writing poems in the notes app
on a cracked iphone 5 that doesn't have a sim card
well past the moons rise into the sky
thinking about leaving this
dry, cracking, miserable town because i'm done
aching for rain

there's too much of you and i here
and i'll never forgive myself
for folding all those paper lotus flowers for you on valentine's day
i now know the dangers of
putting so much of yourself into something so fragile

i grow, but not like flowers toward a healing sun
i give up, but not like the kids in calculus
i love, but not enough for you to love me back

my teeth ache from clenching my jaw
my jaw aches from tensing my neck
my neck aches from sleeping on it wrong
my sleep aches from missing you
i miss you because you don't miss me
you don't miss me because i was never yours
i don't know why i was never yours

i wish my house had a basement
i wish this town had a lake

maybe my stories would be better if i could tell them right

i can't connect my thoughts these days.
i can't connect my own pieces together.
my heart is in my arms, holding you
my mind in some far off movie scene,
catching the rain on it's tongue
i gave my lungs away because i don't need them anymore
my blood evaporated on the surface of the moon

and your lips taste like **** and peppermint chapstick
mine taste like ultra violet monster energy and aluminum

but i don't love you, and it isn't poetic

humans
are built
to
self destruct

some just
hit the
button

my coat buttons rolled down the drain on 4th street
i watched them as they were carried away by wind and rain
the ring on my left hand got caught in between the couch cushions
i left it tangled up in the coffee-stained threads
records go on playing until silence fills the room
i don't even take the needle off

but i wish i were the buttons, the ring
i wish i could put the record away

i just want to want something

my skin is under my fingernails, now
a daisy caught in my throat
maple syrup dripping from my eyes
bloodshot heart from reading your texts past midnight

i'm not sure if you love me
even though you wrote the words all over my neck

spray paint
on cement walls
honesty
in an art form

someday
i'll tag one of these walls
and you'll hold my paint cans
as we fill our lungs with smoke

sodium chloride
and dihydrogen monoxide

separate us

but we still
dream in the
same colors

i used to think
the wounds
were the worst part.

but it's the scars.

my knit sweater holds tears in
i fantasize about the old man that might have worn it
he used to smoke, i think

i dream about his mahogany pipe
with it's european engravings

in another life i might have cried at his funeral
but i just have his sweater

and i promise to remember him

i miss home
it's to dry here
dirt caked
under my fingernails

but you're here

so i'll stand under the showerhead
a little longer
and pretend that it's rain

if my stories don't leave you raw
then let me take off your sweater slow enough to feel the goosebumps
before i kiss your skin away

for my tongue tells stories
far louder than i can scream

i don't smoke as much as i write about smoking
a cigarette just paints a better picture than a pen
when you're too broken to do anything but pull out a lighter

i'm very afraid
of death

and i don't
particularly
want to drown

but when you look at me
with those eyes...

perhaps i can make
an exception.

the sun turns our thoughts into sweat
so i curse at the sky and blinding heat
for taking your voice away from me

i think i like it:
the way that you look at my face and feel the guilt writhe in your stomach
as you remember that you forgot me

you said
'i love you'

before you said
'i trust you'

kissing you
and smoking

create a venn diagram

and the middle
is large enough to hold my empty hands

i'm doing
this
for me

right?

i don't need
your
opinion
to know
that i am
valid

right?

i am capable
of deciding
what
i want

right?

when did "want" become "need"
when did "bye" become "****"

when did "kisses" become "breathing"
when did "leaving" become "drowning"

always a tear
falls
drawn toward the earth

for what is crying,
if not growing

you didn’t set up your voicemail box like i awkwardly texted you to at 11:48pm last month (so i could leave you awkward voicemails)
and you don’t call me back this late at night
(because somehow you're still afraid that i will be asleep)
but i’ll keep one headphone out
just in case the phone rings

the music is loud
but my tears taste louder

i take my coffee in the form of hard candy

because if i drank it
the warmth would remind me too much of you

i'm breathing in
my own
suffocation

please break my fall

i am looking
for okay
in all the
wrong places

the purple dye in my hair
is fading

and i can't help but think
it's taking me with it

feelings
[file: move to trash]

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[delete forever]
are you sure?

[yes]

we lit up
on the flame of one another's company
the smoke doused us in laughter
and the sky
was big enough,
just for a little while

we were infinite:
more terrified of blinking
than being too small

chewing on black holes
just to pass the time

leaving a fingerprint
with no identity attached

but the black holes got sour
and we spit them out
with the stray embers
caught on our bitter tongues

we buried the cigarettes in the dirt,
footprints their only grave marker

i still listen to our song

i just cry at all the parts
that are supposed to make me smile

twenty seven candles
unlit
on a cake
with frosting
almost as sweet
as the
girl who lost her breath
with nothing but
sugar on her lips

smoking to die
living in the expletive
relishing the waste

for wasting must mean you have

i immortalized you
and you don't even know

i'm not hungry, i'm just
empty
and now i'm just
sorry i expected you to know the difference

you're all locked up, and
you gave me permission to
enter, without giving me
the key

a life told in
text messages

swallowed up
by distance and time

never
to see
the sun

i am a grenade
that keeps
apologizing
for
blowing up

when it is my time to be ruined
break me like a promise

you'd think we'd learn
to love by now...

all the books and films...

but ink smears
and cds scratch.

reggae music
and vegetables
crying alone
misspelling my own name
losing time; losing space
weeds growing in cement cracks
dried paint, beginning to peel
scorching sun
uneven breathing

and not being able
to fathom my words
into anything
with a purpose

bleach running down my throat
to clean out all your lies
which i swallowed whole

here i lay
my ribcage open to catch the rain

your languid lines
under my calloused hands

we see clearer in the dark

you don't hold me
as tight as
you used to

and i can feel
my pieces
starting to slip
apart

i lick the stars
from your open lips
and a supernova
explodes on my tongue

as beautiful as it is
it shatters my taste buds
until i can drink
nothing but the sound of
your voice
sliding into my mouth

you are so far from me
that i can feel the earth turn

don't ask me
how i'm doing
ask me
what i'm listening to