CXCVII.

Toes clenched tight against sheets
She throws her head to the side
And grits her teeth
Muscles wrenched tight
And the whole world
Feels like fire.

CXCVI.

I swear to you on this dark blue sky
As night falls low and the heavens cry
I took a breath, I took a step
I fell to my knees and slowly wept
Rain
Fall
Blue
Moons
Love
Hope
And
You
The streetlight above that curses me
Turned on tonight as I walked beneath
Thank the ones you love for life and hope
Hand in hand for now we walk this road

CXCV.

If the world was just the ocean
No land above the seas,
If the forest held no secrets
Deep within its trees,
If the wind didn't carry my voice
But rather just a breeze,
None of it would matter
As long as you're with me.

CXCIV.

Every single breath is a grace
That I do not deserve.
I ascended the road,
I sought only the sun.
I let my legs hang over the freeway
And thanked God for moments like these.

CXCIII.

When the air outside feels the way it does today.
A smooth seventy-eight degrees or so.
When you put your hand out the window
And you feel the wind as it flows through your fingers.
It's more than that though.
The air holds oxygen, my breath,
But it also holds my memories,
As I stretch out my fingers,
I can see moments of my life,
Memories encapsulated in the weather,
In my sense of touch, in feeling.
These things never leave me.

CXCII.

I just needed you to know
A thing or two.
I wanted this to be
Your name: written in lights,
Or across the stars,
Or on my wrists.
But those things will come.
For now, we wait.
The way we breathe
So quiet, so secret.
The way we scream
So loud, so reckless.
The way we sing
So in love.
My heart has never
Felt quite like this,
So vulnerable, so free.
You are the breeze
across the pores in my skin.
Where they had made me write,
They had made me whisper,
Only you have made me sing.
So young, so honest.
Abandon every inhibition.
Throw my heart
Across the city.
Dare my hand,
To find your fingers.

CXCI.

I passed by your house tonight,
Or at least it used to be your house,
When you lived there.
I know you're state lines away,
But it doesn't change the fact
That when I look at the stars,
The ones we used to wonder at,
I still glance over as if you were there.
It has got me thinking a lot lately
About how I might call those the good times,
When really they were just different times.
And that's what I'm starting to realize,
Is that all the sins we shared,
And all the secrets we kept,
And all the love we showed,
Even though we aren't the same,
It doesn't mean it's gone.
Just because I don't feel the way I did back then,
Doesn't mean that I don't know what it feels like.
Like all of these moments are collecting,
And the way I walk, the motion of my words,
Is formed from all of these experiences,
Fire and wind and waterfront and bathroom floors.
I know I passed your old house,
But that's not home. Home is in our eyes,
In our hearts. When we breathe in deep,
And I know that you have changed me forever.

CXC.

I have this idea that I'm best friends with the city,
I look for faces in the vacant, but lit, windows of large
multi-storied office buildings.
And I laugh, as if being joked with, when the streetlights
turn off as I pass by.
I smile to myself when I feel a gust of wind, or hear a passing car.
As if all of these things were there for a reason.
But what I meant to say, to you at least.
Is that when I went to sit atop the rooftop of my favorite spot downtown, looking out over all the larger buildings just west of the freeway, standing like cut outs in the backdrop of a movie scene, I thought about how you said you missed this city, and I turned and thought to myself,
"The only thing this city is missing is you."

CLXXXIV.

If you think this is about you,
Then it probably fucking is.
Here's to the hearsay
That tells me what you've been up to.
Here's to the late nights
With your legs spread.
Here's to every time you said
I still meant a god damn thing.
You're gone, and that's how I want it
But you can still make me bleed.
Still make me feel cheap.
And I will never not loathe you for that.
So here's to paper hearts,
Looking at stars,
And burning every feeling that ever mattered.

CLXXXIII.

Sometimes I think I'd like to lay down in the streets
Let the city lights sweep over me and try to fall asleep.
I'd lay beneath the high rises, as if they were bedsheets
And cut my teeth on dreams so grand, I pray my breath to keep.

Three A.M. I want you here with me.
We can count the white divider lines,
The way I used to count blades of grass in my backyard.
I know it's not much, and I know I'm not much,
With stars just above our outstretched arms
The only thing that matters is how our chests rise and fall.

CLXXXII.

Sometimes if the music is turned up loud enough, I feel like I could drive forever. I pass my exit on purpose, and I sing until my voice is hollow. I'm alone, but for the first time in my life, I'm starting to think that might be okay. I know I'm nothing special, but that's still more than nothing. Deep breaths.

19.

I will tell you something you may not know about yourself; you set the world on fire every time you open your eyes. And while you are sleeping, the grass collects dew and the birds paint themselves into sickly-dark trees, crying into the hanging moon as it comes closer to welcome the world. I woke up next to you, and this is what I learned. I would not trade you for anything.

-Rae Davis

CLXXXI.

I told myself it would be okay
Because in the end you'd be alone.
But now I see that I will be too.
I'm not better than you.
It's just what I told myself to get over you.
We keep thinking you're an accident,
I need to get you out from under my skin.

CLXXX.

Something written in a book,
About how to get over you,
I had to make you into art.
So I did, and so I do.
All the girls I have met,
All the hands that I shake,
Are more than enough
To keep your memory at bay.
I am doing all that I can
To become what you detest.
I hope these words find you,
With a hole in your chest.

CLXXIX.

Are you out there?
Can you still hear me.
I didn't forget you.
But I do hate you.
And I've been thinking lately,
Whenever I see your face,
How much I knew about it.
And how little I care now.

