Pink ballerina slippers A child crying out I have loved you – a thousand, a thousand, a thousand times
Your breaking voice The cracks in the tiles of my ivory bathroom floor If I could hold you forever I’d be somewhere safe Somewhere where the demons can’t get me Looking into your soft, collapsed face
One day I’ll understand God’s timing But honey, I’ll never stop trying My dandelion My aching Baby’s Breath A cardigan I only wear when I smoke non-menthol cigarettes Watching evening television Will you be there with me?
Counting my fingers Keeping me safe A car on fire on the side of the freeway I cannot wait until I get to see you again
Biting my fingers Keeping me safe I took you in my arms, but you showed me the way
I cannot wait until I get to see you again I cannot wait
Minnesota in the hot, hot sun I’ll write a memoir, like I’m a film star Like my words are fiber nectar & galvanized tar I wish I could join the assembly line Not to find out, not to decay, but to come out bright white & crystal, grey clay To become transparent in the grand scheme of things Be able to extrapolate meaning from my own devices Tell you how I find human beings so lifeless Wrapped up in their due process of mind Fingertips on roses, your hands on the arched back that is mine Fever dreams Amphetamines
I know the road is farther than it seems I’ve seen the bitter resemblance of what’s paved underneath My eyes blur, I can’t see, I can’t see a thing Wouldn’t you like to have a dance with refined me? I’m mesmerized by nothing at all Nobody pays attention to what I want them to pay attention to I’m violent, I got this, I’m gutless, I’m thinner than the fabric Screaming my insides out, I’ll eat you alive Won’t find me on your bedside You said, you said You said, you said Your goodbyes so hazily Tell me, how do you wish to be portrayed? When they paint you wrong, are you dismayed? What are you proud to take to the grave? I’m taking the dreams I made
I have this one song, I get a lot of meaning from it The way it blankets me in security and A freedom I’ve never found in a single human being They’re tar-stained, they’re charcoal remnants They’ll gaslight you and then say that you’re gaslighting them in return The apprehension is near, I told you the car was far away I didn’t see it coming my way Somehow I didn’t mind I had this dream, I saw the glass-slipper ball gown The one I wore when You said, I swore, you said You said, I swore it, I swore you said Wouldn’t be there Star-crossed lovers Awake with hesitation Marvel at my presentation Scattered in assembly, grief like parasites Do you know anyone who sees you in the right & softest light?
I’m thinner than fabric, I’m tougher than fossil fuels If it’s confusing, it’s only confusing to you Me – I know what’s going on Write you a grocery list of things to bring A sustainable sparkle, a delicate sapphire An element of surprise to add to the details and decor Horrors of society seem to fade when we turn the television on
Melt me like aspartame in Coca Cola Ignite a funeral home Tell me what you find transparent Covered in frost, I’m not vaguely processed I’m rarely understood and I think I know why I think this life is mine to apprehend and find I lose my keys over and over again on purpose Locked out so I can write But I thought you said, I thought you said But I thought you said, I thought you said
I have this one song that makes me feel more like myself than anything else I play it on repeat because I’m sick of hearing about my diminishing health Drown out the noise, fiber-glass, can’t see, my vision blurs The ocean is my lord & savior I’m not even surprised by their behavior The evidence is real because it’s written on parchment paper
It always ends It always ends like this I’m in the shower, white roses and pink carnations, I feel true bliss You’d be obsolete In a thousand years We’re connected by the fabric The sheer and hazy stillness Do it on the daily Hate you a little, just maybe Match my evening glow
If you hate me, that’s not a well thought-out decision You have your fears and I have this one song That makes me feel more like myself than I’ve ever felt before And I play it I play it all day long When the noise drowns me out, I sing along You wouldn’t say, you wouldn’t say Anything to conclude the grime and the dirt you brought to my doorstep A cave’s internal diameter A concave, arching sky The exact shade of your brown eyes My skin is softest on the tops of my thighs
I don’t hate anyone I don’t hate anything I don’t hate anyone There’s just nothing left to sink Drowning in the deep end because in the water I’m completely occupying my body I don’t hate anyone I don’t hate anything I’ll let the water have me, on purpose, on purpose
Does drowning make you nervous? Does real love make you hesitate?
Does drowning make you nervous? Does real love make you hesitate? Does drowning make you hesitate?
