family friends since we were small
tracing grout in linoleum floors
I watched your dad pull those tapes out
he drew his weapon you drew yores

I can't be mad I say to this day
generations cursed
my first boyfriend shook his head
"I thought I was your first?"

there was a lump in my throat
and I thought back to that game
little frog ran over by the cars
you taught me how to skip through lanes

first friend that I ever had
I still think that you knew better
simply "child's innocence"
crayon written apology letter

floral pattern sheets
I was a flower at full bloom
until you flung me on that bed
I wilted in that room

you told me sometimes that it hurts
but it'll be super quick
that I cannot say anything
people will think I'm sick

It all goes black soon after that
red stain, metal taste, a puncture
Did the right thing after the fact
though frozen like a sculpture

you went on and on again
and never really paid
those girls carried it with them
through 1st and 2nd grade

and now I am a grown up
with something in me hollow
a little froggy in my throat that I still cant seem to swallow

I told myself I'd get better
through hell or through high water
but then felt you pluck more petals
when I heard you had a daughter

You were just a boy,
Only a few years
younger than me.
I, too, was only a girl,
but one who wanted to be
a woman much too quickly.

Except we didn’t meet,
Because you found me
surrounded by sleep.
You had no need to shake my hand
Or learn my name. Just a body,
in the shape of your needs.

When I was a child,
younger of a child
Than when you came
Across me, I thought
Satan haunted me
and kept me from sleep.

That night, where you had
told others we'd met,
I thought Satan himself
had found me again.
Drunk on youth and whisky,
asleep in a stranger's bed,  

I realized that Satan's
only a child's fever dreams,
or, sometimes instead,

a teenage boy,

clinking his belt,

invading my sleep.

The dark oil seeps into my lungs
and then as fast as it came it goes
pouring out turned into the hateful words I describe myself with
drip drip drip
but it isn't oil pouring out of my mouth
it's blood pouring out of my wrists
from the cuts inflicted from self hate
from an inability to make myself feel okay
drip drip drip
unfortunately I have to patch up the cuts before all of the self hate can get out
drip drip drip
I'll wait a few days before I let it out again
I can't bleed every night

I want to break the tiny bones
in my fingers and crunch my hands
into crumples of blood and skin.
I want to break all of my possessions,
I want to shatter glass and crunch it
into tiny shards with my palms.
I want to cause a collision,
to run my car into another,
to watch matter bend and implode.
I want to hear the echo of inconvenience,
to discomfort and dishearten.
I want to set the world on fire
and to reciprocate the feeling of contempt
I hold with a tight grip.

i think i was just used
my mind abused
for ****** gain
and personal strain

he's a good friend
or was rather
now i'm starting to think
i don't matter.

An insect.
That crawls upon my body, except I can't quickly swat it away
Without causing attention to myself
and everyone noticing that my
white ******* are pulled
all the way down
to my ankles.

My lips are dry so I bite them.
Knuckles whitening while I hold onto the grip-strap
And I hear his heavy breathing against my neck.
I look at the tunnels, quickly passing by.
'Maybe this will end fast too?'

Naive of me to think so.

Sliding into my flower
Like a toxic, little aphid.
Stuck on my sticky leaves
As petals are parted and

I pour out of the open doors in Shinjuku station,
And run out, wiping a tear on my sleeve.
I tug up my decency
While I run to the ticket booth.
Angry foreigner was yelling at the old man who sits within.
The clock above strikes eight.
I decide that it's not worth it.
I won't tell anyone.
It doesn't matter.
Could be worse.
It's okay.
I'm okay.







I wasn't okay.