CLXXIII.

I found all the knives you left in my back.
I watched the concrete slowly crack.
Your true colors shine through.
I will never fucking be like you.

CLXXII.

It was easy to keep my distance
When I could still taste the blood in my mouth.
But now the taste is fading, and you seem so far away.
I'll never get it back.
Today, I break.

CLXXI.

They say we kill the ones we love.
You watched me bleed for you.
But now you're dead to me.

CLXX.

After we burnt everything that we loved,
Watch the ashes slip through your hands.
You lit the flame, I watched it burn,
But ashes are nothing more than that,
You can't piece them back together.

That's what you said.

CLXIX.

I've been waiting by the moon
For you to come and save me.
I've been outside your window,
So I can bleed out when you're ready.
If this is watching everything you love
Slip silently through my outstretched hands.
The stitch has ripped, I'm falling down
Grasping at every last god damn strand.
You built your walls too high, love.
You've made your heart too cold, love.
You don't believe in me any longer.
But I wish I could have your soul, love.

CLXIII.

Could you tell me what it's like to pull out all my insides?
Is it as empty as we'd both thought it would be?
I keep wishing that your heart wouldn't beat while I'm not around.
Then you'd have to have me back, like the winters nights we spent.
You told me not to write and God forbid I did,
So I buried all the letters. Now I stand on top of my roof
And I yell these all the lines in the direction of your house,
So maybe then you'd know that this is killing me.
My throat is dry, my voice is gone.
I'd take you back even if it was just to let you tear me back apart.
I don't care if you care anymore.

CLXII.

Before we get too relaxed,
Let me pull this knife out of my back.
I don't know what made you think
I somehow wouldn't find the link.
If I'm splitting hairs, then please let go
I never meant to be so slow.
It's just your promises come up short
And our plans never left port.
It just leaves me wondering
At all of the beautiful things
That this will make us miss
Countdown to our last kiss.

CLXI.

The soles of my shoes.
The back of your hands.
If I spilled my guts to you,
Do you think you'd understand?
From the bronze of the floor,
To your favorite glass ceiling,
I've been itching for a way out
I know you know the feeling.
A light shone through the fog.
A stack of hay burning bright.
The arsonist hates the dark,
Light the fire, escape the night.
Crooked teeth, crooked words
It's hard to keep things straight.
Off the sidewalk, crooked steps.
Headlights seal my fate.

CLX.

God damns and God saves.
But I'm tired of being a slave,
To the doubt that puts wings in chains,
To the death that pours down like rain.
I have been needing so much more.
I almost lost faith that faith would find me.
But staring at the sun has led me blindly,
Into a sea of discontent.
'Father, take me back".

CLIX.

Ground moves under my feet
But my legs don't budge.
When your grave's dug out for you,
It's hard to hold a grudge.
Late at night I've been up dreaming,
I can't do that in my sleep.
If I die while God is resting
I pray to you my soul to keep.
At night I whisper secrets
To the bright lights that keep this city.
My suitcase is full of bricks,
Because if I leave you're coming with me.
So say a prayer as you step outside,
Say it loud to the dark night sky.
Because when you leave you don't come back.
When you die your soul turns black.
'I never tried as hard as I said I did'
Truth be told I'm just so fucking scared.

CLVIII.

Water builds behind a wall
Curtains close and then they fall
My show is over, I am done.
From these seas, you can not run.

CLVII.

Even if I could find the words to describe what you do to me,
Floating amongst the hued clouds at sunset,
I don't know if I'd say them.
You are my song without words.
My rhythm.
My chaos.
My love.
And you have every piece of my heart.
So even if I knew how to say it.
I wouldn't.
Because you are better left unsaid.
And I am not sorry.

CLVI.

The product of a broken generation's shattered dreams and one million heavy hearts.

Save me the horizon.
Save me the sun newly risen.
Bring me my last solace.
My soul escapes its prison.

CLV.

To drown for all time
Judgment is fate.
I sink into darkness.
My life is dead weight.
Hands made of bricks
Feet carved from stone
At the bottom of this sea
I suffer alone.
I show no remorse
For trespass, for sin.
Blacked out sun,
Charred like my skin.
The screams of the fallen
Now all that I am.
As I sink lower
I become the damned.
The heat of ten suns,
A den full of snakes,
There is no end,
To this fiery lake.
A prayer for salvation,
Fell on deaf ears,
I writhe beneath ground
Until apocalypse appears.
A morning star
A bed made of strife.
I had prayed for salvation
But you'll beg for your life.
Pig.

CLIV.

It's not like I asked to be here.
Where I am.
Desolate.
Or maybe I did.
Maybe when I whispered those convicted words into my bed sheets late at night Maybe this is what I was really asking for.
Maybe.
Wandering mile long airplane terminals.
Searching for something.
Searching for God.
Like maybe I'll find him in California.
Or any other place.
Or maybe he's waiting.
On standby.
Like myself.
Like all of us, in a sense.
But like I said, this isn't what I imagined.
I never wanted to be this blank.
Empty.
I never thought I'd be content with apathy.
I thought I had passion.
I thought I had something more.
I thought wrong.
It's not like I want to die like this.
Live like this.
Is there any difference anymore?
But in all of it, all of this.
All this is.
I know we won't be getting on the next plane to California.
I knew it all along.
But for some reason I came anyway.
I hoped anyway.
I cared anyway.
Maybe, hopefully.
Maybe.

CLIII.

