Figments

I must be the saddest girl to ever wear pigtails and pink ray bans.
I want to paint zebra black stripes on the walls.
Being with you is like being at summer camp.
We build forts in our bed late at night.
Tell me a ghost story.
Write your name on every piece of blank paper you find.
Fold them up
and put them in bottles.
Cover me in warm
because it's so cold out now.
I die after every party.
Close my eyes
count to three
and take the picture.
Silent tears swirl
with black eyeliner
hush, now.
Rain makes my whole body ache
reminders of damage done years ago.
Don't go.
I see you're falling into sleep.
I'll lie on the couch
until my body turns to concrete.
you can't fix me because I'm not broken.
Take another shot.
Take another shot.
Take another fucking shot.
You must have bad aim.
Are you awake yet?
Notice me.
I'm the saddest girl to ever wear pigtails and pink ray bans.

Thaumaturgy.

Take a photo of me and fold it into an

origami dragonfly.

I always wanted to be someone's good luck 

so keep me in your pocket

next to your change

to remind you that there is nothing better.

You breathe into me in the mornings

mint breath

sleep breath

mixing and molding in my lungs like

concrete.

This is concrete.

If I were versed in anything besides words

I'd like to think I'd be a sculptor.

I'd mold us a life

with a fairy tale ending.

Sometimes I can't tell where you end and I begin.

Your hands write me love letters

with your eyes closed.

And I echo your responsiveness

with sound.

There's a woman with her head in her hands in a photo frame.

Sometimes I think she cries for love.

Sometimes I think she cries for someone she lost.

Today I thought she might be crying

because we've finally realized

what beauty really means.

I wait by the door

like Pavlov's dog

thirty minutes before you get home.

You

Snap pictures of my sleeping self

and call her an angel.

She really looks like one

when I see her through your eye.

Breathe into me in the mornings.

Plant your lips on mine and we'll grow.

Fold me into a paper airplane,

and come fly with me.

Brothers

I remember when we used to play hide and seek together as children,
Running and laughing with the wind.
We were small, and I helped you find good hiding places.
But your laughter would give you away.
I never doubted that you'd be that fun until you grew old,
And then,
I figured,
You'd yell at kids to get off your lawn as an old man inside joke.
I watched you grow up,
Just like you watched me grow up
And
I never doubted when you fell,
You'd pick yourself back up off the ground
And dust off your own skinned knees.
I remember
Climbing into bed with you when we were little,
because even though you were younger than I was,
You somehow always chased away my scary dreams.
I remember you always wanted to share things.
Even if it was your last piece of bubble gum.
You stuck up for me a lot.
Even when you knew that maybe I wasn't being quite so honest about who was responsible for the empty brownie pan.
You never had a shortage of hugs,
And you stood your ground even when we fought amongst ourselves.
These are the things that I know you will pass on to your son.
Your strength,
Your laughter,
Your honor,
Your love,
Your guts
And your glory.
You'll share your last piece of bubblegum with him,
And play hide and seek, always helping him to find the best hiding places
You'll dust off his skinned knees and
Scare away his bad dreams.
I know, because I have watched you do all of these things and more.
You're the best little brother in the whole world,
And it's only fitting
That you'd become the best dad in the whole world.
I love you, bro.
Congratulations.

Foundations.

You
Lit up the night sky with your
Bazillion watt smile
And painted the air
Purple and blue with fingertips
Outstretched from your palm
In the universal sign of
Hello.
I walked on.
A woman on a divine holy mission to forget
What went wrong
Why was it raining in the house
That my heart built?
Why couldn't I see the sky through the holes in the roof?
You appeared there,
Standing outside on my soul porch,
A few days later.
You were broken,
Asking for solstice and shelter
From the storm and
I knew then,
Because you painted sunsets in thin air
And shone more brilliantly than
The full moon that I
Could fix you.
I could offer you shelter
From the thunder bursting through your hollow ribcage.
You were raw and screaming on the inside
So I took a piece of plaster
From the walls of my heart
and hand fed it to you.
And then I watched you die.
As your body convulsed
And
You cried out to a faceless god
I held you,
Watched tears stream down your face
In a death rattle
That echoed in my brain until I heard nothing else.
I stripped you naked,
Washed your empty body
As the house that my heart built
Crumbled.
I watched the sun come up
As I laid you on a broken mattress
And sang you lullabies.
I fell asleep next to you
Wishing it were as easy for me
As it was for you.
I awoke to your fingers in my hair,
and your lips on mine,
Your smile dazzling as the desert summer sun.
I knew then,
We would rebuild the house,
But it would be the house our hearts built.
Together.

