the girl
the ex girl friend

she hung around in stranger ways.

she hung around in clothing sizes. I wouldn't think about it, but I would pull a blouse off the rack at the department store, and she was there, and her ghost form taunted me about the pound cake I enjoyed when I got coffee in the afternoon.

She whispered things to me about her frail bones when I would look myself in the mirror at night. She would tell me how she listened to cooler music. How she had superb cheekbones, and the pockets of her coats were lined with better things than I could expect in the low middle class.

But I smoked her out.
I smoked her out when I could fill my whole brassiere. I smoked her out when I knew grammar and when I woke up in the night with nightmares that he held me against.
what he held against me---
I don't have all the answers.
I've got what I've got left.
I've got voicemails and love Post-its and I've got the men who flirt with me in Italian and Americanos. I've got hours and hours.
I've got that...
They'll be around when the ex girl friend shows up
in the ways that I can't deal with yet.
With the ex-insecurities
with the ex-lawful obligations
with ex.morning.coffee

with scrapbooks full of ex.
with internets full of ex.

This is what we come to bury, but hope for,
to prove that we were once
someone
before we were a lover
or before
we kept it all in a history,
and before we knew we could be strong and do it all again to an unsuspecting someone.

I rip off the tape, from the back of the photo.
I look at you and I together, one more time. Years of you being taped to my wall, unable to escape me. And this time, I wad the tape between my fingers and palm.
I let you go.
Tuck the photo into the album, safe from us both.

I'm ready to move on to all of the night skies that will bring fireworks without us.

if I sat at this table- pretended to be more of a person to you..I could give you longer revisions of the whole story. that I am a slut for the emotion of moving on, of being seduced...you wouldn't think of me as much, after you sold the furniture shop/you married me in all the Jewish ceremony. we broke glass. You thought you could meet any brown-haired girl who could love you more than me.

every time, you were right.
That my heritage made me a girl who could not hold love in her heart.
that it made me partial to literature. to counting steps, to counting words. To ignoring that you had needs and I had a soul made of earth.

I watered the plants after you left. I hoped to say that I couldn't love men, but I come back to
"rejoices"
rejoices....
to painting my face into smiling
no matter what real life calls on you to do.
To hold up a light in the darkness.
To pretend yourself a hippie with a candle.

I promise you I am alone with my horror movie dreams.
I promise I wish I had been a girl, with girl motives and girl romantics.
I promise I thought I'd grow up to be a girl.

what a simple word; the word no. And yet here I am, uttering it in all the language. Every language. Uttering I told you I am sorry. You should not have come near me, and I will take all the vindictive steps that you couldn't have guessed.

I wake in a sleeping bag.
I wake, a serious slumber party.
I wake by myself.

I don't remember if
I'm remembering Emily
the way she really is,
or the way she deserves to be remembered.
what I remember is, that each small touch
released a wave to my brain. And that she was real
and that I forgot about her. Too quickly.

She is a forest I'll be glad to be lost in--again.
She brings me back and hollows me out.
Sings me Spanish lullabies.

I let you call the shots for all this time
oh honey.
And now you come back looking for me, to find me nowhere. To find me in hotels where the air is thick with sex and money. The other young women and other young men, hurrying to the elevator and no one else is around but me to put down my head, shamefully. To ignore their whispers as they walk past me, and I'm peripheral in the movie of their life.
You find me in therapy sessions where the doctor holds my arm away from my body, and says, "Yes, there is a problem here." You find me melting.
oh sweetheart.
When I couldn't fulfill myself in you, I spread the fulfillment around.
oh, baby,
Don't say too much out loud.

don't come back. don't blink eyes too heavy. don't say a name and mean it less than you used to.
Pull up into your spine a wonderful memory, and don't make it out to be something it's not. Coax the heart to keep beating. Whisper words to it that it would associate with happiness and Christmas and the first day you loved Jesus.

Drink water, count traffic lights, pet the dog.
You can't believe everything that you tell yourself.

You and I both know about the short moments, and how we will never end up as two.
I will never end up loving you longer than--
I was a shorter girl with fiery hair.
I was a belligerent officer offering my services.

WE would take a lot of steps to try to figure out
each other's
phone numbers.
But most of all, if we pasted on our faces in the
morning with a combination of
calamine lotion and sunglasses stapled
underneath our tresses
We could become what people looked for in magazines
a girl's body pressed up against a man's body
as shallow
and despicable as money can make it.

After falling in love by uninterrupted correspondence, we could brush our teeth, fake good grammar and be something very whole.
Very ambiguous.
Very knowing of problems
and understanding in language.

climbing lots of stairs, and it was up and up the yard. I stopped, momentarily. I held my arm out in front of my face to touch the skin, to point to somewhere far away. But there aren't stars, in this part of America, like brilliant spots on the map, so brilliant that we can't see anything else besides our own deafening electricity.
climb a few more stairs. dust my knees in Begonias, bathed in shade. They would say, "how I love to keep staying here, the sun can't touch me, the moon can't touch me. Love and reproduce under lack of--" they write love letters in the dark, by candlelight, wearing sunglasses.

