sky
almost hurts my eyes
the irony I see reflected back at me
how such a daring light could hide behind
a cowardly institution
My thoughts are crisp and clear
after two nights of no sleep
and I cant describe
I cannot describe what I see
But its there behind my eyelids
when I close them shut
I am dreaming of tomorrow
But tomorrow never comes.
I am closer to god when I am sleepless
Though I'm not sure I believe in god when I am awake
like all things are during suffering
and the sky is just a canvas
for me to whisper my thoughts to
I paint his hands in the shape of clouds
under this red sky at morning
They hold nothing
and nothing holds them
heavy hands and my heavy eyelids
both closed
open
wide
shut
he holds me in his hands
he holds the promise of tomorrow
I tell him tomorrow is a lie.

You spoke addiction
like a language
like an art form
marks on your arms
on your thighs
A Mosaic of patterns
You said they looked prettier than the
ligature marks around your neck
the invisible noose
you constantly swayed from
Like addiction was a guy
you couldn't make your mind up
about
at-least they had more meaning
You said I never understood the purpose of tiles
and how beautiful they looked close up
and how you never got bored of counting them
There was more life in your bruises
than in your eyes
like each little hole
****** out a little more of you
said I could never understand the
beauty in
feeling
really
feeling
lukewarm bath water
turn cold
In a womb of your own destruction
in a needle
in a rope
in a razor
a false sense of life
of *life

Next time you tell me to go away
I'll show you just how good I am at disappearing
You just haven't stuck around long enough for the
vanishing act
You have the audacity to
say my name tastes like filth
But have you ever thought
that the source of your uncleanliness
was born somewhere in your lung's
and made its way up your throat
I can taste that
when I kiss you
No wonder everything turn's to grit
in your mouth
You have the stones
to say
you're an insomniac
But there's a difference between
not wanting to sleep
and not being able to
And your hands wouldn't shake so much
if you didn't drink so much coffee
and you wouldn't look so tired
If you smiled once in a while
and your breath wouldn't taste
or smell
or look
like ****
if you didn't smoke
100 packets a day.
So you have the audacity to tell me
"Well, baby the truth hurts."
In that southern drawl
With eyes so animated
I wonder which movie star you're impersonating now
After four months of Kurt Cobain
I've had enough of your angst and love letters
And I'd love to lay
my hands against your throat
and let you feel the threat
of life
draining away
But I know you would just smile
and rack your brain
for a quote from a movie you have stored somewhere
away