Words.

I write you Love letters on
stained bar napkins and used matchbooks.
I never let you read them,
Because I fear you'd find them cliche.
I keep them anyway,
Stored in a shoebox locked away in my heart.
Most people think in pictures,
But I,
I think in words and phrases.
The memories I have with you are
Metaphors and similes,
Phrases and clauses,
etched on the paper walls of my mind.
They say that love
Can make a poet out of anyone.
But you were a poet long before I met you.
I have kept every word you have ever written to me,
Because I am a hopeless romantic,
And I wanted to keep you close,
When you existed a world away.
I never told you how I felt,
Never told you I'd kept little pieces of you,
Never told you I'd never let go of you.
I loved you.
Wordlessly,
Selflessly,
Speechlessly
And all I have
Are words I wanted to say to you.
Letters I should have sent,
Even when you lived a world away.
I still somehow believe
That our hearts have always beat in sync.
I still love you
And in my star-crossed happily ever after
Trains of thought,
You are there.
Waiting for me.

Naked.

You asked me, how do I like you?
How do I like you.
I said I liked you as you, because I'd be pretty disappointed if you were someone else
And
That was the truth
But
How do I like you?
I like you naked.
You're going to laugh,
And say
I like you naked, too.
But that's not what I mean.
I like you naked
Stripped of all your physicality.
I like lying there, next to you,
And losing myself in you.
Your essence, your very nature,
Your being.
We talk a lot about souls,
You and I.
I like your soul.
I like seeing it in your face,
Hearing it in your voice.
Feeling it
When you touch me.
I like you naked.
I like hearing what's on your mind,
And I like knowing you trust me enough to let me in.
I like you mean, and nasty and rough around the edges,
And I like you strong yet gentle,
I like how you make me feel safe.
I like you naked.
I like meddling around in your mind,
Watching what makes you tick
And what doesn't.
I like you naked.
I like not just hearing,
But feeling and touching and tasting and smelling
You.
I like you
Unconditionally.
I like the game of devil's advocate we play,
I like you naked.
I like waking up next to you,
And falling into sleep to your breathing.
I like being with you, around you, beside you and on your mind.
I like you naked.
I like you like school children like recess.
It's usually what they'd say their favorite subject is.
You're my favorite subject.
You're my muse.
My heart,
My soul.
and quite possibly,
My forever.
I like you for everything you are, everything you have been, and everything you may or may not become.
Mostly,
Though,
I like you naked.

White Bitch

"Look at that white bitch. She's white as snow. Hey white bitch. Hey snow. I'd tear your ass apart. Hey white bitch! HEY!"
I ignored you as you drove past.
It was four in the morning,
And I don't live in the best part of town.
But your words echoed within me all day.
White bitch.
Snow.
White bitch.
If I had, for one second called you Mexican, or Black, or Indian, or Asian you would have spat the word Racist at my feet,
Like you spat the words "white bitch" at my face.
When I was a little girl,
I visited the Muskogee reservation in Oklahoma.
I was only a little girl,
Visiting my family.
My cousins laughed at the color of my skin because I was so pale.
They called me Snow.
They laughed at me and called me Snow
even though the blood of our shared ancestors runs like deer through my veins.
They called me Snow
even though we had the same long dark hair.
They sang "Snow White glows at night"
and smeared dirt in my face,
over my arms,
and threw rocks at my legs while I cried.
I was only a little girl.
I'm a grown woman now,
And I understand childhood cruelty,
But you,
Yelling white bitch out of your car window,
You reminding me that I live on the wrong side of town,
You
Spitting the word Snow at me.
You became the embodiment of what bigoted racism looks like today.
the nameless, faceless voice of a rage induced monster
screaming at me through your car window.
That's right.
I didn't even see the color of your skin.
I didn't need to,
Because when you opened your hate filled mouth
to spew those words at me,
You ceased to exist as a human being.
You became a thing.
A nasty, cruel ugly thing
that clawed at the edges of my thoughts all day.
I want you to feel
like the heartbroken, battered
and dirt laden little girl I once was.
It didn't matter what the color of your skin was.
What mattered was what came out of your mouth.
White Bitch.
Snow.
White bitch.