Your smile dances
along the limits
of your face,
Like musical notes
Tiptoeing across the page
Each one of your teeth
Playing it's part
in the orchestra.
Never have my eyes
encountered something
as graceful as
your silhouette
Elegant and spectacular
As my hand traces
it's way down your neck
stretching outward
like a plateau onto your shoulders
The centerfold of your
magnificence,
So round and soft,
And accented so easily
by your collarbones, barely
nudging above the surface of your skin
Followed by your nipples,
Perky and cute and everything
they need to be.
Winding slowly down your abdomen
Soft and tender and right,
Until your hips rise up
like a ridge in a forest,
preceding the most delicate
piece of your puzzle.
I spend time mystified here
by the beauty and simplicity of
your womanhood.
But your legs never ask
questions, they stretch on
Like roads in the country,
winding and beautiful.
Your ankles so sophisticated
and sharp hinging your tender
feet. Every inch of your body
is a journey, and every scar,
Every bruise,
Every bump,
Every little thing
Even the ones you hate
are to be admired, like
the cracks in an aging road,
One only wonders at the stories behind it all.
Everything you think an imperfection
really just appends to your beauty.
Did I mention that your eyes are endless.
So vast, that I get lost there, but I still count
Because to me you are like music,
You are becoming the song that is in my soul
And I count your steps,
Your words,
Your movements,
As the footfalls in a wondrous dance of romance.
I count, because you are rhythm.
I count because you are reason.
I count because you are motion.
And I count because you are chaos.
I count the hours,
The minutes,
The seconds,
Until I see you again.
I count every second of your song.

CLII.

The longest day of my life,
Was stretched across grey clouds.
With tears flowing like faucets,
And cheeks burned fire red.
God made a bargain with the Devil, with Death.
He gave the dark my faith,
So that I could keep the beating in my chest.
A dead God saved me from myself.
I know what you did,
And I know things will never be the same.
But maybe one of these days,
I'll remember what fire feels like.

CLI.

Nights like these,
When the black of the sky
Blocks out the stars,
And the cold courses,
through my veins,
It seeps into my bones.
Screaming at whitewashed
Walls I used to slam
My head against.
I'm not fucking sorry.

CL.

Why do the stars shine?
And what makes the moon bright?
And if I try this a million times more,
Do you think I'll ever get it right?
Why do the winds speak?
And what makes my heart tremble?
And if I give you everything I have,
Would you promise to stay humble?
When the air outside is perfect,
And my hand is outstretched in yours,
I feel like the world is ending,
And the things to come are ours.
If I swear upon the nights last light,
If promise to bleed myself dry,
Would you bring me all the salt in the sea,
Would you give me every star in the sky?
What do angels talk of in passing?
And is Heaven a place or a thought?
If I picked every pedal on a flower,
would it end in 'they love you not'?
Do rainbows know their own beauty?
Do clouds acknowledge it too?
And if the beat in my heart is God's
Does the skip there belong to you?
Does the ocean sing to the heavens?
Or does it hold that tune just for me?
Every song that the waves carry
Has opened my eyes to see.
Do mountains stand facing the future?
Or do they cringe, like me, at unknown?
If I swore that your heart was safe,
In your soul would I be able to roam?
Does the sunset wish for company?
Do the mountains wish for the same.
If I traced my finger over the skyline,
I think it would spell out your name.
Does the dirt we walk on know only the truth?
Can a rose not tell a lie?
Nothing that I have ever beheld,
Matches the beauty in your eyes.

ICL.

It takes a few months of black skies.
Before you'll miss the stars at night.
But it only took nineteen years of getting it wrong.
Before I realized that I'll never get it right.
I miss the days when my feet weren't made of lead.
And memories of being able to do more than hang my head.

XCLVIII.

I say that you can't save me.
But I say a lot of things.
I know I don't deserve anything,
But I've always held in the deep of my heart
In the faintest of hopes,
That I'm wrong about you.

Bring me a beggar's kingdom.

XCLVII.

It's almost like there's nothing to say.
I am blank.
Empty.
At a loss for words, but at a loss for so much more as well.
It's the start to a cold winter, and my blood has just started boiling.
I don't know what else to to say.
Today was just not my day.
If I lied down on these train tracks.
Would you save me from all that I lack.

I didn't even yell this time.
I bit my tongue.
And I shut up, because thats what you do sometimes.

All of these words mean shit.

XCLVI.

All those mixtapes.
All those songs I sang.
All those words I wrote.
All those nights I waited.
All those secrets I whispered.
Turns out they didn't mean shit.
This is your antithesis.
I'm tired of writing about you.
I'm tired of thinking about you.
I'm saying let's keep in touch,
But we know what I really mean.

XCLV.

They say that absence makes the heart grow fonder,
But all it's done is make me wonder
If this faint of heart isn't just a trick.
If I don't tell you this, I think I'll choke on it:
My favorite times spent on your floor.
We'd lie and twist as my senses roar.
I'm done with trying to implore,
Don't make me waste these words on you anymore.

XCLIV.

Too tired to dream.
Too mused to think.
The words come but
I'm out of ink.
So low now that
I can't even sink.

XCLIII.

"Even Castles made of sand fall into the sea eventually."
You said it, not me.
And I've been wondering lately:
If it's not something,
Is it nothing?
If it's not growing,
Is it rotting?
I need something more from you,
because eternity is in your eyes,
but I'm tired of waiting for you to open them.
Make me believe.

XCLII.