She didn't break a long stare. She refused to believe in what to wake up with out her. rippedupedness. I put foot in front of another, higher degrees, or extra crashed jeans in ice, grin, sip, please, another stretch up to a doorstep.
So rich.
So doctor.
So "help me, I've been climbing the lawn for hours now."
Just bearable. Just hear-able.
Pull me into living room of "I can feel that potato chip, I choked on it, I feel it down in my ribs," but really what you want to say is,
I woke up this morning
my guts rejecting what my heart wants so awfully.
becominganastoundingactress
you break into an attic, stuffy and a lot of unresolved heirlooms of memory. But still put arm next to arm, saying sorry if I touch you.
Foot in front of foot,
saying I need you to move-out-of-my-way.

I spoke up until yesterday
for a more monopolized version of us and the ten crackling whispers.
BUT I CAN'T PROMISE ANYTHING
you are disappointed in the open fridge door method of when I stare into space and wrap the pieces around me
tie bows
tie knots
tie ties for forgotten summers that I want to focus in the bright lights of a microscope; scrupulous to the every moment I could
go
back
to
you
my beloved, my first endless unconditional.
what we bury under papers and familiar checks
what we will never get to say goodbye to
Asparagus
lightning
and strawberry rhubarb jello.

BUT you are waiting for that
very Last
the final kiss in the moment of Hello to a Glorious.
Hello to white shores and up-close-and-personal..

intangible.
unacceptable.
grossly underestimated this

It was when my face was made of metal and my hearing gone;
oh wait and draw marker:
yellow lights.
You were a millionaire and laughed a lot, but
I can't see your face behind the mountains.
I'd rather you be all here
or mostly gone
wrapped in seran wrap, tucked into someone's backpack
where I can lie and say
I didn't wait.

I didn't wait, or wait, and wait.

if you'd like to take six years off your face and tell me the real parts, the truth, and we don't take pictures anymore
because everything
is too soft to touch,
too sensitive to drill holes in that it becomes
angel-food-cake
and if the alarm wakes you up, smile
if the man holds your door open, whisper thank you and smile demure
and if you get wrapped up in whatever welcomes you in the freezing snow

it's

alr. ---ight.

when you tell the whole honest truth, or something synonymous I wouldn't blame you if it came out like a lie, with your face scrunched up in the market place. I can't ask you to be more than that girl in those clothes and
I can't love you less than if you
were something believable

and the scent comes back as memorabilia. Something you'll pay close to anything for to drown in
slowly
and slowly
but cautious

We would just pull our stockings on and sing a new song that we were making up on the spot - say not only no (but the kind of NO a junkie says to rehab, scraping finger nails on the floor, or the door jamb or the feet of stranger in the lobby) and shake our heads smiling: "No we will not be preoccupied with how the gaping wounds, yep you can stick your hand or your arms through these wounds and out the other side, you could feel my cardigan, no I am not satisfied to live with a hole where my heart will be. Honey, I will not try to fix it, or dwell on it, I am going to walk in high heels, and I'm going to keep washing my hair, and I'm going to smile flirtatiously with the mailman each day until it goes away." We'd say that. And after awhile the burn was more like lightly toasted, and we didn't use band-aids in hopes of cauterization.
And we never ever ever called a doctor about it.

under green yellow light in a bathroom for kindergartners -bring all your flaws forward, ahead of you, don't disguise them behind apple computers and orange doors with posters on them-- I need you to be realistic more often, and take less acetaminophen.
punch out answers, run down America,
and realize one day the smooth edges will be gone. I love you desperate and distant (me, not you, you asshole) and I crave seven sips of skin
even though you are your own population
and I'm still me.the.girl.with.shortish.brown.hair.

it's the second left of your face
your uneasy way of being absent
like drawing a knife from mouth to sideache.
but only for me, darling-dear-sweetheart
leave me the free one and you always satiated by the one you hold hands with
and I pick up the scraps of us and mold them into
cut out paper flowers or memorized pictures
the lines in your frank tied up speeches
when I'd wake and feel your arms
is a
ghost
I wander in empty coke bottles and leave you messages
and leave you.
I am flawed if I'm not free.

I can't blame you for being cold
we.are.twotimers.
the both of us glazing over old facts
and pretending things that we don't ever come to face.
pouring coffee
pouring old stories down the drain.
you don't meet me in the eyes
or where you flinch when I touch you.
It's not a negative side-effect it just fucking happens a lot of the time
when you got your Wednesday night
your wallet pulled out
your eyes shut
and your lies wrapped up neatly packaged
as a tendency to wear sunglasses and stop grinning sideways
during the passenger seat ride back upstate

it's a map, always,
back to where you first got into Steinbeck or drank
Americanos while you read Luke Chapter One
--I'm late for work and
Satan left me a message
made my hands look old in the drive through
(when I wanted something permanent...anything permanent
like good handwriting or the lines on your skin in all this mess)
a try at a better me--
loosely
we run because it
hurts less and less
and maybe I don't want the poetry
stitched into my skin because
I've never been thoroughly sentimental and I like
starting
over
like
bleach
white.

so here for a moment
(a truth)
taking in the hair spray
and the youth we take for granted
I would tell you about law
I would tell you my secrets
yes I must be lonely if I've taken naps
I couldn't find myself a corner to list my mishaps and let my fingers touch your face
so few obstacles between us
except fear
which is enough.

it's just for a trick---
I'm marching in
to your bones
like a hundred cold textbook answers
that you want to refuse

you stand six seven eight
by a window you used to imagine would heal
you of all the waiting you do.
I am not a democracy and will probably tell you lies.
I can't help it
....sugar's the only answer
and it's just too bad.
Too bad for broken album covers
for shitty broken knees
and for the tired people who run the world and who will be happy to watch it burn.