Shelter.

"I never said it was a dealbreaker!"
As we drove home on the I-10,
I practically screamed the sentence at you,
The way my soul was screaming at you.
I couldn't muster many words.
I was trying to hold myself together
Even if
My eyes were leaking mascara  kissed tears
And my brain was reeling as if it had been slapped.
I was
Twisting on the inside,
A proverbial
Apocalypse of emotion.
One.
Boy meets girl.
Two.
Girl falls in love with boy.
Three.
Boy breaks girl's heart.
No!
history has a tendency of repeating itself
NO!
i must be having a nightmare.
NO!
pleasewakemeuppleasewakemeuppleasewakemeup...
NO!
I am the strong one.
I am the glue that sticks people back together,
I am the rock in the dam that keeps it from exploding...
Exploding.
My heart is exploding.
My body is tearing apart from the shrapnel
This is Hell.
This is War.
I'm shell shocked.
My heart is coming home
From the front lines
In a pine box,
I'm fleeing back into a foxhole
Where they say
No one is an atheist
So I'm praying
I am on my knees while gunfire grenades and mines are exploding,
I'm praying
To whatever deity is listening
"Please, please if you're listening, if there's anyone out there listening, forgive me for what I am about to do."
I knelt there in the dirt,
For what felt like forever after you left,
My ears were ringing with
I love yous,
And
The sound of the truck door slamming.
I let the tears drip off the tip of my nose,
And onto a small flower
and I realized,
In that moment,
That when we met a seed was planted.
And we nurtured it,
Protected it,
And grew
Us.
And I was not about to watch that blossom wilt and die.
I promised you,
That I would walk the road that led to your heart.
I never break a promise.
I stood,
The storm calmed,
And I carefully stepped out of my foxhole,
And into the minefield.

Forgiveness

This is not a love poem.
I found you years ago,
Though it seems sometimes like yesterday.
I was instantaneously drawn to you,
Like a flies to rotting fruit.
You were broken and I knew I could fix you.
I could duct tape your broken wings and help you fly
Straight into the sun.
But you were no Icarus,
And my last name never has been Wright.
You were Henry Miller
And I could have been
Aniäs Nin.
But I was bound hand and foot to another.
That never stopped us.
We drank cheap beer together,
And reminisced about the old days when we were young
Before we knew the other existed.
It didn't matter that night,
We were too drunk
Or too high
To notice.
We played poker with body language.
You'd bet with a look
And I raised you a touch,
And before we knew it, we were going to your room.
But this isn't a love poem.
"Jess, I know I don't have much and you have a son, but I have a plan,"
Shut up and kiss me.
I wasn't interested in plans or what you had,
I was selfish.
I was bored with what I had and you, You were shiny and new and beautiful.
You made love to me three times that night,
I fucked you three times that night.
It was a full moon,
And I was hungrier than a starved wolf.
You held me all through the night.
You brought me coffee and cigarettes in the morning,
I thought you were just being a gentleman,
You actually were taking care of me.
I was a master manipulator,
A master of secrets,
A master of the dark.
And you were trying to feel something, anything, but the hole left in your heart.
This is not a love poem.
My life as I knew it,
The life I had carefully put together,
The life I shared with him,
Crumbled two days later.
For as Much as I have tried,
I have never been a good liar.
You were there,
But I shunned you almost as if it was your fault.
This is not a love poem.
It took me two years after our night together,
To finally figure it all out.
You've found someone new now,
So have I.
And we have talked since,
And I apologized,
But I don't think you ever heard me.
You told me not to worry about it,
You told me that you were thankful.
You told me you were fine,
I believed you,
Because you were all of those things.
I figured it all out, two years later.
I self sabotage.
I think I don't deserve things,
Good things,
Good people,
Goodness.
I had all of those things,
And I took all of those things away from myself.
You were an innocent bystander,
Not a catalyst.
You are good and right and selfless.
I see it in you every time we bump into each other.
You were never wrong for what we did.
I took you away from me, too, that weekend.
I lost out on you,
And not in the romantic way.
I damaged things,
Burnt bridges,
Broke bonds.
I see that now.
And for the record, I learned my lesson and forgave myself
For the record,
I am sorry.
This is not a love poem.
This is an apology.

