Living in the digital age is so exciting! Is it?

I used to take snapshots of you
in my head

Moved you right along, occipital
to temporal lobe

But now that there's always
something to look at

I guess I don't really stop
to see anything
anymore

Final Goodbye

I'll never look
for you to save me

Learned enough
to wanna be a little alone

Can't rip the phone
out of the post

Drove a thousand miles
and then a thousand more

But there's a trail everywhere
you go with electric notes

I might be magnet arms
and you might be robot machinery

But that much distance
weakens anything

No more crashing
into and away from me

And if all your teeth rot out
then that will suit your mouth

“Let's fix what's broke”
oh, no you don't

The pieces we had were all parts of me
and you can't turn dust into solid things

But I guess you don't remember
my edifice or ornamental dreams

So here we go, me numerating
various pin pricks, burns, and stings

The you'll minimize, fill the air with sighs
and say baby I wonder why

you compartmentalize

and of course I'm not mentioning
the bigger happenings
because you act like
it's all so triggering

but I'm the one
it all happened to.

Anchored

I'm drowning, all the time
and you don't see it

Lately I am thinking
you're more like an anchor
than a life jacket.

Rough Timeline

Good luck with it.

Everything great seems easy once it's done
and impossible before you start
and sure when it's on the way
and everything when it falls apart

Don't look at me like that

Don't look at me
like that

Like some holy
opulence

Like some gilded
sacrifice

Too much for me to hold
on my shoulders
However broad
they may seem

I'm not
who you think
I am

I sound
well composed
whole

I'm not
the kind of girl
you think I am

Don't look at me
like that

I'm no good
for taking home
to mother

In fact I don't
even want to meet
your friends

When I'm holding the
world in
my hands

Remember, mister
it's just a globe, a small
representation

The gift of gab
doesn't mean
anything

My mouth is pretty
but words
are plastic

Oh, mister please
don't look at me
like that.

Fuck I didn't know I could still get this high

Spinning seems fun
till you're spun

Thinking that I'm nothing
suddenly made you the one

Sour sour sour
Diesel baby, pretty
pretty flower

Hypnotized me for
much longer
than an hour

"Drink me down"
let's make this last
a little bit longer

I'm waking up with
more than headaches
I've got someplace to go

I'm waking up with
more than headaches
gonna have to get clean
all on my own

You're blocking the doorway.

You do a back flip
and make me clap until my hands ache
complain you're sore for days.

I'm tired and my gut hurts.
You're rolling around in my head
I've got a bed we don't sleep in

Is this it? Is that all this is?
Baby you're trying to make me leave
I've been the best

Gave you everything you ever needed
everything you wanted
everything I longed for

Washed the dirt off your back
even when you don't come home

Told you baby I can't sing
but still wrote you a song

I cannot hold on
I cannot hold on

Purple stained longer
than this bruise will

Please don't hold on
Please don't hold on

Temporary Oblivion

As soon as she knocked on the door she knew this was going to be horrible. She wanted to run away but the car that had dropped her off was already speeding away from her. A dark haired girl answered. "He just went to go get more beer. He knows you're coming and he ... " The girl's voice trailed off, or something to that effect. Maybe whatever the girl said was blocked in her memory for a reason. Her brain cells filled in the ambiguous parts -- he's nervous; he's anxious; he doesn't want to see you.

Every recent reunion was so jealous and bitter and haughty. Why couldn't she remember this? Why did she spend the whole day doing her hair and thinking about her clothes when she knew that nothing she did would be good enough? He was groomed for hating and destroying and ripping her apart. He saw all her weakest parts reflected back onto himself and he couldn't stand her, in front of his face, while he lusted after her supposed success.

But it had all fallen apart for her, much in the same way it had a million times before.

And maybe that was it. Maybe that was the selling point to his disgust. Shit always went wrong for them, sometimes in pairs. They both had brains filled with dictionaries but he liked to pretend his had been all shredded up. When the bad times came in doubles his were usually more of his own making and hers were usually made of ... of something else. Of dumb luck and slippery things.

And she never spent more than a few days curled up into a ball. She would sit in her room with the lights off and music on and the drinks steady for a few days but she would search for answers in the back of her mind, even when she was drunk. She would lie still but think hard and things always seemed to pick back up again. She could not say that the horrible things that had shaped her life had changed her for the good. She could not say they had made her a better person or a stronger woman. But she could say that she had seen her way through them.

Tide

Waking up shaking
and my body has turned fifteen shades
of green, purple, blue, black
everything but the papyrus pale
I should be.

I can't find a comfortable enough spot to sleep
I can't take a shower for fear
of seeing what you've done
all over me.

And you tell me it's not that bad
and you tell me you'd never hut me
and you tell me it's not your fault

I'm here to tell you I spent too much time
curled up on the bathroom floor,
hiding in the back room hoping that you
wouldn't burst through
I'm here to tell you I spent too much time
staring in the mirror and at the razor blades
you left in the sink and hoping that I'd be
strong enough to make it stop.
And when you found me alone, on the bathroom floor
begging for it to all just end,
you say I ruined you that day
that I was crazy.

Did you ever stop to think and say
I can't believe I made baby this way
all the yelling, the chase, the names
I scared you right into my arms.
I'm struggling to get out
I'm struggling to get out
from under your thumb
Why you wanna make leave you this way
you always stop to say
strand you here and leave you with no escape
you need me, you need me, baby.

You'll promise the moon to bring me back
but all I will get
is the tide.

ash

Keep me open
Keep me broken up
Load me
Light me up.

And when I turn to ashes
you'll scrape me off the bed
knock me out for some fresh taste
and I guess I'm okay with it.

Feeling off again.
Trailing off with him.
I'm not sure where I begin
and this pit of lonely ends.

blood red / beet red

I've got a heavy mouth;
it weighs my body down --
not good for keeping quiet.

I cut my tongue out
but my body
still speaks loud.

I've got a horse's mouth
wide and neighing
nay saying.

And I've always been a bad liar
the fake words mess with my head
my face exposes, flushed.

You can trust when my heart pours out
the blood is just that, not
sugar water dyed red.