What would you want with a hallelujah? I always tried to tell you the answers in between the flavor of cherry we both decided was real. It was really in the air when we stood in the Denny's parking lot, but not quite clean, as in "run through the wash" or warsh if you're in Iowa.

I'm choking on the individual idea of a scent buried in my clothes. A kiss you left on my eyebrow. A hand I've forgotten how to hold. Excuse me for a smoke...

Lefthanded. She was left handED. Somehow sparkly and coca cola with her mailbox open and waiting for my letters she told me stories.
How one day we'd be languid. Or Livid. Would we be livid if they broke us in? Even softly? giving us bowling lessons first? Could we wear headbands when we were twenty or twenty one or 32.

Stay. Still.
This is the thank you note you lost in your car.

Would you feel brilliant if I touched you> cuatro > the number of times I lifted my head up and saw you walking through my life in falling leaves and smells that cling to my clothes
not in an Abercrombie way
or Nordstrom with the piano
I dream you.
I dream the way you stick your foot in the door
hold out your hand and grab me
you make me swim intoxicated in your leftover heart
WHAT?
the smell was dizzying like
beautiful almost
the way city lights hit my eyes?
I don't know.
I feel whole? Taking time to love the fall-apart.
Loving the girl you leave me for
to be fragile, I am so wonderfully good at sitting by
myself in the holy, stale and biting temperature
of the middle.
Lately it's about strawberries and what we remember to be church and God and the way we cry when we are so happy that we keep wearing shoes and socks. You love me, you love me, you love. Like corrected vision and the door swings open, we are here.
We hear.
We hear when you are sobbing and when you're laughing.
We hear the past and how it soaks the future with honey and something soft that weighs down your arms. How you keep running in pink socks.
You thought no one saw them in your shoes.
You thought they were ankle socks.
But we keep going! LOVE. We keep rummaging for the
truth.
We found it in empty 12 packs, somewhere at the bottom. We are the night and the morning and the hour that everyone despises.
Glue. I am the longest responses to the letters you've been writing. The complaints you've been lodging and the tired way you rub your eyes in the morning.
As if,
it would some how do.
To be here, me and you.

I ate soap once - when I didn't think I loved you - I was reaching for something (you always wanted a little denial, when sitting on the couch in your underpants) yes, I swished it around in my mouth and close my eyes and swallowed. a few seconds later I knew I was a lunatic and put my sunglasses on and walked outside. I walked down the street and I didn't think I loved you. I still don't. But the next day I woke up heavy from allergies or black and white dreams, It Was Bob Who'd Held My Hand. Savvy and holistic in the secret strange under dirt lifestyle I tried so hard not to provoke from the door handle with pancake syrup (Noah's been here again, the garbage is tipped over) and you are so
so
sorry for me, but always twisting the red top off the bottle and bottom's up
I don't feel nurtured
I don't feel like I'm naive.
Maybe wasting but still painted onto your two minute per hour memory of (58 minutes for other more obliging subjects, less smart ass and more stylistic) me. Darkly brilliant and
honey, you're not all there
overheard by seven women who think it's easier than it is. And I still don't think I love you.

i like your texture
when you feel guilty about the colors on your face in
the orange ford pickup truck
we pardoned ourselves but didn't bother to speak much
a bobby pin or two leaking out of my head
my interchangeable pieces:
the occipital and such
how could you know that though?
you feel bad about other belligerent thoughts you have about my
singing in the kitchen
my unaccomplished cartwheels
my faltering mind.

but you trade me in
anyway
for a new one.

An old man sits smoking on the bench, close to me.
He gauges exactly when the smoke hits me in the face;
my eyebrows raise. He watches them.
My sandwich suddenly tastes richer.
oomami I think they call it.
I quit smoking a couple weeks ago...

I'm sure he has a good looking son he never talks to.
(I have skirts I never wear.)
I'm trying to settle down these days.
walk on the sidewalks more.
I've only been drinking half my cup of coffee, Aimee.
And wearing Bandaids on my cuts.