Omission

Today, I thought about you.
I thought about the way the dim light on your dresser illuminates the planes of your face.
How hauntingly beautiful that is.
I wondered if you knew how I see you.
I watch you often.
I memorize the slightest details of your face.
I can see it when you hold back a smile,
or when you're being seductive,
I can see the ghosts that lie behind your eyes.
You asked me the other night
what my favorite part of your body was.
I could have easily said that I loved your cock,
watched your ego inflate,
but I didn't.
I said that I loved the space in between your shoulder blades, especially when you lay on your stomach.
I could tell that you were suprised.
That space, though,
that little flat crevice,
I love it.
When you lay on your side,
with your back to me,
I can nestle my face in there
and breathe you in.
The light on your dresser
casts a perfect shadow
so sometimes it looks like
a valley
and I like to trace my fingers up and down the hills of your shoulders.
Your shoulders attach to your arms.
And your arms,
they tell stories about you.
Those arms pin me down in
fits of passion,
they throw me up against walls,
across your bed,
and against counters.
Your arms keep me safe.
They hold me up when I can no longer stand,
they wrap around me when I need to be close,
they bring me back to earth
after you've thrusted me into oblivion.
I love your arms.
Your hands come next.
Your hands are fucking beautiful.
They create beautiful things, treasures, art.
Your hands invoke orgasms, cries of ecstasy, and pleasurable pain.
Your hands hold mine,
They tangle in my hair,
And they trace up and down my spine.
I love your hands.
I love your chest.
I feel safe up against it,
Whether I'm being crushed or held,
It supports me.
I press my ear against it often,
Just to be close to your heart.
I love your chest.
I love your legs.
Your legs carry you to me.
Your legs dance with me.
I think about how beautiful they are,
Well muscled, almost statuesque.
Your legs are made of steel and silk
I love your legs.
And your face...
Your face...
Your eyes are icicles and snow and sky and ocean.
I stare into them and see the infinate,
And I see cold fires.
Your lips are soft and perfectly shaped to fit mine,
And when you kiss me,
I feel every part of your soul behind it.
Your mouth tells me secrets, stories, truths, and promises.
You build bridges,
Tempt storms
And break me with your mouth.
Your nose is handsome.
It provides the perfect perch for your glasses,
A landing spot for my staccato kisses,
And finds its way to the soft spot on my neck, where shoulder meets clavicle.
I love your face.
So when you asked me what part of your body I favoured,
I made an omission of truth.
I favour all of your parts,
From your head to your feet.

The Road

I never asked for your vindication when I confessed that I loved you.
I knew the second those words left my fingers that there was no way your heart was ready.
I never asked for your permission to love you.
I am not your property. I am not your submissive, nor your slave.
I never asked for your heart in return.
I know that I am always the first to fall feet first.
The road that leads to your heart
may be treacherous,
full of beggars, murderers, kleptomaniacs, and con-artists,
possibly death, destruction and chaos.
I am but an unarmed, unprotected woman-child,
susceptible to all of these things,
and more.
I may walk through fires,
cut my feet on broken glass,
blister my hands from climbing,
starve,
thirst,
and collapse,
but I promise you,
I will not give up.
I have been broken, bruised, battered, bitten,
I have died,
and been ressurrected.
I have braved the coldest of winters,
sweated through the hottest of summers,
prayed through the barest of autumns,
and plowed through the fields of spring.
I am an unprotected, unarmed woman-child.
And though I may suffer,
I may hurt,
I may crumble,
I will crawl toward your heart
on cracked knees
and busted hands
to prove
my love,
and to earn yours.
I never asked you for vindication,
I never asked you for permission.
I never asked you for love.
I expected to earn it.
The best rewards we receive in this life,
are those we have honorably earned.

Black and Blue.

I adore the words
Willing Victim.
At age eighteen I was the victim.
Caught in a violent relationship, I never asked to be
Victimized.
The screams,
The bruises,
The broken bones were not consentual.
The hospital visits,
The lies,
the black eyes
And the tears
Were physical testaments to my
Everyday struggle.
I was broken
In every sense of the word.
I was the victim.
I survived.
I grew stronger,
More defiant,
More aware.
I began to blur the line
Between victim
And willing victim.
I took control of myself,
My body,
My mind,
And learned how to trust again.
Learned how to love again.
Learned how to be a person
Again.
I learned this
By being the willing victim.
I'm chaotic energy
In the right hands
Fluid light
When I'm bound
My screams no longer pierce the night sky
In agony
But rather,
Bliss.
I no longer cry out to god
For mercy.
I cry out to god
Because in my moments of painful ecstasy
I want to remember the name
Of the deity
Who was blind and deaf
To an eighteen year old broken girl.
The bruises I bear now
Are no longer reminders of the horror I faced.
They are hand written condolences, sweetly stinging love letters,
And heartfelt tributes to the beauty I was rebirthed into.
I am no longer a victim.
I have a name.
I have a soul.
And I have a choice.