These words are bound to carry the same intent as all of the other bumbling verses that I write about you. I still don't know what it is, but I've felt it since the first time I kissed your lips on that warm June night. I feel drunk when I'm with you, less of a loss of coherence, and more a lack of care for anything and everything around me, except you. And like I said, when i left your house tonight, all I could think about was how much I just wanted to turn around and be back with you. There's something careless in your touch, that despite my inhibitions and my insecurities and your naivety that keeps me coming back, and holding on and wanting.

XCLI.

You can sing me any song you like.
I'll sway to any rhythm you can dream.
I am always lacking in color when it comes to romance.
Red. Fill me in.
When I think about you, and the way your hair falls it always always reminds me of concrete.
Of the way that the zephyr sweeps low over these streets.
These streets are my home, if I've ever had one.
And you are my solace.
Breathe, sing, collapse.
With me.
God, there is an eden, there is a heaven.
It's in your eyes, in these moments, in this space, when we converge.
Touch, scream, collapse.
With me.

XCL.

I dig with my shovel
I dig in the dirt
I dig when it's night out
I dig 'til it hurts
I dig for three feet.
I dig for three more
I dig when it's day out
I dig 'til I'm sore
I dig really deep
I dig over my head
I dig my whole life
I dig 'til I'm dead.

CXXXIX.

We're burning the pages of books before we've even read them over the same flame where we turn grains of sand into glass monuments that reflect the illusion of grandeur.
Like the wisps of wind that kick up the dirt upon which we walk.
The leaves are dying, but to me they're more beautiful that way.
I hear your true colors come out when you're closer to the end.
I think my soul is black, but I'd like for it to be a bit more vibrant.

CXXXVIII.

I used to talk about the things that dreams were made of.
He used to be a surgeon, he'd pick her heart apart.
She has always been an acoustic guitar.
And I never could play a damn song.

CXXXVII.

I've been at bit overstated as of late.
It's what I do when I'm feeling nothing.
I'm not dying, but I'm not dreaming.
Dragging my feet, that's about it.
The other day I walked through the rain.
It hadn't fallen in so long.
But I walked.
And the rain fell.
The leaves are beginning to turn.
And the rain fell.
The wind is starting to blow.
And the rain fell.
The air is getting colder.
And the rain fell.

I've been a bit overstated as of late.

And the rain fell.
And the rain fell.
And the rain fell.
And the rain fell.

CXXXVI.

I have these skyscrapers for teeth so that when i bite down on bricks I taste the blood in my mouth.
I have these knees made of glass so that when I fall to the ground I am left to walk through the shards.
I have ears made from sea shells so that when I am quiet enough to listen i hear only the emptiness of distance.
I have these eyes made of regret so that when I look at my past all I can see are the ashes of bridges I've burnt.
I have these arms made of failure so that when I reach for the sky the clouds slip away from me like sand.
I have these feet made of lead so that when this ship sinks I will drown like my dreams.
I have this heart made of stone so that when I put my hand to my chest I can feel my soul rot.
I have these hands made of spite so that when I carry this cross I feel the weight of my shame.
I have these lungs made of human flesh so that when they collapse I'm left choking for air.
I have these hollow words made from nothing at all so that when I write them i am reminded that I am void.

I am the reason.
I am my demons.

CXXXV.

I am Sodom.
I am Gomorra.
Destroy all of me.
I am a pillar of salt.
I am a golden idol.
Hell hath no fury.

The flood waters are marching toward me.
But I never built an ark.
I never really believed in this shit.

I am the fall of Eden.
I am the Red Sea parted.
I am the decay of Babylon.

I brought you this cross.
I hope you like it.

CXXXIV.

I'm not trying to save the world.
I'm not looking for any trouble.
I'm not trying to make a masterpiece.
I'm not looking for any grief.
I'm not trying to compose your symphony.
I'm not looking for anything really.
Just asking for the blood in your veins
And the air in your lungs.

CXXXIII.

Take your heart out from behind those bed sheets that you have strung up to hide it. Set it out on the table while we talk. Next to these two short glasses that we're drinking from. Water in yours, whiskey in mine. Tell me what you're scared of. Tell me about that trailer park in your imagination that you're always writing about. Tell me about the words that keep your heart running. Moving like a small machine in your chest. Wheels and gears and days and salt. What sound are you? What does a breeze in one's soul translate to here? Search me the way only your eyes can and read me the way only your words do.

CXXXII.

So elusive, like the last moments of the night's prepossessing dream. Stretching out your toes and rolling your eyelids shut, searching for just one more moment. So close. That's how you hold me. That's what you do to me. The blood flowing through your veins is like a symphony. An epiphany of beauty. The warmth of your touch, the curves of your stomach on the edge of my fingertips. The letters we whisper. That no one else can hear. Words can not describe the beauty of a woman. The depth in her eyes. How the blues in her retina can burn a hole in your chest or make it whole again. Mountains, continents, extended. Your eyes are like galaxies. Stars held in place, swirling through the ether. Moving through my soul.

CXXXI.

Martyrs get off easy.
Because dying is simple
It's sitting here watching the world decay through these hollow eyes,
It's hearing every lie come through these gritted, stained glass teeth,
It's keeping yourself afloat just long enough to see everything you love drown.
That is what will rot you.
Burn you.
Eat you.
Kill you.
This is the short straw.
And there is no such a thing as a hero.

CXXX.

Here I am.
Rotting, like always.
Waste of time.
Endless fucking days.

CXXIX.