He has a good looking son I've talked to.
A lot.
I think he'll die if he keeps smoking like that.
We all die, and some of us just love the poison in between,
Aimee; I think.
Have a word with me, will you-
in between poisons.

doyouhearmewhenIscreamnexttoyou
the first night I collided with you
on a Sunday
left first then right you gotta whisper to me
"stop crying, stop crying, damn it"
but do you see who this is?
the space between our arms
and no one's ever seen the skin on my back
least of all you
no one's ever seen my bad side
least of all you when you are such good friends with God.

what do you say to a girl
what do you say to yourself when you question your own mind
when you don't know all the answers
but you know the hairs on your arm and the scar on your back
and you know its all gotta mean something-
shouldn't it?
doesn't it?
what then, God. what then am I supposed to say.

i love you so much
honey - pretty boy
and maybe you'll just love me too if
I get my nose sawed down
or if I stop drinkin' coffee
or maybe if you go blind and you like the sounda my voice
so quietly leaking into space

choosin' sides
I don't contemplate life with you
I contemplate the six strangling seconds it takes you
to go from
you like me
ya hate me
you quietly leak into the space of thinking you're a kinda good guy.

this can of coffee was 100% fresh
guaranteed
two years ago.
this American life on the radio reminds me of the paint and the old times before I met you
it was easier in those days
to just turn it off.

this thing you got
sticks its hands inside my chest
instead of choking me forthright
you squeeze my very lungs, till there's nothing left
so close to the heart
and yet you do not touch the heart
ruthless;
simply because you are ruthless.
It teaches me to wish I was drowning
to leave my last oxygen, and breathe in the water
instead of letting you hold me in your violent ways
as I put on mascara and my stockings
in the m o r n i n g.

anything that matches take it grab it
it's yours
whether or not that's true

LIVING in your head every single moment
the dirt the filth
we ache
we ache
we want to live in truth but they keep saying truth is relative
and I just wanna go back to the old days when
truth was truth
and always proved itself to be that way

we ache
we fight we are going somewhere to
live for a few days in
our filth our dirt
our time of retching in the dark
STOP this is not about what I do or who you are or why you can't stop beating me with your carelessness
I was born to hurt from truth
but we're gonna get clean, baby.
Frozen
clean
cauterized

lifted from our lies

we click together better as strangers.
two no-names in a too-bright parking lot.

well, I know your name.

but we don't have to look into each other's eyes.
we could keep our hands in our pockets
and that is
so nice.

He says
"You know-
we could get rid of this
table easily"
and the lamp
and the coffeepot
we could throw them out the window
in the morning before
BREAKFAST
You and I, in the dark
will do dark deeds
disposing of illegal substances
eliminating evidence before
your parents
come for dinner, Honey
they won't be able to tell
what lives we lead
what little shame we have
when we wake each day
Yes, we are monsters, You and I
maybe we have no souls and no conscience-
but we could get rid of this table easily.

somehow I don't feel sorry for you
can't correct you
can't think that weeping would make any difference
somehow you've melted down
there was nothing there after all
but pieces of shrapnel you wished you weren't.

stripping it all down,
my mind is anesthed
my memories are numb and fade just like any one would want.
and
she
is
always
the truth,
more than I am.

What she loved most was pretending that her life was not
profane.
She would smirk at me
most days
in the morning
she would pretend not to drink coffee, not to swear, not to be the girl she was
she was clean, in her mind
never tainted, the way she she spoke to me
glaringMOCKINGlaughing
but she was a broken broken thing
pursing her lips together and always looking so sophisticated in blonde
I love her and I hate her
I want her to fight back
I want her to leave the room and know Grace.

but she's so cold in her state.

pull apart this body with these hands
stinging
that what is the self will
take itself apart
in the night
DOWN to the dirt it digresses
every evening
Alone in it's bed of lies.
a lack of hope
maybe.
a quiet destruction through the years it has laid there.

She'd water the chair.
With dismal arrows pointing towards her heart, with crayon emblazoned on skin.
She'd water the pages she was trying to write on
Get frustrated with yourself
herself
in three toned pearl paint lexus mobiles
YUCK. ha ha.
she would laugh, yes, then laugh it up with some other man that was not you. You poor old boy. Listening to the radio. Eating up the strings. The strings made it alright, yes?
Some Brazilian girl. Now talking to you from the back of the Lexus.
"What are the answers? How you say?"
But you don't always hear her.
She was only out
to
get you, Carl.

I FEEL THE SAME
as I did in empty rooms. I sometimes scoffed at that, having feelings at all, having no feelings, and finally, having a feeling for you
about you
dangerous
to be passion's slave
but I am just as guilty as you
and
you
and
you.

don'tevenalwaysknowwhattotellyoudear
honey
don't worry
should I say that? don't worry honey?
should I scoop out your eyeballs so you can't see my face
the funny
faces I make because my brain is swimming in blood
upside down it swims on it's back
can't talk about it right now
don't want to talk about it, Sweety.
will you get mad at me
if I get mad at you?
pretty upset?
I really am a cardboard cutout
I'm in a dive Chinese place hoping I'm not poisoned by food
and laughing out how insecure I feel in night time time time time time time
tea time
bed time
summer time
supper time
watching shapes shift.


bleck.

tell me your oldest answers
the ones that hurt me most
your phrases that make me feel inferior.
cut that and put it at the end.
end of the poem.
alarm goes off upstairs.
tell me I shouldn't have my phone on so loud
the echo scares you
scars on my chin
the floor cracks
still.awake.now.
he blows his nose upstairs, and he just woke up and I haven't gone to bed yet.