Falling

I didn't want to let go.
We raced through the streets that night,
playing truth or dare with the wind.
I held on to you as you
whipped us through sidestreets
on your two wheeled
death machine.
By the time we stopped,
I was breathless, and I didn't want to let go,
but I did.
I didn't want to let go
the first night you held my hand
We laughed and smiled and whispered
downtown,
listened to stories,
and began creating our own.
I snuck my hand into yours,
as we walked toward the bookstore.
But I didn't want to let go,
though, I did.
I didn't want to let go,
When you wrapped your arms around me,
your lips pressed to mine,
your body
leaning into mine,
your heart
beating in time with mine,
Your breath,
Stilled, like mine.
I didn't want to let go,
But, I did.
I didn't want to let go
The first time you grabbed my hand, and led me out onto the dance floor.
The bass was pounding through my chest,
My body moved in time with yours,
Everybody else just dissappeared
And there was only you and I.
I didn't want to let go,
But I did.
I didn't want to let go
When I wrapped my arms around you while you slept.
Being curled up next to you,
Left my dreams sweet.
I wanted you to know I was there, though you were softly snoring in my ear.
I didn't want to let go.
But, I did.
I don't want to let go,
Because my soul recognizes yours.
I love the way you make me feel when we touch,
When we laugh at ourselves, or at each other,
When we're together, or
when we're apart.
So, I'm holding on.
Holding on to the ideas, the dreams, the talks and the stories, the jokes, the good times, and you.
I'll hold on to you.
Until we're ready
To let go.

Ugly.

I hope you cut yourself
When you
so eloquently etched my name
On your bedpost.
If I had a heart, I suppose I could forgive you,
But you stole it away
And buried it along with all your secrets.
I tried to tell you in words
Words I wrote to you
That I had fallen for you,
That I loved you.
And in a single sentence,
You ripped all of those words
All of those stanzas
All of those verses and couplets,
Out of my soul
And flushed them out.
That's all you are now.
A poem.
An angry, heartbroken, ugly poem.
I want you to feel as lame as the excuses you gave me.
I want you to limp with their weight.
I want you as crippled as you left me.
Begging for some sort of crutch to help you close distances.
I never thought you heartless,
But now I know better.
I hope the next time you feel anything,
You hurt.
I hope tears sting your eyes
And you are blinded.
I hope you cut yourself
When you carved my name
So eloquently
Into your bedpost.
And I hope everytime you look at the scar,
You remember the girl who wanted to give you everything.
You're just a lonely, angry little poem now,
And I deserve to write better ones.

Tin Man.

Ever since being diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder,
I've envied the tin man.
Not having a heart meant I would never experience chest pain,
Never experience hurt.
Never experience love.
I laid down on that hospital bed knowing very well I could die because of my faulty ticker.
I lay there, in the darkness,
Bitterly wishing for a new heart.
Or better yet, wishing I didn't have one to begin with.
As they pushed the needle through my chest,
I thought about the tin man.
I thought about how happy he was
When the wizard gave him his heart,
And I wondered if the tin man ever
Felt like his chest was going to explode into shrapnel,
Like mine did at that moment.
This morning I woke up and realized what a fool I have been.
I realized that you were gone, and never coming back.
There were pictures, and treasures and memories that you gave to me.
But you weren't there anymore.
My chest, though healed,
Felt as though it were exploding.
You had a heart.
You loved like it was your last day, everyday.
You never knew how important you were.
I never knew how important you were,
Until your heart stopped.
Until you were no more.
You and I followed the yellow brick road to the emerald city,
Neither of us actually knowing
You were the Wizard,
and I turned out to be the tin man.
And you were the one who would give me back my heart.

Allegro.

