I'm picking the skin
Off my fingertips
And pretending
That my heart doesn't ache
And when the sun rises
I'll open my eyes
And take a breath
That I don't want to take
I've made some mistakes
And maybe the worst
Was believing
There's such a thing as fate
Because maybe I stopped trying
And maybe that's
When I started dying
We have to fight for our dreams
But to me it seems
That maybe I spend too much time
Hiding
Too much time
Crying
Too much time
Buying
Into the idea
That you can coexist with fear
Because if I stay here
I swear there will be no point
In living
This fight is imminent
I'm shedding my ignorance
Because it's what I need to survive
It's do or die

I just want to feel beautiful words
Drop them from your lips
Slick, and slimy
And sugar-sweet
Let me hold them
Close to my ribcage
And burn their characters
Into my skin
The pain is nothing
Compared to the emptiness
I feel when they're gone
I'll line my brain
With artfully worded lies
And plaster the walls
Of my subconscious
With pleasant portraits
Of a time and place
That never existed
Feed me beautiful words
Like candy coated arsenic
And let me feel something
Whisper sweet nothings in my ear
Like the empty promise of a faded tombstone
Gone, but never forgotten
Lay me to rest on a bed of wilted roses
And bury me in soil
Polluted by the labors of man
When the worms finally come
I will not permit them to lie

If I could suspend my tears
In the darkness
Like stars
Maybe I could make something
Beautiful
Out of something so ugly

I'm fragile and broken
My shards decorate the floor
Multifaceted hues
Of a person
Who never learned how to cope

I am the chill in the air at night
And I am the uneven breaths
Painted in wisps across the darkness

And I am the broken bottles
From too many bitter drinks
Strewn on the pavement
Catching the light
But never my breath

I think it's getting bad again

I just want it to end

How many times
Have we likened the rain
To a Baptism?

I don't have an answer
But last time it rained
I stood outside
And let the drops slide down my face
Until my makeup ran
But I don't feel cleansed

Maybe the rain knows that I'm not Christian

When the going got tough
They said
"Go west"

Maybe I'm just
Another victim
Of the American Dream

When I spend my days
Dreaming
Of the shores of
Washington

And
Running from
The Atlantic

New Jersey has nothing for me
This I believe

my life is spent in toil

creating
constructing
perfecting

a mask

it looks much like my own face
but when i glimpse it in the mirror
i see a stranger

at night when i should be sleeping
i am at work
molding it
adding layers of paper mâché
and slathering it
in the sordid tones
of concrete
and plastic
and smoke

camouflage
befitting of a world
created in brimstone
and gasoline fires

it is grey
it is sullen
and it is nearly perfect

this is the face that people see
who i'm expected to be
but it is not the real me