West Dale Palms boulevard Clover avenue I go to the grocery store And I run right into you Ask me how things are back home Do your days ever feel terribly long I say, I have to go Think I know the place where I belong
Hollywood, Los Angeles at dusk Her perfume smelled like camellias that bloom in November They look just like roses, so naturally I’m obsessed Swing the door open to a settled fire, Capture in my hands: tiny, soft embers Collapsing into moonlight, but Cradled like dust I’ll be strong for both of us If I must
Love poem: Grocery store [continued]
You have to feed your nostalgia sometimes It’s really the only way that you’ll survive It’s how you keep the dreams alive It’s the only way they’ll see you on the other side
West Dale Palms boulevard Clover avenue When I go to the grocery store I always look for you
Nuclear envelopes A testable hypothesis Will you still love me if I – Will you drown me out Like the noise in a soundproof room He always said he’d like to go to solitary confinement just to get away For a honeymoon
Light leaks Asparagine and leucine Convoluted sighs and my pink floor-length satin dress Eating three times on Mondays, Eating four times, the day after Consuming enough carbohydrates to be like a plant A prisoner in your gardener A wide-awake blooming orchid Couch that fell from a truck bed onto the motorway We could just make it ours Watch the fires and fireflies swarm in the distance Devouring apricots A routine for my bedtime
Poem: Ant colony (birthday balloons) [continued]
Letting go of lethargic tendencies But I don’t have the energy I’m miserable, with or without you Have to be the writer of my own memoir, the heroine in my own maladaptive daydreams That serve me quite well Like soft serve by the beach Made from plant-based oat milk & Oreos I’ll let the sea and the sun and the sky devour me, so I can merge with the ants and Worry only about my colony What a dream it’s becoming
Empty head Empty thoughts Your Percocet My writer’s block I’ve been too, afraid, to put this down on paper A typewriter with no keys Hands that swell Knees that bleed I know perfectly well That I’m who you need Will you be there for me, in the daylight and the evenings? My handsome prince Tread carefully I’m exactly who I aspire to be
Poem: Ant colony (birthday balloons) [continued]
I believe in myself, most of all Though, the cognitive dissonance gets swept like ashes At a fireplace Melting, blurring a reality that you swore was three-dimensional You vase of a porcelain starlit galaxy You atmospheric void, claustrophobic from your own apprehension I’m so in love with every part of you Especially the pieces you really disdain
I’ll take them in my hands Like the softest of sand
Poem: Ant colony (birthday balloons) [continued]
I don’t know what to do with all these birthday balloons The vinyl you bought me, thank you, by the way You precious thing. And the things I have to move on from Tangled in grief-ridden spiderwebs Merging through lanes with my blinker forever on I follow all the laws When the crows are watching, carefully
I’ll let the sea and the sun and the sky devour me, so I can merge with the ants and Worry only about my colony What a dream it’s becoming
Live in modest obscurity Classic California beach living Sunglasses, shades, Maseratis, fast cars, soda pop A life that has been glamorized Or so I had hypothesized He wouldn’t even be reading in between my lines Too busy thinking about himself all the time
Perhaps a few motels overlooking the coast Empty parking lots Paint a vision for yourself Soft ice cream in all good health Said you were sober, had liquor on the top shelf Honey, I thought you loved yourself
Ladies, you know me for my diamonds I’ll show you everything sparkly that’s designer That girl you once knew, you’re right behind her To enjoy the high life without mascara on To come to rise with the evening sun To know how to really know someone Stay omnipresent – hot, wild, and young Like every morning, a new life has just begun Dark spaces for dark traces of ice-cold skeletons Bones only fit like fragments Do what you’re told Let your dream love life in front of you start to unfold
Everything in the right order Everything in the right order Everything all the same Everything all the same
Lying between last quarter and new moon I figured when we’d talk, we would be with each other soon There are words on my body, on yours – video game cartoons You never meant to express how little I meant to you
I started noticing in conversation When the focus was on us, you lacked elation I quit my work for you, I gave up waiting I became so exhausted not living, but waiting I tried to show you I was patient You hate yourself like you’re tainted Letting of go of the dream that one day you and I would make it
Now I’m in the doorway, sort of half-naked I’m alone, but I’m tranquil, and nothing you do will change it
I’m alone but I’m tranquil Nothing you do will change it
I thought about how you didn’t say Merry Christmas Even though it’s my most favourite of holidays I thought of all the rainy dates The sombre, cold Saturdays Square cross-sections of apple-green pyroxene Hand over my mouth while I scream The antagonism of adenosine by caffeine The nights of unconditional pain Nothing to lose, nothing to gain I thought of you as my John Wayne Only my devotion remained the same
Daffodils paint your iridescent smile I always try to get you to stay for a longer while I’m not who you’re looking for, but I’m trying The roses I buy myself are perpetually dying If you bought them for me, they’d stay alive They’d put their hands on my shoulders when they’d come on by I’d never have to come up with a reason why When you’re faithful and in love There’s no reason to lie
I nailed death decrepit, got it in centuries-old buildings You throw away all the invitations to friends’ weddings I’d love to meet your family I’d love to meet your friends I’d love to meet anybody that admires the time you spend Fixing up daisies Mowing the lawn You softened my view of right and wrong You made me too vague to quite belong
Falling out of love with someone you’ve loved for so long Sounds an awful lot like an unfamiliar song
But I’m learning the chords Your vinyl collection, of course You want me to play housewife and do all your chores But with my pale blonde hair you still manage to get bored The hollowness in my eyes has become an eyesore So when I look directly at you, you just choose to ignore And I wait at the docks, my knees up to the shore If I asked you for freedom, you couldn’t give me any more Spoke to me like a virgin Told the world I was a whore