tell me that you love me.
could you? do you have that with you now?
does that smile mean
nice?
nice boy?
are you going to be nice to me for a long time?
when the world is cracked in half, and
one part
floats. to. outerspace.
and the other half is swallowed by my
motorcycle neighbor
I will love you
and could you just love me then, on the
moon.
It's not that hard to answer.
Yes-or-No.

unsettling
a little before me, a little after me
you would know me in a little while.

drums and guitar in the dark and
yes
we were always cold in the doorway. the painted frame. the hole
and bitter, we were happy bitter.
happier when we were unhappy, maybe.

shoulder to shoulder
saying swear words and proud of the bruises on our knees
we laughed. in a dirty old car missing it's mirror on the right.
so long, old times.
so long, old car.
so long swearwords and bad words and bad girls.
we got us some hard times now, good as we are.

when we often would-
it was cold and we'd changed our passwords
but we sat in smoky silences and tried to close our eyes
and sleep.
Couldn't. We were too tired.
We were young and we were old
atthesametimebaby
taking pictures of ourselves smiling
holding bricks of our thoughts in our hands

didn't you
think that when I changed
I'd come back the same?
full circle
yep. I wasted some years, didn't I, baby?
you did too.
We wasted them at the same time on the same things
but you still hurt
and I don't.

Sometimes, I believe you are a skeleton. When I'm looking at you, and I see the outline of a man in the doorway. I wonder what happens inside your bones. What happened in your heart? In the part of your mind where your memories live. Tell me one day? Even if I don't want to know.
And when I'm sitting next to you, and I'm looking at the lines in your face, the way your eyes crinkle when you smile, the way you glow in the light of the TV, I want to freeze time and stay that way. I don't even have to touch you, just sit and watch you be.
I don't know what happened to your skeleton, Boy. Sometimes you tell me, and sometimes you don't. That's alright. I'll be okay with you. It'll eat me up inside until I pray really late at night, but we'll be alright.

When I love-
when my love happens to a person
-a man-
it will be one hundred percent
it will be every day of the week.
It will be superglue
my body won't ache my head will not hurt
I will scream and yell and not fall down the mountains.
I will walk and run and not lose my breath.

He will be my blood tumbling through my veins in between my fingertips and behind my ears, and through my neck

I'm not as exciting as I sound
I'm not as nice as I look
and there is not one exotic thing about me.
Sorry if I lie sometimes.
I wouldn't love me
I wouldn't fall for me.
How could I expect that of anyone?
I smile smile smile for the cameras, and
dammit, I mean this. When I say I want
things cold, it's because that's the way I'm
used to them.
I love God in the cold. When we die we are cold,
and if we ever stop moving we are gonna be cold.
I used to laugh once.
Everything was glittery...
Beloved, nothing is simple or at all for certain.
The virgins cry, chaste as ice
the hollow cry through broken nights
and the joyful cry behind their eyes.
Only the plastic and the pale will survive this.

despite the hooded sweatshirt dreams
and the things we don't talk about
I want to glare at you
I want you to hear your own pride coming
out of your mouth.
I want to drink you like a coke,
and make you forget who you are because
dangit
my eyes hurt by now Gina.
We're so old, Gina.
Shut up Gina.

despite the mounds of sleeping bags
from when we were camping
when you were smoking and drinking
camp beer,
I remember a time when you weren't so crushed.
You had that long brown hair,
and I wanted to write on you like paper.
Gina, you're an idiot.

despite the time you dropped my phone in the sink
while you were washing your hair,
I still loved you. Dang it.
You broke your foot, and I brought you a hamburger
because we were
fat kids that day.
Gina, what's your problem?

to Steve



we were just two
wreckless drivers in the night
and by the laws of
coninciding people
we would most likely collide
and see the brilliant shards
of light
intruding into our insides
believing ourselves to be
the luckiest people in town
relaxed on the pavement
we would know that we would
have work off tomorrow
and rest while we pondered.
I would ponder older men,
handsome men with pipes.
You would ponder a younger me,
a careful me,
and we would sigh when
they brought us bitter coffee
and saw the flowers round
the room.

maybe I am charged with jealousy
when waking up and wishing
there was enough coffee for my life to work.

maybe I am weary
mal adjusted and
creeped. I can't make
my tongue work.

say that I am not quite
forbidden to be sad
to let 9 minutes fall out of my eyes and
hope that tomorrow my
brain can work.

'that this too too solid flesh would melt'
and I wonder,
to be, or not?
if Idaho is available
maybe my car can work.

I'm lying awake on a
brand new mattress, and I can't
even sleep with how nice it is.
I'm waiting for
the springs to break my back,
and when they don't
I can smell her upstairs
making a pot of coffee
because she can't sleep either
and while my feet ache too much to reach
the two new inches to the floor
I try it anyway
I wonder if her coffee is black enough for
me tonight
I wish that I had a perfect throat to finish
off another cup without some medicine.
I think about new army drugs, to help
you remember when you can't. Or something
like that; he was telling me about it because
he heard it on NPR.
I wish that it was not so hard to lay on this
nice soft mattress that I am trying to love
but somehow I am waiting for the springs to break my
back.
And when they don't, I think of something funny
that you said. You were sixteen, and in love with
my best friend. You were funny, and I laugh out loud
whilst I wish for coffee and army drugs and wonder
how you grew up too fast. Why your hair grew out so
fast. And if you still want to become a policeman.
I wish I were as tired as I thought I was.
I wonder, is she reading up stairs? While she drinks
her semi-black coffee with my really good cheesecake?
I made that cheesecake pretty well. I know that
I'm pretty good at something, just not good enough
to fall asleep tonight, without my old decrepit mattress.

