Pressed against you like paper and ink
through the rolls of a printer.
Stories read to children
to help them sleep at night.

The author’s prized creation:
solar systems of endless
chances repeated
with each bursting supernova.

We could have a sky:
habitable or raining diamonds
or the catalysts for life ready to procreate.
Chemical reactions fusing into flames.

We are a fragile anomaly
of lives and worlds colliding.
We are words printed
across this infinite universe.

My perfect face, my perfect form,
It’s been some time since you crossed my mind.
My perfect eyes roam, longing for features that will never be mine,
Yet I am not sad; I carry the essence of my kind.

I wish I didn’t dwell, though I was sailing well on this rocking ship.
My mirror lies beside me, a truth I yearn to eclipse.
I could seize it now, as effortless as dispersing a speck of dust.

My perfect face, my perfect form become what I wish,
I hate to love you and ache for your kiss, but...

They always say a relationship isn’t always 50/50
Sometimes it’s 20/80 or 70/30
But together it will always make up for 100%
Does that ring a bell?

I don’t feel like that 100% is there anymore
Don’t even know if it has ever been there
It feels like I’m charging an old phone whose battery isn’t at full capacity any longer
As if it’s 110 vs. -10

And I’m sure you feel the same way
I’m sure you feel like I am not bringing enough to the table either
As if, together-
we are overloading the battery

Each of us thinking we are charging with the right cable
Charging it for the right amount
Or in the assumption of the battery knowing when it is full
But the battery doesn’t know
We both don’t know

It’s a constant guesswork of where we are on that scale of zero to a hundred
The odds are so small of us both picking the right amount.
And yes, it has happened before-
but that only means the odds of it happening again are getting smaller

I am terribly afraid.
I don’t want to switch batteries.
But maybe, for you-
It’d be better.

One day, while getting ready, I looked in the mirror
And I saw my legs blow up to twice their size
So I quickly left to change my ripped pants
Wiping away the tears in my eyes

And the next day I returned to this mirror
And my face had a dark shade of red
So I shut all of the windows in my house
And hid under the covers of my bed

And whenever I went out in public
I could swear everyone was looking at me
And I knew I wasn't human anymore
For a monster was all they could see

So I kept my head down
Throwing piles of unfitting clothes on the floor
I would probably grow monster-like tentacles for my arms
Or monster-like claws to scratch all the doors

Then I couldn't stand the sight of me
So I shut off all the lights and shut out the sound
But I could still see about one hundred reflections of myself
In the shattered mirror on the ground.

"Wear black, it'll make you look thinner."
And she did. So often, in fact,
the simple act of getting dressed
in the morning began to feel like
she was attending her own funeral.

My skin bleeds in anguish,
I do not understand my eyes.
My lips are charred,
My legs are aching.
Perhaps because for a long time they have been carrying the burdens of beauty.
I feel ugly to my core,
It's a truth I have accepted.
I see pretty girls in glamorous fashion,
I look down at my worn shoes and jacket.
I don't like my body.
Perhaps we can exchange our mortal trappings.
Then I could be the beauty with a brain,
And I won't have to compensate
For the ugliness running in my blood veins.
My hands are trembling,
I dislike my ****** structure .
Nobody could love my body, they could perhaps love my soul.
It's a compensation that I always pay.
For If I am ugly and mean,
I think I will be a bigger loser.
Somewhere I have to win.
Pride is a false illusion that I feel for my medals and trophies.
Nothing matters because
My body cannot be loved in this lifetime.

See! See! See the mule as she trots below the bars, carrying the weight of the unicorn on her shoulders
Look at how only pills find their way into her cotton filled stomach
On the stage where she holds the light that shines upon the fairest of them all
So you can watch the princess in the tower,
And notice her cries from the sapphires that fall down her bony cheek
Why don't you spy the masses of she-demons that weep acid over the screen which erodes the paper thin illusions
Spotted illusions, that flash like circus lights which find their eyes upon the pinup doll who struts high up on a tightrope in the air
When the mule stares from the bottom of the stage, is it the thinness of the waist or the wire she finds herself in envy with?

Hear! Hear! Hear how the pig squeals when they ignore her wishes to eat from an empty trough
Listen to her scream for the bones that creak when she moves a little too much
Can she overhear the way they speak of her size, as if there's a prize for claiming the biggest pumpkin
When she tunes in to the radio and hears them praise the waists of corpses in their seats made of lost teenage palates
Then they will make out the subtle sawing and snips where she finds herself cutting off the undesired fat that's lingered for too long
Wasn't she warned that it isn't safe to use a plastic knife to cut off a muffin top?

Speak! Speak! Speak of what you want to see when you look in the carnival mirror that distorts your shape in all the desired places
Then we can **** up to the girls with halos that fit their size 00 waist,
And talk of chopstick legs with an appetite that follows,
So you can brag about how you only eat one at a time
In what manner is it necessary that you chat instead of chew, to distract from your untouched plates!
You ramble on and on about the space that satiates your hunger for beauty
The beauty that has destroyed what I loved about you
When I whisper to myself in the bathroom mirror so full of nothingness
So full...

But I'll still eat the last of the candy in the bag:
Orange bottles that linger my dreams above my lips,
Out of reach,
And out of sight.

the magnified, mascara applied
                                                    eyes of my skull
burn holes in my thighs
                                       mulling over the size of this hull

i chunder my lunch and wonder of
                                                          everyone else
and if they're also laser beaming love
                                                               i­nto themselves

or if they're boundlessly born with it
                                                              unstained smiles, strained bites
maybe they're just born with it  
                                                   no pained bile or insatiable appetites  

either way, i hardly
                              can infer
if my stomach is
                          half empty
                                          or half full

i don't even like you.
(i want to be just like you.)
i don't want to participate in your humiliation ritual
(i'm sick of being the sacrifice. spread someone else's ribs on the gym floor.)
**** conformity.
(i study every movement and take it for myself.)
**** conformity.
(i want to be just like you.)
**** conformity.
(can i wear your skin?)
don't come near me.
(i want proximity and brotherhood like a sick second hunger.)
please go away.
(please hit me without being afraid of hurting me. with all the tender force of brotherhood.)
i don't talk to him.
(look at me, look at me, look at me, please.)
i'm not good at sports.
(i work so hard and still come up short.)
don't hurt me.
(hurt me like a brother would. i am sick of you walking blood through the hall from the eggshells you walk on. i am not so fragile.)
i can smell the axe body spray.
(hit me like you know i can take it.)
please, no.
(i wish.)