I want to Lay beside The edge of your bedside Realizing I can’t say the words I wish would fill my mind Out of the fabric from my lost and heavy fingertips I have This weight Encapsulating me in tragic divinity When you don’t Look Me in the eyes I feel something akin to death to fate’s memory Are you fond of me? Tell me, Are you fond of me? Please tell me
You smoke A cigarette I gave to you Outside Before the rain starts to fall I look up At your broad shoulders Cream, silk face Your grandfather sweater and the way I Don’t think you’ve quite forgiven me yet I’ll drive home Gripping the wheel Trying not to Trying not to Trying not to cry Envisioning me by your bedside Soft and golden, starry and hazy Would you let me trail My fingers Along your head In the Right places To make you feel
The white flowers at the edge of My bedside I bought them for myself They weren’t given to me But I wanted To find Flowers On your desk When I came by I know expectations are futile I know they will be the death of me I think I’ve already lived this lifetime
I drive Deep into the night Gripping the steering wheel My vision blurring Me chasing Created memories after each other as they create marked trails in my mind I can’t see What colour the light is, or whether it’s telling me to go And I don’t mind Because nobody would care Or know What flowers Are appropriate To bring
For a flower girl A flower girl I’m a flower girl Yes, I’m a flower girl And there weren’t Flowers For my arrival And yes, I am a flower girl I’m God’s favourite flower girl Always bringing Flowers To other peoples’ Weddings And goodbyes And celebrations
But what do I have to celebrate? When I drive deep into the night I begin to close my eyes Gripping the steering wheel
Would you get me flowers If you knew how that would make me feel
He tells me Not to get too excited As we sit alongside the deep-blue riverbed But me – I’ve been counting down the days I saw my chamomile flowers bloom, then close, and fall apart in the duration of one week As I hadn’t changed the water I was distracted by the sparkle Of the morning’s horizon As it painted me in shades of pink I couldn’t quite capture on film
California outlawed flavoured vape products I know, I’m mourning it heavily Now I find myself smoking non-menthol cigarettes in my parking lot Like my father did, in his Amber tones of his skin shining like Diamonds you pick back up from the jewelry store That line your blue-tinted watch with a brand painted in cursive ink Like your mother’s Russian handwriting Soft in all of the Roughest places
My afternoon gaze is Thick with gloom and hope, both at the same time I’m wrapped in my navy ‘Windy City’ sweater that I bought at a Walgreens Where it took four cashiers to properly ring up my alcoholic drink, too Because the cashiers were mostly underage But we were on the same page Laughing about how liquor makes the turbulent flight go smoothly And how I’ll wrap myself in bridal magazines and read the new Forbes “thirty under thirty” list Knowing I won’t make it on there in less than three years Cutoffs are so harsh, isn’t it maddening Life is so funny sometimes, at the right times I’ll fade to November grey like a collapsing sky I’ll lay my head down and never, ever wonder why I’ll endure the gradual passage of time
He adjusted his collar And we laughed about who is taller Because me, my small frame, I take up so little of space Though I feel like if I spread my fingertips, they’ll reach the mountains Surrounded by cherry stems and cascading fountains Waterfalls along the trail where my senior terrier walks on her own self-created path My glimmer of hope in this brittle, dark night Made for a hollow tin of little coloured cards stolen from the paint store Where we wrote our biggest dreams on Gathering the courage to set them on fire And not intending to burn down the park grounds down with our miniature vision boards
I found a poem I published for a boy three years ago On his birthday It was called ‘I wrote you a poem’ My mother laughed at how cute that was I did too I think back to those years and how he never came through And somehow that didn’t make me love him any less Probably even more so
I have to get better with taking derivatives Along with the vitamins in my medicine cabinet I finally bought a parking permit for university so I could stop Getting tickets Even though the traffic cop is such a sweetheart He asks about my navy ‘Windy City’ sweater Things like “so when are you going to finally end up there?”
The piece of rose-tinted, painted card-stock That I’d never set on flames I keep it in my wallet To know that I’ll get there
I’ll get there Until I’m at the drugstore again with the cashiers That are of-age, by that time And I’m buying wine
And Chicago will treat me like it’s been mine this whole time And I won’t love it any less Probably even more so
a free verse poem about finding stability & self-acceptance
I know That things won’t work out as planned I know that Because my mother taught me how to be a man But there are Parts of me that won’t let someone hold my hand Because I Because I Find graveyards appealing Harsh winter thunderstorms healing And the chaos within you is quite often revealing Of the doom and dismay your surroundings convey The filth The agony The dreams others built for you become destroyed I’m my own person
But when I drive home at night I don’t feel alone I just know I am
It was cold in Chicago And I wanted to lay down In the snow My frail body Seldom appears melancholy Singing you songs, breathlessly, to you in your sleep Though my voice is never the right pitch Maybe that’s why I wait Until you hit your steady dream state An abyss of perpetual ignorance to moral obligations
The impatience Is testing me Like a ticking clock Telling me I Haven’t painted The sky quite right Haven’t gotten the stars To my audience’s delight And I think I might combust From the tainted, porcelain figure I often wish to set on fire Because what burns Feels so warm In winter
It’s almost February The anniversary of A thousand slumbers A rainfall that struck me like Lightning on the fast lane on the highway Swerving between cars with my eyes closed Thinking I’m oh – I’m just so composed But me, parchment paper thick, practically comatose Wouldn’t keep anyone up at night When you haven’t Made a name For yourself And nobody Gets the intonation In your full name quite right Maybe it’s not The right time To say
That what burns feels so warm In winter My god The shades of blue How I’d devour the skyline Like an arsonist, I fade to grey Along with the trembling cityscape
I encapsulate all the seasons & am easily forgotten
I only hope to properly portray The vacancy light in this hotel I occupy
Me, Against the wall Cold, doll-like, confused Fingertips Painted the lightest shade of pink that the nail salon could offer me If only, I could be elegant I could like parts of myself that others don’t I could live my life like My father envisioned
When he said to me
That I was born In the perfect season For a girl who prolongs Finding a reason To burn this place down to the ground
Hollow Cave Where my old journals remain Where ex-boyfriends mispronounce my last name They never remember the best parts of you They never really knew How to get through How your eyes turn dark green when your favourite song comes on Or when the colour temperature is five thousand Kelvin and I feel ashamed That I woke up to find Myself Not in embers But filling a body With wholeness that only
Real self-acceptance could develop and create
Something permanent Is never Found
I’m no good with directions but I don’t believe I’m lost I’m exactly On my own two feet Waiting To leave a message after the beep
But I hang up, because I remember They can’t pronounce my last name The intonation Is weak And I Am so Much farther than I thought I would be At this time of my life Are you, at all, surprised?
When I look At the cars Passing me by On the highway, I wonder If they’re going Somewhere warm and inviting
I don’t know why That To me Feels so terribly frightening