"the moon is green in this light"
I think because there is nothing else to think right now
what would you have me say?
because my foot is next to the windshield
and you've never looked so calloused.
what the hell am I supposed to know?
am I supposed to talk about how he left us
for mexico
he left me for all that tequila that suddenly
looks so hideous
and what am I supposed to laugh at if
you won't even blink
you sing the words that you
don't think I know.
I'm taking chances with stoplights at 11:04
wishing I'd get arrested
so we'd feel something
and I hate tonight
even while I can't stop laughing.
Because what else am I supposed to think right now

what it is then,
is that flashlight in the dark
piercing the smoke when
the garage door opens
and Brad Pitt is on the phone
with Johnny Romane.
suddenly my neck works,
and I realize that I
left who I was in Nebraska after
I rode with a friendly love on a dirtbike.
I realize that
I liked who I left behind in Roscoe-
another me, a confident me
that had eggs and toast for breakfast.

Aaron-
I'm sorry that I slammed the door when I went. The wind sort of blew it shut, but we were still yelling at each other weren't we? I'm sorry that I didn't tell you where I was going. I'm sorry for tearing your pictures off the wall, they are actually really good (I said they sucked cuz I was mad). I'm sorry for not knowing who I was, and blaming you for it, I'm sorry that I left towels on the floor a lot. I'm sorry that we couldn't make it work.
I hope you fed the dog. I hope you didn't cry (you probably didn't because you're so tough, you idiot).
I'm sorry I spilled wine on that rug from your grandma, and for pretending it was Jess. I'm sorry for those times that I lied.
Thank you for not chasing me down. Thank you for giving me my camera back (I found it on the porch last night), and thank you for leaving me that really thoughtful message on my machine. Thank you for the memories of us sitting in the kitchen, listening to the radio, and for bringing me gatorade when I was sick. I'll miss that. I'll miss you. I'm just sorry.
One day, you'll forget when I backed over the mailbox. One day I'll forget when you were stoned and couldn't remember where we were. We'll forget why we hate each other. Sad thing is, it's still not going to work.
I'm really sorry, Aaron.
Goodbye.

WHEN IT WAS LOVE,
IT WASN'T REALLY LOVE
IT WAS LERVE.
IT WAS LIKE SOME HYBRID
FROM WALMART
FROM STARBUCKS
FROM MCDONALD'S ON THE DOLLAR MENU
IT WAS ALL THOSE JERKY SENTENCES
I SAID TO YOU WHEN I WAS MAD
IT WAS ALL THE TIMES YOU LAUGHED BECAUSE
YOU GOT WHAT YOU THOUGHT YOU WANTED
IT WAS KICKING LOCKERS
AND WRITING NOTES
AND WHAT THEY CYNICALLY SAID
I COULD HAVE AS MUCH AS I WANTED
(WHEN I LISTENED TO THE RADIO THOSE MORNINGS AT 6:03)
HAVE IT.
YEAH, YOU.

he looks at me
with the red badge of courage on his arm
I want an expensive coffee
and a decadent magazine
I want to forget what I hate and be skinny
have money
kiss the enemy
but it's so hard
when I'm cold, and I'm a radical, and
the Bible stares me down
it's easy to say
I won't.
I will.
please don't look at me with your
red badge of courage
I might feel bad
and heaven forbid another
over privileged american teenage
GIRL
have her feelings hurt.

its funny
ethereal maybe
I wonder what its like to be you
because you're so
happy
never melancholy
I feel like I could walk across the
light fixtures
when you play guitar
"chill"
you say
and smile
ethereal maybe
so strange to be you, maybe
you look like
the music you listen to
and I feel like
we could be friends.

the shining, the glittering
of time moving quickly
catches me off guard

its been a year
the shortest long year
of my life
without him, things slowed down
without him, I forgot to check the clock
I'm getting old
I'm constantly dreaming of falling asleep
sleeping away this world
sleeping amidst the entropy
closing out the disaster-
alone in bliss?

No, I'll close my eyes while
he whispers
"as soon as you are born you start dying"
but I supress a grin.
I'm not dying
there's too much left to do.