I could leave tomorrow You wouldn’t say goodbye It was my absolute most favourite holiday And you must have forgotten that brilliant thing you had to say My friends keep saying this time I need to stay away No more watering the garden No more child-like play Find me reminiscing in your spot in the doorway Nostalgia too much to bear Your petit-mal seizure stare I’m not quite there But I’m almost halfway
I molded you into a diamond You decayed that way Now you’re so lost in thought that you’re digging your own grave I’m upset my soft face can’t bring you back Been trying to determine what it is I lack It’s so sad to see you so worn out like that My words are so useless, coated in coal-black You’re so sober when you drink your cognac I keep thinking of this one hazy flashback
It’s you and me on the balcony But this time you’re in love with me
I’m not who you’re looking for, but I’m trying The roses I buy myself are perpetually dying If you bought them for me, they’d stay alive They’d put their hands on my shoulders when they’d come on by I’d never have to come up with a reason why When you’re faithful and in love There’s no reason to lie
You only see black & white but I’m lilac You only see in me all the things I lack A heroin dream that begins and ends with black
I know I said forever, but I’m not coming back I know I said forever, but I’m not coming back
It’s you and me on the balcony But this time you’re in love with me I know I said forever, but I’m not coming back But this time you’re in love with me
I’m a very kind and gracious girl If you let me, I will give you the world But as the brutality of this world continues to unfold My mirror’s edge is veiled, my patience can’t be sold
Give me your garden Make everything quiet I swear I’m prettiest when I’m not lying I won’t give up hoping, I won’t stop trying But it would be a piece of fiction to say I don’t dream of dying
You’re laughing at me My blonde hair blows in the breeze I will prevail, even though they’re dead-set on bringing long-lasting harm to me I see through the trees When I run, you freeze Collapsing in child’s fables isn’t only for the weak Take me with you I want to know what God knows Don’t be scared of the nighttime In the darkest hours, I’m most composed
The more you grow up, the smarter you think you are But in the same circumstances, you always lose yourself I collect hard-cover books of flowers & death spells I know all the wonderful roses by their first and last names I play with my sanity like it’s my favourite win-or-lose game You were always so harsh But me? Oh, so tame Didn’t know how to respond to all the accusations and shame I hate you, I love you It all sounded the same
I’ve decided to take my most loved photo of us down from my shelf I thought it proved we were real The space between you and myself But my mitral valve is still broken, so I can’t afford to inconvenience oneself Though our smiles were true You said it yourself Never seen a girl look at you so warm and heartfelt It hurts now But it didn’t back then Those split seconds repeat in my mind, again and again You were my prince, my most handsome immunogen You said I stunned in my floral dress Dainty and parisienne
I know this frail body wasn’t exactly built to please I’m a young girl too – I have restraint, but I have needs My singleness of purpose is far too remote I tend to break up with boys by posting poems I wrote When I was at my most fragile, I asked you for a rose Your promises were painful because I never got those
But your perseverance to love me will be your best power I stay up wondering how to please you I only sleep a few hours Me at my most tired is me at my most sour How much more beautiful do I need to be, in order to receive a white flower? I’m sort of like a princess stuck at the crown of a tower My father’s hung flyers for the peasants and princes to form a line Some of them have courage Some barely have a spine The common denominator seems to be they’re all trying But if you said it’s to impress me, I’d say that you’re lying
Several days ago, I bought roses To make myself smile I didn’t change the water Just like me, they’re dying
Winters in Chicago were when I felt my most free The wind chill was so strong, I felt it belonged to me It didn’t matter that it was a lake, I still saw it as the sea All I remember are evenings at Argo Tea Feeling happy, just to be me
You must have composure, you must be determined I’m taking care of myself, I’m doing it on purpose The December chill confronts me with things I am sure of Like how spontaneously great heights can collapse Like how the disillusioned are most likely to relapse Like how I felt, true love was almost in my grasp
But as the fog on my window, it visited and then passed It disappeared just like that I’m trying not to react
I’m screaming into my pillow (I’m trying not to react) I’m folding laundry to feel productive (I’m scared of whom I’ll attract) I lied to everybody & said I was fine (I was so scared the whole time) I’m taking every analeptic (I write your name, strike it out with a line)
I picture me in your backyard, Picking grapes off the vine I cried the whole way home, driving past the coastline I thought I didn’t deserve beauty, God doesn’t want me on cloud nine So I hit up your number, Forgot you were atropine And now I’m having trouble sleeping because you aren’t my lifeline I tell you I need you! You say, maybe next time “I’ve got a girl here, she’s helping me escape my mind”
To some people, I’m gorgeous To you, I’m saccharine But everything I am, you will always undermine I’m not your chosen one Never your valentine
I’m the one that treads water Looking for reasons to be alive
If you were safety, you wouldn’t give me your hand You’d sail towards what suits you The palm trees, the sand
I would get tired Give up and drown You wouldn’t say sorry, because you wouldn’t be around
The water obscures my hearing The green-blue current is the only sound I wanted to be loved, the void was what I found But the ocean is my new bliss, so I fade into the background I’m five again, I’ve found my new playground
I would get tired Give up and drown You wouldn’t say sorry, you wouldn’t be around I’m five again, I’ve found my new playground The sea has become my chosen burial ground The green-blue current is the only sound
The void is what I felt, but true love is what I found