We will celebrate you.
We'll bestow you a crown.
Then we'll step on your neck.
When you begin to drown.
Among all the consonants
You were a noun.
But when the time comes
You'll burn to the ground.

CXXVIII.

I tried to write you something.
Right you something.
But nothing ever comes out right.
Nothing ever comes out as smooth as it does for you.
Your words roll off of your tongue and into your lap where you can take your time assembling them like the pieces of the puzzle.
My words come like vomit, like trash, just like everything that comes out of my mouth.
It's quick, and it's ugly, and it's over.
Your words, whatever they were, whatever these letters mean to you...
I don't know why I'm writing this and it is unlike me to do so.
I'm so vain and you, you try to catch onto whatever the new addiction is
I don't even know anymore, I was only ever addicted to the feeling of your hips.
To the movement of your lips, to the whispers in my mouth.

CXXVII.

I'm going to watch this world burn to the ground.
Accompanied only by apathy and gasoline.
Life, love, passion, deceit, hate and death.
Dearest, there is nothing that I haven't seen.

CXXVI.

My feet moved around about as awkwardly as my words had tumbled out of my mouth moments before. The moon was hanging low low low in the trees and the stars were stretching over this chainlink as high as I've ever seen them. I don't know why I feel the way I do, but I feel like I'm learning that life is far too short to hold on to anything privative. I sang the same words that I always sing to you and I felt no shame in knowing that what I was doing was right. You are so right. In this dance, neither of us know where it is we're going exactly, but I think we both like it better that way, learning the steps as we go.

CXXV.

Whenever I am here, I would always rather be there.
With you. With any of you.
Why do I loathe my time spent alone?
What in my soul makes me hate what's forsaken?
Fuck.
Why can I not live with myself?

CXXIV.

And if the world is but a stage,
Then I'm missing my soliloquy.
By trying to write each turn,
And control what's laid out in front of me.

CXXIII.

A not so steady rhythm of my hands against steel sounds as I try to keep pace with amplified percussion blasting through my speakers while I lay beneath a starving sea of a sky and watch lightning break across the embracing canvas. The clouds framed just above the streetlights and the cable lines, a fingertip away from touching my outstretched hands. My back on the hood of this dull silver car and I can feel the warmth of the engine and the bass from inside as I throw my head back to catch a fleeting glimpse of a tail light descending westward. These stars and the thought of your eyes have become my only solace. But in this moment, in moments like these I imagine that I am free.

CXXII.

Girl, please take my breath away.
Please sweep me off my feet.
Please shake to all these songs.
Please dance along my dreams.

CXXI.

My eyes see true beauty.
In the spirits of those that speak to me.
Scared, quiet, lonely hearts,
Afraid to lift off, terrified to depart.
In a crowd but alone,
Left to deal with this endless unknown.
I find fragments of soul
And I wish that I, that all, could again be whole.

"Arise, my soul, and sing."

CXX.

This mask I wear has stripped my soul of any weight it held before.
Both feet in the grave that I dug out for my dead beliefs.
Slowly, I'm letting go of everything that I may have ever loved.
Scared to death of trusting in anything, but dying from a lack of faith.

CXIX.

Words fall from your mouth, the letters tumble out.
Knowing that they'll amount to nothing doesn't make you a martyr.
You aren't dying for anyone else's sins, so stop acting like you're saving me.

CXVIII.

If violets are blue
Then I guess that roses are red
As long as we're telling some truths
Truth is, you're stuck in my head

But even if violets were to die
And all the roses were dead
Regardless of all of the flowers in the land
I stick by the fact that you're stuck in my head.

CXVII.

The memory of your smile, lingering on the brink of my recollection.
Why? It has no place there. You have no place here.
I've tried to rid my head of thoughts of you, section after section.
Your smile will kill me. If I let it, it will kill me, dear.

CXVI.

On lonely nights, you'll find me screaming at the skies.
Yelling empty words, trying to remember what it feels like to be alive.

"I'm not dead yet."
"I'm not dead yet."
"I'm not dead yet."
"I'm not dead yet."

Please, God, don't give up on me.

CXV.

If my words weighed more than air
If they weighed something more like gold
Then I wouldn't be wasting them on this.
I would sell them somewhere else.
For a buck or two and a handle of whiskey.
Being poor and sober is something awful.

A syllable, A shot. Knock it back.

CXIV.

"Literally" is the new "figuratively",
and everyone is speaking in hyperboles.
Every mouth sore from parading its teeth
Every throat, a machine bound tomb.

CXIII.

My mouth was saying no, but my head was screaming stop.
"Mercy, please", cries the condemned to the executioner.
When retreat was the only plan that the general had left
He yelled,
"Another God damned end to another God damned night.
Yeah, that sounds about right."

CXII.

"Every car looks the same when all that can you see are their headlights." David sat one step below myself, he continued to turn the broken pieces of wood over in his hands. I watched as the traffic signals continued to cycle, like the seasons passing. The statue of a man and a young girl cut out in bronze was positioned to my right. They, unlike the seasons, unlike anything in this life, hardly ever change save the weathering of their souls. If this is art, provided that you can even call it that, what comes after postmodernism anyway? Nothing, I would gauge. We are at the end of an era that was dead before it started. From what I've heard I was created from dirt, and one of these days I imagine I'll return to it.

CXI.

Atlas knew the weight of the world,
I know only the weight of my heart,
We all feel the weight on our backs.
Out of context from the world apart.
Give me one good reason
Not to throw this all away.
When the sun reached the horizon,
Atlas shrugged. And I will do the same

CX.