I realized after I stopped yelling in your face
that I didn't know what I was talking about anyway
so I took a deep breath

this prayer's been so long that I've forgotten
what I'm asking for. where has my faith gone?

she has a banner that tells you what her mood is
and I don't want to be like her
she's so crowded under that hair and she
shows everyone when she's falling apart

I can't keep my head up
but I like it
I like the blood rushing to my face
when you look at me

I don't worry
because you're just another
guy
looking at my math test
another guy
who hasn't shaved for two days
another boy
that is inconsistent
I don't want to love you, I just want to bug you
I just want my face to stay red.

and they all said that she would be
such a good girl
did they notice when her blushing naive days were
past them
did they realize that sometimes she would let
him walk her down the hall - he being a highly inebriated boy of 17
did they realize that she was running away?
did they see her when she was not their
sweet little Dolly?
would they have known that she could not give something
sacred to the hazel eyed mistake she let be
she let him be
and she found Jesus
she found herself
she found a Glory when she cried herself awake in the morning
reality was reality
"such a good girl"
they pat her back
they don't need to know, do they.

I was just trying to get away from
caustic, biting words
just trying to be normal
but, they follow me
they know how to destroy me
and I'm just hiding behind my
hair,
my concrete smile,
and God.

sometimes the monsters go
away
if only for a day or two.
I want to have faith
in the dark.

my mind
a deck of cards shuffled
need to be put into place
- I believe -
he told me to trust
so I am
he did always take care of me
but not without me falling to pieces
he burned broken glass together
and he told me to trust
- I believe -
crossing out
I have so many iniquities
to right
that I know I can't, so
- I believe -
like poignant sugar coated smiles
I give to you
I'll mean them in a minute
Just give me a minute

I don't know how to tell you
what I think about when I
close my eyes,
breathe in and out,
and sigh at every memory I have.

He was the wrong boy.
I was the wrong girl.
I don't want to remember
his hair, or the way he made me feel
like I could be completely honest.
I don't want to think about
how happy/sad/careless
I use to be
when his eyes changed color.
I hate.........
Well, I don't want to know anything
anymore. You told me the end, and
you
were
right.

you live in
red-eyed, forgotten haze
and everything I say to you
goes only just past your eyes
to the part
where you think about me
sometimes
you think that we keep each other's
secrets
you think that I'm pretty when I don't put on
my face
you think that I will just smile
but I really can't smile forever
if forever means a
red-eyed, mistaken haze

I wrote this 11.21.04

"make me feel better"
she asks me
I want to save her world from incisions that pry at her stubborn skin
want her to
laugh
smile
whisper
like she did before he BURNED her.
she should know that I've been selfish
she should know that she is loved...uncomprehendably
Paper Hearts
and too much salad
70 miles per hour
and the night is between us
and... does she feel better?

(I don't remember what the last part signified to me. I was somewhere that you weren't)

strange ways
that we sit around on a bed
look at pictures
"we don't talk about that, ever."
blue walls, tangents
and
"the difference between you and me is
that i had a cup of coffee"
he wants $20
but i want ITALY and a
really good talent like
harmonica
a melody to break our worries
and it's still too many days til
i turn 17
but its not that many days til
i want to turn off the clock

sometimes I feel like I'm
trampling
someone else's sanctuary
in my smug smile
and mess-hair
maybe I'm sorry that
I forgot so much I was suppose to remember:
all the braincells fled in
those perturbing nights
and I woke with no recollection
if I woke at all
I hope I'm not trampling
your curious-life that use
to be
minus me
things would be so different

I want to see you safe
warm and gentle
you are broken always
I want more for you
than another fluke
another temporary solution
to become fixable,
is improbable
but I have seen miracles
and I have a hope
you will wind up using your life
for more than you thought
if you could pull together
in the quiet moments of the dark.

vending machine life

i press A5
here is my candy heart
i glance past glass at what
i think i want.
sixty five cents for a couple ounces of skittles.

i laugh.
my head is leaning on the glass
i don't want anything.
even if i did, i don't have seventy five cents
(one dime back)

i wince and see
you are looking at my vending machine life
could you not criticize
my cheated dollar
the way that, every once in a while no candy comes out
even as you give me every quarter you have?
whisper words to glass.
maybe it will permeate my
empty interior
and i will light up for you.

I'm sitting here staring at
valentine hearts
reminding me of the day that I'm pretty sure
I fell in love with you
reminding me more of the day that I had to tell you
it couldn't be the way it was
you were tying a ribbon around my neck
I felt your breath, your hands the closest they had been
since the day I knew that I was in love with you

Most days I wonder what would have happened
if I had said nothing
if I had not torn the ribbon off my neck and
if I had let my voice waver
you would have known I didn't mean it
and you could love me

Always I know that it would have remained
so empty
so breakable
and it wouldn't matter how much I had given you
it wouldn't make it beautiful,
it would just hurt more

if we were in a movie,
this would be the part where I look into
your eyes and make a demand:
"don't just stand there, say something."
but you give me a sorry look
take my hand
and tell me
"if things had been different..."
but they aren't.
they are the same.
TAKE FIVE.
lights go off, cameras aren't rolling
cellphones are ringing
where have we gone?

I hate chemistry and my
guitar is melting in the back of
my red pick up truck
sitting in my driveway
I ride my bike, you ride my bike
and I'll keep baking cookies.
See, my life is happy
or at least that's what I tell them all
but if I had a bright red marker,
I would write my promise on the wall
"things aren't over yet"
and I'd keep living like
my throat is on fire
I'd let you know what I was doing,
sneaking out the back
I'd say 'don't worry' cuz
no one else is looking over their shoulders
so why should you?

