These are the days
When the ichor in my veins
Transmutes from ethereal to acrid
When the fire in my stride
Burns too hot for human skin
When the tangle of all I am
Becomes unbearable asphyxia  
But I find
I cannot
Cast myself away

I exist in a world of careful structure
Taken out of Chaos and made habitable
By strict planning and strict ruling—
Structure is imperative
Order keeps us going
Deviations are not allowed

If you wish to live in my world
You must learn to follow rules

Reliability is key
Being dependable as the rising sun
Predictable as a new moon
Always infallible

Disappointments are not tolerated
Insufficient will be cast away
Deviations are not allowed
So if you can’t be trusted
Then you don’t belong here

There will be order in my house
For in games of two, there can be no others

There
Are
Rules
And they exist to keep us out of Chaos
They exist because structure
Ensures that we don’t collapse
So when your eyes are wandering
You are marking yourself as inconstant
Dangerous
Unacceptable
And I will stop at nothing
Until you’ve suffered for every sweetness you’ve laid at another’s feet
I will stop at nothing
Until you’ve learned that you must always choose me

I will burn you for every betrayal
And some will call me jealous

I once said I wanted to waltz across the sun
To swirl among the solar flares
And burst like a supernova

They’d call me bits of space glitter
And I’d be brilliant

Today they call me human
And I find I am fleshy
Neither molten
Nor shining
But volatile all the same

It’s a shame
The heat would have suited me

I am fiery, flighty feelings
Quick to love and fury and sorrow
Quicker still to bubbling crazy
But I am stuck on this ground
With thoughts exploding through the atmosphere
Punching holes in the ozone
And leaving us all to burn

I inflict myself on everyone—
The sun would have suited me

I just want brilliance
But lately
Bright lights give me headaches
So I’ve been condemned to duller shades
Tearing at my skin
In the hopes of a shiny new layer
Restless like a *** about to boil over
Inadequate and dangerous
Like a rocket about to crash

You once knocked the breath out of my lungs
Only to teach me how to get it back
Stuck a mirror to my nose
And said beautiful
Do you see it?
Beautiful!
And I stopped closing my eyes for a second
And breathed

I am not a tranquil person
But in your arms
I am peaceful as the moon
And I am melted
And I am hopeful
And I am the person I thought I’d lost

You once breathed Fate into my ear
And I smiled
For you thought it romantic
But the Fates were never watching
—I made a choice—
And that should be all the more romantic
Because I decided that it was your hand I wanted to hold
And you must have thought the same
Since one day I woke up to you smiling
And another
And another
So these days I could outshine the whole universe
Provided you’re by my side

There is homework strewn about,
Stray pencils and rampant equations,
And he is next to me with a guitar,
Hair wild,
Fluid mechanics tossed aside for
Metal strings and quivering notes.
Neither makes much sense to me.
I played violin for seven years,
But I never learned to command
Music;
Keys and sharps and flats
Just told me where to put my fingers,
But to him
They tell stories.
They leap and prance and laugh from his hands—
Eyes closed,
He holds them.
This is home for him,
Away from stubborn assignments
And looming futures,
And just when I suspect that he is someplace I can’t follow,
He turns and smiles.

Sometimes I play the strangest games with my head
And get sick with memories
And wish for a vacuum-existence in only present tense,
Because my present tense is so much prettier
Than clingy yesterdays and chancy tomorrows.
My present tense is full of music,
Soaring, brilliant, beautiful music,
And the musician who strums away my relentless anxiety.
It makes no sense to me,
But that doesn’t matter
Because for now,
I’m in a place where moments pass in a time signature,
Strung together by his careful hands
And brought to life by his enamored gaze.

It is in this way that I have come to believe
That everything will be ok after all.

I am a planet knocked out of orbit
Officially space-junk
And a hazard to the universe
Left with no gravity anchor
Just frightening velocity and the panic of empty space

I was not held tightly enough

There is a seizing terror in the hollows of existence
A nightmare in the dark holes where wayward satellites disappear
There is only solitude here
With space-time stretching away, away, away
And nothing trying to bring me back

Stupid girl
What were you thinking?

When the cosmos were rearranging
I thought to find myself a warm body to revolve around
A hopeful path to comfort and stability
A chance to escape the darkness of infinity

I thought to find myself a Sun

As I was inspecting every glittering piece of space rock
One caught me unawares
He pulled me straight into orbit
And I could have fought
But he seemed the brightest body in the sky
So there I was
Happy to be trapped by gravity
Doting on my captor as he shined back at me
This was the exchange
My unwavering attentions
For some heat and some light

I should have known these things can’t be sustained

There is so much energy in a burning sun
But the funny thing about fire
Is that it kills its fuel source
So despite my efforts to keep it going
The Sun found it tiresome to shine
The Sun found it tiresome to entertain a doting planet
And suddenly I found myself rocketing around the galaxy

Stupid girl!
Did you never realize that you are too much?

I have a nasty habit
Of allowing my life to revolve around someone else
Call it obsessive
Call it needy
Call it whatever you want
I should probably just call it delusional
Because it still shocks me every time I get pushed away
For trying to come closer
It’s hard
When something that brilliant means so much to you
You feel very small
And smaller still when it wrenches itself away

The universe is vast
And I am tiny
And I am lost

I wish I could have learned how to navigate alone
Or at least how to care less

You named her “best friend”
And she became the twitch in my eye
She became the wall I began to hurl myself against
Praying that I wouldn’t shatter before she budged

You named me “baby”
And marked me down for what I am
A child who doesn’t like to share
A jealous girl clutching her favorite teddy bear
Who’s one temper-tantrum away from scratching at anyone who’s ever touched him

There are parts of me that I’m afraid of letting you see
Pieces that I cracked in other girls’ mirrors
Trying to be all that was desirable in them
Lately I find myself
Crunched into the corner of her looking glass
Desperate to know how she commands your attention

She seems so harmless
Small and smiley
But I’ve watched her gaze
Seen it try to tear me from your side
So I named her “benzene”
Sweet and cloying
And toxic

I’ve been gagging on her name ever since
Felt it clawing at my throat
Forcing me to either acknowledge her presence
Or choke
Still, I named you “dearest”
And she has been watching me with liquid nitrogen stares
Unreactive but deathly cold
Leaving me goose-bumped and panicked

You sing her name
Oblivious to how it knocks against my ears
How it squeezes my skull until I’m retching
So I named her “migraine”
And every time she is there I am ill
Her name has me ripping out my insides just to stop feeling sick
Wondering how to rewrite myself
So that you won’t crave her attention anymore
How to make myself good enough
So that you won’t need her anymore

You named me “beautiful”
Sighed about getting lost in my eyes
But I noticed
Hers and mine are the same color
Sometimes I can’t help but wonder
When you’re staring into mine
Do you wish they were hers?

Still, you named me “dearest”
“Darling”
“Girlfriend”
You named her “best friend”
I am afraid of what she names you