I am failing fast holding up in my defense.
Trying so damn hard to hold on to innocence.

18.

How do you criticize, when you stand so safe inside?
How do you climb, when you built your walls so high.
How do you fight, when your hands are firmly tied?
How do you rise when all you know is the downside...

-Memory Layne, Blacklisted.

CIX.

The numbness in the tips of my fingers and toes,
White on the ground, blues on the radio,
Paint, concrete, grace and headlights high
I do this to myself just to get by.


Cold, Cold, Cold, Cold...

CVIII.

These stagnant eyes
This blind faith
Seeing nothing
Seeking no one

These desperate hands
This crippled hope
Feeling nothing
Helping no one

This dying mind
This broken love
Knowing nothing
Forgiving no one

CVII.

I walk blindly through hallways flooded by faceless strangers,
One hand steady against the wall, I feel every crack. Every break.
Stumbling slowly forward, sleepwalking through a life spent wasted.
My hand against the wall, against the wall, against the wall.
Tracing paths of imperfections, my hand, my head, I break.
Memories flowing in, times gone by, envy for my former self.
Why do we all break the same way? Why do we break?
I'm dragging my shoes across concrete, I'm outside, I'm waiting.
Cold brushes my neck and I put on my hood. A horn, a crosswalk.
My hand against the wall. Why do I always have to break? I break.

CVI.

Failure hasn't always been the greatest of my aspirations,
but reaching new lows every day seems to be my only attainment.
When let downs, transgressions, and flaws continue to pile atop frustrations
I know that I fall short, guilty as charged, begging for my arraignment.

CV.

I've spent my entire life picking up the pieces to the spirits that I have broken.
Porcelain hearts and porcelain hope, both shatter so swimmingly.
Some days I can't keep my head out of the clouds, others, my hands.
But we live a dying dream, and this is the most that I could entreat.

CIV.

A year ago today.
And I'm not saying...
I'm just saying.
I'm glad it didn't end red or cold.
I'm glad you showed your face.
Nothing stayed the same.
Just so you know...
Nothing ever does.
The future is bright and bold.
I'm glad you showed your face.

17.

Look around and you'll see that at times it feels like no one really cares
It gets me down but I'm still gonna try to do what's right, I know that there's
A difference between sleight of hand, and giving everything you have
There's a line drawn in the sand, I'm working up the will to cross it

Rhetoric can't raise the dead
I'm sick of always talking when there's no change
Rhetoric can't raise the dead
I'm sick of empty words, let's lead and not follow

-Dustin Kensrue

CIII.

I said I loved you.
I said goodbye.
You said nothing.
And that was that.

CII.

As soon as you say that this ship can't sink, it is only bound to fail.
Because everything that can fall apart, eventually will.
I've loved you more than life itself, believe me if you must.
But face it darling, we both know that I was built to spill.

16.

we're smearing these words across these pages like they matter more than words ever should.
sticks and stones, my god, oh my god.
they're breaking my bones.
no, they won't.
and i really won't
pretend anymore.
.

and it's becoming quite clear to me that i've always given more than received.
i've always hidden rather than having been seen.
i've always needed you more than you'd ever agree.
and before i was ever gone, you'd given up on me.
.

so. sorry for believing in the things left unseen.
sorry for having faith on the nights i'm in need.
sorry for loving you more than you'll ever love me.
just sorry
so sorry
for forgetting who you used to be.
.

and we're walking out on thin lines
but we don't know where they cross
we're still screaming out to jesus
cause we think we might be lost
we keep holding on to heaven
but tomorrow's still a prayer
i'll be coming home for christmas
but i'm not sure that you'll be there.
(i still want you there.)

-Amy Sue Rudiger

15.

Dear --,

I began your letter at the stop sign on Third Street and lost it in a traffic jam on Hemming Way; you would've rolled your eyes at the name, so I tried to imagine you sitting beside me. That's what did it, of course--I had a perfectly good sentence and it went right out the window

with sentiment.

See there--I was trying to redeem myself by writing a poem, but apologetic prose doesn't like to share. I had grand illusions--something about a word on a breeze (how cliché) wandering past a car full of screaming children and a businesswoman on her phone. There were soccer stories, a brief pause for some striking observation, and then a tremendous ending in a field, or a grave, or your lips. (Probably your lips.) It was another perfect poem lived and never written. Speaking of

I've written you letters
on scraps of paper--
napkins, Sears receipts;
once I wrote on the back
of a manila folder,
and several times now
in the margins
of our favorite books.

This one had somewhere to go, but don't they all? The failure is mine, of course. I recalled the time you tied me to the bedpost and wrote words across my hips; the ink was so cold and your breath was so warm. I shivered as you blew across the letters, and you smiled--large eyes shadowed by the glare of a muted television. Sometimes I try to picture that smile. It's difficult out of context, but every now and then I convince myself of the memory, and the effort's almost worth it.

You wrote a poem once about my letters--not these letters (well, maybe these letters), the individual letters in individual words. There was a line

This D implies the bend in your shoulders
when you're pouring your coffee

(two lines, then). I read it over and over, reliving a moment when I bent past you early one morning and grabbed keds that didn't match; it took you half a cup of coffee to notice, and I didn't believe you once you had. It was a silly argument, but I cherish the silly ones. I think I made it halfway through lunch before I finally broke down and left you a message. "Baby," I said, "baby, I'm sorry. I love you. You were right about the shoes." I never wore those shoes again--not even with the right shirt--but I still have them. I blush when I pass them in the closet.