Hypocrite

somedays
I don't want to be the backbone
the medicine
the callous
the punchline
the freak
so for this moment
I crumble and dissolve
into someone I should hate
but I don't hate her
mostly just envy
because she has your attention
undivided, unflinching
and she is unafraid to
ascertain more
will you let her? like everbody else?
or will you put an end to my
foolishness...

life in the fast lane
I am impatient
I am seeing stars
and black is trying to envelope me
so I sit down with speed
coursing through my throat to
every part of me that is
shrinking
try to save me quickly
try to save me at all
I can't hear you speaking
my hair is flames consuming my
head
but I smile
and you whisper
"are you alright?"
and I nod
while my eyes scream "no"

the pictures on my wall
are hung sideways
so I always feel I'm falling off my bed
how bout you?
do you think that you made your one big
mistake?
I could press "undo" for you
but you have to beg and plead

the color of my eyes
changed when you weren't looking
do you wish you could see?
we'll pretend
just enough to get by
with tight lipped smiles
genuine and sincere
just cry for me, ok?

I'm sorry I was blunt
I just threw the words out there
and you can't stand to hear them

I'm sorry this is so hard
but someday you'll come face to face
with what you don't want to acknowledge

I'm sorry you can't be yourself
its not my fault you contrive these messes
and its too bad you don't know what to do

but the fact is, I'm just really not that sorry
because everything works out
so just don't worry

cigar smoke and burgers
and now I'm alone
wishing i had a letter from you
to make me laugh
make me blush
make me mad
but all i have is this plastic box in front of me
a mind so complicated
but i forget as soon as you tell me
i have to read every word again
until it is branded
like a tattoo that is on my foot
cuz no one sees it, but me
and i lie awake at night sometimes
with insomnia
and i pull the old foot out
take off my sock
and there are you words
imprinted in my memory
and i wish that you would just take the time
to give me something to remember

tonight
the only way we know how to converse
is to yell
we don't stop yelling
and so I turn up the music a little louder
until all I feel is desire to whisper
to say I'm sorry
to say I love you
to say I'm not going to give us up
because I won't runaway like last time
I won't stop telling you "thank you"
and I won't get weak and let you beat me
in this stupid war.
so I will do the dishes
and you'll take down the laundry
we'll brush our teeth and close the doors
and tomorrow we will whisper

he leans close
his face in my hair
and tells me
"I'd be happy to make your life
a living hell"
every word stings with truth
as he turns his face to me
I can see every sin of
mine reflected in his face
and
I'm no longer sassy-bass-punk-chick
I'm a withering flower
and empty cup of coffee
a dirty paper towel
and I'm running on nothing
cuz I don't even like your
compliments anymore -
they just glance off of me

you remind me of a sunburn
and I'm sorry aobut the chill

here we sit
talking
to one another
as if it hadn't happened
we laugh
we speak about everything
but the weather

here we sit
in silences bought
with gold
as if we didn't want to speak
about everything but
the weather

here we sit
you and I
we're changing so fast
that we're
unrecognizable to everyone
but each other

here we sit.

i live with
this open wound as
every one tries to hand me a bandaid
while i want it to stay
glaring at the world
i find myself different
from last year
from last week
from yesterday
and i don't really mind
how much this wound hurts
just wish it wasn't there
as it begins to sting
more than the salt water
that comes from my eyes
and the pain at the back of my
throat

an open freezer, and the smell of
frozen
"we complicate things"
I laugh about
too many lemon heads
and he says
"We have this connection"
and his eyes tell me
its not a lie
even when I don't
want truth
the painful truth
because he puts
his hand on my arm
and tells me he's
leaving
but its not hard
because he's not for real
and we both know it
even as she laughs
with him in his
shallowness
I want to say he's someone else
I want to tell her she's not real
either
I want them to stop pretending

someone asked me
the other day
what I wanted to be
and to my chagrin
I couldn't answer -
because the only
thing
I want to be
is someone who wants
to be something

you are shattered pieces of glass
a mirror I can't put back together
I want to hold you and just let you mourn
because voices don't suffice
you want to throw yourself at walls
and wake up in the tomorrow of
five years from now
but there is no fast forward button
on this cliche movie "Life"
was I naive to think you could never hurt?
yet you flee from my medicines
the things I think I want
you want to be fixed the right way
even though its a gradual painful movement
from haziness
to clarity
and I give you a red badge of courage
for not making yourself bleed
even as catharsis exudes from every pore
and I toast to you
for not drawing near to substances
as you watch from a window
and I hold you dear
for not hating me in all of this
while we're spending time trying to fend off
the "advice" that they so freely offer

does the angel lose her voice as she is
drowning in her contemplation?

I see expensive hands
Floating across the surface
They don't puncture the exterior
Or seize any sort of depth

I see the mouth of a pretender
The mask of the superficial
All encompassing
We don't say anything but lies these days

I see you reaching now
Grasping toward the edge of your bubble
Making truth apparent
Is so much harder when you're blind
Am I blind?