I have hand written you
a half dozen half-hearted love letters,
With no intention of you ever reading them because they weren't good enough.
I have practiced what I could say to you
In two different languages,
But when I get the chance to say it...
I choke.
I forgot what it was like to feel this way.
So, I'm going to try again
And maybe you can hear me over the stuttering, mumbling, short circuting fool I become in front of you.
You are so beautiful.
For as hardened as you come off
I know there exists a hopless romantic behind your nonchalont exterior.
And I know the only way to reach you,
Is to plead my case to him.
I know you have been broken.
I can see it in your face when you look at me sometimes.
I can taste it when your lips touch mine.
I know that you keep me at arm's length
because you're afraid of hurting me.
I also know,
That I am dangling from a string,
Waiting for you to give me word to let go.
I know that I am standing right in front of you, telling you that I want you, and no one, no reason, and not even the weather can change my mind.
I know that I may suffer.
I know that I may hurt.
I know that I can handle those things.
I also know
That I am selfish and impatient.
But for you, I would stand through it all. Because I feel more alive when I'm with you.
So don't let me walk away,
If this is what you want.
I told you once that I wouldn't wait forever,
But I can't bring myself to walk very far.
I can't promise you that it's going to always be rainbows and butterflies,
But I can promise you,
That I will stand by your side,
Take your hand,
And never look back.

Confessional

I was afraid I'd lost you,

to you.

I know everything hinges on this precarious cliff,

your insecurities, and mine.

I just want to forget that for awhile

and lay here next to you

breathing you in.

So let's let the music

sing us into each other.

My head on your chest,

your arms holding me close

Let's pretend the rest of the world

never mattered,

and survive here,

in the moment.

This is what I want.

Late nights playing

jukebox hero,

the music revealing more about us,

than we'd ever let on.

I'm fully aware of the consequences

of allowing myself to let go,

And I can't seem to help it

when I'm with you.

You're so distanced,

so secretive,

but somehow,

we're slowly pulling each other

into orbit.

So let's just lay here,

Watch the smoke from our cigaretts curl itself

upward.

You can lip synch while I sing along

and we can laugh when we get the words wrong.

I'll press my face to your neck,

wrap your arm around me,

and wait for the sun to come up.

Elk.

I wanted
To slow dance with you like junior prom.
Let you
Take my hand and walk me across the street.
Help you
Live in the now, under the endless sky.
But I let you
Watch me walk away.
I curled up next to you
In sleep, trusting everything.
I know I wasn't wrong.
You cradled me like I was the only one.
I drank you in the first night,
Letting you let me let go.
I could have gave it all to you.
Time heals everything, it's just too bad I'm
Too impatient.
So I let you watch me walk away
Only
I haven't walked very far.
You're a
juxtoposition,
With your subtle colors so close to mine.
And yeah,
I'm a barefoot goddess
Padding after a strong but silent type.
I'm learning to watch where my feet fall
Instead of letting you catch my clumsiness.
I'll tell you in a few words or less,
That this wasn't about you,
But I'll know, inside
I'm stopping myself from showing up at your door,
Light-footed and breathless,
Teeth and lips and toungue
Seeking yours
For validation.
I wish my words
Could stop you dead in your tracks
And conquer your fear.
But, just like the sure footed elk,
I'm afraid my sudden movements
Will cause you to spirit away from me
So I'm standing here.
Saying everything I ever wanted to say.
Hoping you're listening with a full heart.
Willing you to hear it.
Hoping,
Wanting.
Waiting.

Onions

For as many times as I have let my heart hit the floor,
I never forget who I am.
The girl I see in the mirror tonight is beautiful.
Dark hair, eyes that lie, and a sad smile.
She's whiskey kisses in the dark,
Cigarette smoke curls and crowns her like a halo.
She is a goddess.
Sometimes, I don't feel like a goddess.
I'm the nicest girl you'll ever meet because I fall in love easily.
I'm a hopless romantic stuck on the corner of walk, don't walk.
A heartbroken hippy who writes happily ever afters and sad songs over coffee.
But just because I give my heart away easily,
Just because I whisper in my sleep,
Just because I walk the line,
It doesn't mean it makes it any easier
When I wake up
To a hole in my chest and a screen full of words.
My knees are skinned,
My words are staccato notes plucked out on a violin.
My feet hurt from walking too far for too long.
But I don't give up.
I know you're out there, somewhere, with a glass of water.
I will bring you my book of heartscathing, stunted poetry.
You will take it from me
and replace it with
Just
As
Much
Love
As
I
Have
Given
Away.
Until then,
I have a screen full of words, and a heart on the floor.