But your poem--the one about the letters--I had it taped to my desk, to my journal--it's been in six different bags and kept pages in countless books; twice now I've ripped it up only to tape it back together, desperately, in place of tears. You'll never know, though--how close I keep your words (even the poor ones). I sometimes think I should have told you, but a torn poem in the middle of a million secrets seems a strange thing to regret.

This is why writers rarely make it far in love; we spend our time having sex with words, remembering moments better as we wrote them than we do as we lived them. We spend our break-ups in tragic sentimentality, inspired to write out of bitterness and neglect, motivated by self-loathing and an unforgiving ego. You and I--we wrote while we could, left in despair when the words ran out and replaced themselves with a comfortable silence.

We never worked well in comfort. Writers live better as they suffer.

Even so,

I wish you were here.

-Chelsey Blake Chester

CI.

Tonight I took in everything about Atlanta.
"I drew a heart around the name of your city."
I walked slowly with a piece of paper folded in my pocket.
I had folded the page until it had wings and I wrote 'Amo Te'.
"I write with love and a gun to my head.
These days aren't going to last too long."
I noticed every single streetlight and every pavement's cracks.
"This is my story, love, day one until now,
Background music to a silent film."
I watched as my breath echoed from my mouth.
"Dance to the misery of your life put to backbeat.
Dance to the sound of everything you ever lost."
I climbed the stairs to the top of this city.
Standing tall, She is so beautiful tonight.
"Long live the sound of desperation.
Long live the stereo of destruction."
I threw my paper love off the top of the roof.
I watched as it fell silently to the ground below.
"Dreams are trash on the side of the road."
Falling like this is nothing new.
I take a deep breath and bid the night farewell.
"I'm a sinking ship drowning by a burning bridge.
There's no cure for the 'Dreamer's Disease'."

C.

As I watch my reflection play catch up with my shadows
On top of the wet pavement, I collect not only my thoughts,
But my composure as well. I was swimming in your eyes.
Lingering just beyond anything that's in my reach, is everything.
And as I laid on your carpet and counted the inches between us,
I told you stories that I'd never told to anyone else, ever.
Time puts itself on hold when it's not busy moving through us.
And tonight as I told my brother goodnight, he strummed his guitar.
He still doesn't know a single song, but I couldn't love him more for it.
The next time we meet we'll hang me from your Christmas tree,
And you can paint me whatever colors you want. Breathe it in.

IC.

As hollow as this hole in my chest.
Whole is something I have not been.
Lately this roof over my head threatens to cave,
With every passing moment, every footstep.
Every broken promise, and every fucking night.
Soon I'll be buried beneath ruins,
And tired eulogies can only keep me hoping for so long.

IIC.

The wax has melted.
I have no wings left to speak of,
Home is where the heart is until you've been to hell.
Stuck dragging your ghost across this country.

IIIC.

Tonight the signs hanging out above the streets held an odd amount of unfamiliarity.
I drive on this cracking pavement every single day. I don't understand.
Tonight I held my breath as I slipped a piece of paper underneath that windshield blade.
You had held my naivety in your palms, rolling it over and over, and I was so grateful that you were fragile with it.
Atlanta's always chasing me, or at least that's what I say to myself after a glance in my rearview.
I told myself that the drive home had nothing to do with you, it had nothing to do with you.
But Jesse just kept screaming about how I will "Never get it right"
I guess I'll never get it, like I never got Freud, and I never got sunsets, and I never really got you.
Subtlety is such a robber, you know that? He steals the ones you love without a word.
The green and white of piedmont avenue bleed into archaic dotted white lines that guide my vision.
Shelve me. Please trust that I will not rust, and as discreet as I tried to be, I can not hold a candle to your disposition.
At sundown I expected nothing but your countenance, I sat by that window all night.
Good night to these broken boulevards, and farewell to these moving targets.

IVC.

I am a dead soliloquy.
Lost in the translation
between what was
and what has become.
My simple lines,
fragmented, graceless
and left behind.
I have no stories left to tell.
I have no meanings left to speak.
I am a dead soliloquy.

VC.

Four feet down.
Two feet to go.

XCIV.

Choking down ash, I started this fire.
And now I'm eating my words.
I am destruction in its most elegant form.

XCIII.

So when you're restless on late nights,
Tearing old photos off of your wall.
I'm resting. Turning over under sheets.

The promises I made.
I wrote in sand.
Will soon be washed away.
The promises I made.
I built from mounds of dust.
Will soon be swept aside.

Count the steps back to your room.
1,2,3
Count the breaths between my words.
1,2,3
Count the minutes spent in silence.
1,2,3
Count the words I left unsaid.
1,2,3

XCII.

I let you run rampant in me.
Yeah, well
We've all got the disease.

XCI.

Talking nonsense in my car,
Instills some logic in my heart.
What was it that i said to you?
And since when is vanity a virtue?
Cloud filled nights follow rainy days,
When I crash and burn in the worst of ways.
What was it that I put you through?
To hell and back, who would've knew?

XC.

You're slamming glasses in the kitchen,
And I'm drinking water in the living room.
We both know what comes next.
As your blood clots in your veins
And air ceases flowing to your brain.
"You're right. And when I have a heart attack it will be all your fault."
Well it was all my fault.
I heard your head as it fell to the countertop.

IXC.

As they lowered your casket into the ground
And as I passed that dead dog lying in the road
His blood was the brightest red I've ever seen
And your face was the pinkest rose I'd ever known

LXXXVIII.

