Studying my nose in the mirror
I recall roaming for comfort
My fingers are my ailment- dismay
That you will one day let go of my hand,
Not necessarily for another, (though it has been so)
But from a gradual loosening
My knot of insecurity,
A continual,

Her hands were golden, as if baked under runny sun,
Yolk dripping into the palms,
Painting her in ancient warmth
As her fingers held the cigarette to her lips, allowing the aged paper to crack her mouth open
Autumn afternoon senior year ‘08

Once again,
my eyes have failed
to cradle the sorrow
of her last morning’s cascade.

Once–
my back bathed
under the lazy midday sun,
lightly awakened
by her calloused touch.

i was raised in the house that neither of my parents built
although my mother was the one that raised me
she took a home not built yet and filled it with daughters
and when her husband left
he took his paintings of french women

In his head, he is
beneath the stars,
that are shimmering
but silently so,
quiet in their
overwhelming beauty.
They reach out to him
despite being held
captive
in the sky’s embrace.

there is a gentle pulse on the other side of forever
when Mother Nature’s whisper grows hoarse
and our two hands hang limply in the space between us
leaden feathers dragging on the corners of fickle consciousness,
the laughter drying,
morphine for the pre-dead

The paper is old and wrinkled
Tapered along the edges like a fairy’s carpet
Billowing outward, flowering, creases unfolding in waves.
Rising off the words is the scent of brown sugar, old parchment dancing on the kitchen island.

cradled in the peak of an eclipse my breath capsizes into
the fray
a shuddering recognition of lost time

we sit back on the river rock letting the waves trickle between our toes
wrinkling our fresh skin into prunes

how did we get here?

Everyday I bleed on paper,
(It looks prettier that way.)

Here I present to you my blood,
Crimson seeping through sheets,
Spelling out words that stitch themselves into sentences,
That become paragraphs and poems.

Demeter’s calloused hands inch towards mine
I taste each fingertip in the golden dust that sprinkles my scythe
Her pitying reflection in each bead of sweat that rolls down my earth
Wetting its molten core.
You are a shadow oil that spills and spreads

Morsel of fire-kissed stir-fried greens
Tossed, unmissed through clouds of steam
Hissed as they dished in the wok, has been
A familiar sight preceding my teens

Does it scare you?
Does it remind you of when you were young?
A thin dirt road unpaved and unexplored like your heart.

You were born at the bottom of an infinite whisky glass
Your dad isn’t ever gonna reach you.

i crave what i can’t reach.
burn me into an iris
i want the sun to love me

what is a god anyway?
these cicadas are singing all wrong

boil my bones
i’ll hold this family together

My temper is a candle, with it’s wick burning low
An impermanent cloud where I come and go
My mind is a cavern, where I bury things deep
So mostly I smile, but sometimes I weep
My body is a temple, at which I throw stones

They do not tell you how it happens.
Ignoring the signs does not make them disappear.
The sadness has a voice now,
it speaks in moans and incoherent cries.

part 1: carmine
you want to see my heart?
go on then
haha
not what you expected?
here’s a secret: it never is.
oh, look at that— it’s still trying to beat
but the mice are already gnawing.
was that a grimace? how rude.

Tomorrow my heart will thunder.
rain will pour like a thousand tiny words

summer can swallow me whole.
I’m ready for an ending

the sunlight can eat me alive.
lay me down in the backyard.
I’ll fall right through the grass

and so the ideal takes form
shaped by what we think,
by the way we allow ourselves to think

Tomorrow, I will worry about the future.
But today, I wallow in the past.

Tomorrow, I will be 16 and trying to remember
if the derivative of arcsin is one over
square-root-of-one-minus-u-squared
or square-root-of-u-squared-minus-one.

for so long, i’ve crossed the same streets
i’ve smiled and waved to the same people in the hallways
i’ve thought the same thoughts
i’ve loved the same love
but i’ve outgrown my attachment to comfort and my warmth for the familiar sidewalks

At first, time flies.
Every moment is enshrined
          Ignorant of its fate –
Unaware that one day,
Its presence will be felt.
Time and time again.
            Overanalyzed –
The past to which the future
Will be fettered.

I had a dream last night . . .
I had a dream last night . . .
You died!

I studied it for myself
Looked it up even
But couldn’t wrap my head around it
Couldn’t wrap my mind –

It always starts as a clear spring day.
Serene curtains, murmuring crowds, warbling musicians.
“House closes in five.”
Here, time gets to stand still.

real art is dipping myself in paint and throwing myself against the pavement
wow look at that stain
paint
    paint
        paint
all the feelings away
until you darken the page and there’s nothing left to say.
(darling I miss you
baby baby

Today I am taking down my closet doors.
With my Dad’s old screwdriver, a little elbow grease,
And the sweat that will drip from my pores,
I will welcome the old me to the new one.

The air is heavy, dreary, and bleak.
When burdens overwhelm blessings
The exit beckons to me
But I am bound to stay.

Let me take a pill
Obliterate my past.
For a peaceful departure
From this world, I don’t belong
My time is up, I want to go.

you,
taught me how to hide my curls
in a cloak of shame.
told me I should cry every time my eyes
landed on the details carved into my brown face.
constantly reminded me I wasn’t in close enough proximity.

My favorite button
on the keyboard
is Ctrl.

    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    
        Safe is a set of five.

Don’t ask me why –
I couldn’t begin to answer.

Bittersweetness prevails
As you set off your sails
Where a tumulus sea
once prevailed

Yet, here we are
With merely a scar.

Your breath is lighter
The world – brighter –
Days fly by . . .
You no longer wish to cry.

El Niño

Indescribable, Unfathomable

Warmth.

Simple and mindless.

Basking in the leisure of

relief.

Carried, effortlessly, by the 
breezing winds

You exist

only in

My absence.