Kelsey Martinez visits the glory hole at the local Vons
Every afternoon at 3:00
He fills holes in attempts to fill his holes
And walks away a little more empty
With a sharpie on the inside of the stall door he writes
This is The John Wilkes Booth

The ways we **** sometimes kills us inside

Moriah Carter lost her virginity hesitantly
like a semi heterosexual cowboy
Riding *******
Because sometimes we just can’t look our lovers in the face
She knows how sometimes we are objects
Just a means to an end

Amanda Lee Van Zetten thinks about the day she was conceived
How if her parents had done anything besides missionary
Might she have been born differently
How passion might be lost in translation

Do not lose us in translation
We are not math or language
Not some secret cuneiform
We are simple structures of bone and breath

Just ask Kacie Brumley
Who lays awake some nights
Translating her body like braille
The Kafka transformation into blindness
Fingers like antennae
Response like music

We moan like music
We **** like music

I **** like music
There is ***** soul in these *****

If you don’t **** like music
Go to your nearest guitar center
Plug yourself into the nearest distortion pedal
And
Rrrrrrrreeeeeeevvvvive yourself

Remember Janelle Gibson
Who dances like a slow hurricane
Whipping sweat like beach water
To wash away sandy rough places
She knows how to spread the wet

Or Jennifer Smith
Whose body is a fire most days
And she wants someone to kiss her
On the blue part of the flame
She knows how it’s hard to find someone
Willing to touch you like they won’t be burned

Touch us like you know how to put out our fires
But won’t
All this flame is show
All this fire is just some unrequited glow
So you can still see us against a dying sunset

Jaimee Sanders
Is fine ******* in the dark
Knows that we really are like insects
How we feel passionate and blind while the lights are out
But the minute the sun breaks the blinds
We scatter to some new dark space in shame

Forget having perfect bodies
And ******* with the lights out
We are sunsets
That don’t sit well
Like bedrooms in the dark
We are shameful passion

Just don’t regret me in the morning

Toffer doesn’t regret me
After that one night so many years ago
He knows as well as we do
How often we are just fleshy strands of light
Flayed down to some simple structure
Of bone and breath
And the need
To be needed

I want to want someone so badly
Thinking about them helps me sleep at night
He said

So know this
We are fire
And we **** like music
And we **** like shame
And we **** like insects in a dark room

This is how we ****
And it feels good

I'd like a re wind of my life
at a slower pace
where nothing causes any strife
and i turn up the ace
no bumpy road
no sad mistakes
life is all twinnings and
cupcakes
this is my dream
a silly one
no wonder im flat
on my ***

To want is a specific desire,
not to be confused with what we require.
If a cozy sweater is what you need most,
don’t forget those who need the warmth of fire.

If one needs, they will fight to remain alive.
When you want it’s just for a new way to thrive.
To want can seem quite selfish, but half the glass is full--
the need to rise past the mundane helps us strive.

If one desires a hand to hold and love,
is such an act like caging a cooing dove?
Do not let your dove be cooped without a key,
their wants, compared to yours, should be held above.

When you want, keep this simple idea in mind:
What for you’ve pined may agree with the divine,
but hold close the ones you deem ethereal,
for a wish that’s perverted He wont find kind.

She said
'keep it private'
and winked at me,
now, her whisper on my ear:
'this is between us'
she blushed, a red red hibiscus flower,
for a moment i thought,
"she is elder, my mentor"
then i saw
that glint in her eyes,
wasn't it exquisite!
pain scented with pleasure,
i know not what,
it kindled the dormant fire,
we walked hand in hand,
along the hibiscus lined path.

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

She told me to lie still
Let my thoughts take a deep breath
Until memories
were all that remained
She did not know that I carry treasures
drifting in and out of my mind
like the ocean’s tide
that can never be contained

She told me I could block out
the words I write
Even the ones I now know by heart
that wait
As if they were, only a habit
I had formed in time
But........ she did not know
those words
would only keep flowing
She had spoken
too little,
too late

I spoke to her of your embrace
of my first moment with you
How your eyes never drifted
from my own
Then I watched as she saw
your heart in my eyes
It was composing the words
that will never stop flowing
from me
She took a deep breath,
and moved on.

Touch me,
it doesn't matter where
and it doesnt matter how
I need to know I'm still alive
so someone touch me now
Shake my hand and say hello
or pat me on the back
kiss me on the cheek
that I may feel this sense I lack
slap my face and pull my hair
make me bleed I just don't care
dig your nails into my skin
so I can feed this need within
I've been numb for such a time
that even pain would be sublime
so touch me, touch me now
I don't care where, I don't care how