worn out faux leather jackets for lean shoulders; tattoos with meaning; tattoos with none; smirking lips glisten whiskey and salt; slender diesel-smudged hands wrapped on a bottle, waist, throat.

wispy smoke veiled sick brown eyes
nicotine, gunpowder, or maybe just you
your fiery breath
in the haunting brisk of autumn

pain and pleasure in semi-darkness
behind locked doors
floral perfume oil with the rotting nostalgia stench and bitter tobacco melting through
one match made in heaven! set the world on fire!

mess in a mess; flesh and soil
my funeral congregation of saint skies
you mumble an urban prayer, throw a gardenia
in the dirt, flicker of the flame. let it burn!

ashes, ashes, she shall fall down.

when the bullet burned my heart
did your senses sizzle with satisfaction?
it won’t be the first time
my body gave you pleasure

and i’m sure it won’t be the last time
when pain excites you

i’m slow dancing in a burning room
and my faults are on full display
as the smoke fills my tar black lungs
the song is getting louder and it feels
as if i’m entangled with the ghost of who i used to be

these may nights are lonelier
than they once were
it’s as if they’re telling me
“here’s the knife!”
before jabbing it in my insides
where they know it hurts the most

i look for my soul
but i don’t know where it’s gone
where did i bury it?
can somebody tell me?

you will not go on like this into the night!
i will rip the fascination and souls out of the moonlight; romanticize the way you reach your hand into the dark like the way you philosophize putting your hands onto a lover who cannot fathom between a tragedy and a fairytale.

i draw planets on my wrist
outlined with the ink of a sharpie
my fingers are numb when i put my nails to my teeth; i smile anyway.

we tumble onto couches and beds
i sing you a song about ghosts and dancing
staring up at your ceiling and talking about
tomorrow’s destruction

my lips are tinted red from you biting down on them and my lips are glossed with tangerine ***** (your voice is murmured as you tell me you love me while i play with the lighter. i tell you the truth —i’m suffocating— you tell me to go to sleep)

your hands twist my skin
into hearts and stars
(we call it on the bottle, if it lands on you, i’m
yours. on me? i’m out the door.)

self destruction is the new mouth watering fantasy, we make ourselves bleed just to feel something.

(but baby, i’m so bored with all of this.
red wine spills onto my white tee shirt
and i hate the way it stains
but i still drink with you anyway)

your lips and guitar must be lonely tonight
while you drive to the gas station to buy ***** to drown yourself in, the bruises on your knuckles aching while i lay in bed listening to track number five on the mixtape you made me.

( and we still make ourselves bleed
but this time it’s for fun )

memories do not always soften with time
like these ones i carry on my spine
sometimes, they grow edges, like blades
some memories pierce.
ghosts don’t haunt us; it is us who cannot let them go. (i am telling you now: let go or be dragged)

i stay up nights upon nights with madness filling my ink veins
ugly grief is the price we pay for love
how quick we are to run back to those who hurt us and fight ourselves for their redemption

i saw his soul with my dark eyes
and held it in my bare hands
i loved it, oh, my, i adored it

i still do.

i am alone on my bedroom floor
the carpet burns my calves and the runny nose and eyes
i can feel the moon closer than ever as if it’s waiting for a big kiss
it looked like a crescent keyhole, the other side being a realm of light. being in the dark never felt so unsettling, i forgot how lonely summertime is.

i remember i told you i wanted to live amongst the stars and sleep on the moon
you smiled at me and said
“i would love that too, but won’t you get scared of living in the darkness without seeing the light?”

oh but darling, whom are you to speak? you’ve been surrounded and consumed by darkness all of your life. what’s a little less moonlight going to do to you?

maybe summertime isn’t so lonely.
maybe it’s just me.
maybe it’s always been just me.

filled with rage, laced with shame.
disgust fills my weary bones
this cannot be!

i would die to be myself again
i would die to be myself again, with you.

he held more curiosity
in his electric dark eyes
than most people did
in their entire body

but he came and went so often, my darling, i did not think love was practical for us. it was a dream! more ridiculous and risky than all of his noble adventures combined!

i hid my deepest feelings so well
that i forgot where i places them

dear my lover
go on! i have a new adventure for you!
etch your roads in my molten bones
burrow for those jewels of my love
you’ll find them somewhere near
the arteries in my heart in the oasis of
a desert

that’s where i will wait for you, my love!
under the shade of a palm tree
dipping my bare foot in azure waters
sparkling under the eastern sun

come find me
i’ll be waiting

(i can’t wait for you to tell me
how you killed two birds with one stone)