Just for the record, I've been meaning to say, "I told you so."
Because nights like these sure do have a way of adding up.
The air only feels like this when I'm alone.
Once you said that I only called when there was nothing else.
And maybe I took you for granted,
But you'll never know how much that meant to me.
That solace now absent,
So, just for the record, i've been meaning to,
And I guess that's all I can say for now.

LXXXVII.

The air is getting cooler,
Fresh almost,
Like the way you used to look at me,
Or me at you.
I passed my exit tonight,
It's been a while,
Like the way you used to sing to me,
Or me to you.
I'm losing myself again,
Differently though,
Like the way you used to watch me sleep
Or inversely.

I watch fires flicker through the winter.

LXXXVI.

Feeling nothing and falling short.
Through the darkness I struggle to see.
Easily forgotten and left to demise.
The sound of regret echoes through me.

An endless cold surrounds my mind.
Escaped from misery by the skin of my teeth.
Remnants of hope left stuck in my chest.
Alone but alive I awake in the street.

Starting over isn't always renewing.
Thankful for the ground found under my feet.
Just like anything else, I had to fight for this.
But the skies are open and my heart still beats.

I dreamt my way out of despair.

LXXXV.

I build these monuments.
Brick on top of brick, I build.
Until the only thing left of me is ruins.
I walk through a sea of past faces
and old mistakes. There are so many
fractured statues in this field
that it's getting hard to see.

This is nothing special and I do it all the time.
So tear this one down or I'll do it myself.

LXXXIV.

The same thing that causes the sun to come crashing into the horizon, caused this to break.
And they'll always say it was only a matter of time.
But these times that live with me are the only times I ever really lived.

LXXXIII.

I've been standing on this shore for an eternity.
Watching ships sailing through the night.
I'll be standing in your wake for the rest of my life.
Time slips through my hands and so do you.

14.

We can spend our lives letting the world tell us who we are. Sane or insane. Saints or sex addicts. Heroes or victims. Letting history tell us how good or bad we are.
Letting our past decide our future.
Or we can decide for ourselves.
And maybe it's our job to invent something better.
In the trees, a mourning dove calls. It must be midnight.
And Denny says, "Hey, we could use some help here."
Paige goes, and I go. The four of us dig with our hands under the edge of the rock. In the dark, the feeling is rough and cold and takes forever, and all of us together, we struggle to just put one rock on top of another.
"You know the ancient Greek girl?" Paige says.
Who drew the outline of her lost lover? I say, yeah.
And she says, "You know eventually she just forgot him and invented wallpaper."
It's creepy, but here we are, the Pilgrims, the crackpots of our time, trying to establish our own alternate reality. To build a world out of rocks and chaos.
What it's going to be, I don't know.
Even after all that rushing around, where we've ended up is the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night.
And maybe knowing isn't the point.
Where we're standing right now, in the ruins in the dark, what we build could be anything.

-Victor Mancini, Choke.

LXXXII.

Here's to tomorrow,
to a new beginning,
to hopes of starting over,
to whatever that looks like,
to whatever may come,
and to whatever this may mean.

LXXXI.

Climb for the stars.
Like the ocean waves pile on top of each other.
Longing for the sky.
Like these mountains standing tall and reverent.
Climb for the stars.

LXXX.

The open lake and summer air.
Midnight drives and the masquerade.
Three day weekends and trampoline wrestling.
Laughing, Skating, Talking, Chilling, Living.

And if these are the best days of my life,
I'm glad I spent them like this.
This is for you guys.
Cheers.

LXXIX.

Take only what you must,
Leave only what you love,
Goodbye to all you trust,
Hello to hope above.

Farewells may echo on forever.

13.

I looked and you know what I found?
That you can't expect to trust this world
When you can't even trust yourself
And your head starts to spin
As you dance to the beat
Because tomorrow isn't promised
But it's sure as fuck coming
And your body starts to shake
As you sing in the streets
Because it's cold outside
So you better start running
Don't count on me to save your life
When I've never had
A clear enough perspective on mine
And I know things change
we'll go our separate ways
And alive is the only thing
It seems we've stayed lately
And the truth isn't always easy to believe
You walk alone to the sound of your own heartbeat
And I know it's not always so easy to see
But we are still all so fucking beautiful to me

-Sweet Innocence, Life Long Tragedy.

LXXVIII.

It's never a new view when you fall down.
It's always the same view from the bottom, looking up.
It's never a new feeling when you're starting to drown.
It's always the same feeling from the bottom, coming up.

LXXVII.

Oh, God. My God.
Believe in me.

Sure enough, You've never stopped.
Which at one point in time I considered Your greatest flaw,
however now I can see that it is Your greatest mercy.
And I pray only that You let said mercy continue.

Believe in me.

LXXVI.

I will never let my song be held within.
My voice will always rise.
I will never let my hope be held back.
My dreams will never die.

Dream no small dreams, for they stir not the hearts of men.

LXXV.

I skipped rocks underneath the night sky next to a sea of serenity,
While I rambled on about the never ending implications of my insecurities.
And when I got out of the car tonight, the stars were there,
Waiting for me to notice them, just like they always are.
I had almost forgot the solace you can find in a beautiful night.
Just as I often overlook the peace that comes with being still.
Times when I quit talking about how much I already know.
And I listen, and remember that I still have so much to learn.

LXXIV. (II)

Because the higher you stack this,
The harder it will be to top it,
And eventually, the more severe the fall.

LXXIV. (I)

We swallow so many things that our stomachs will never digest,
Just like you promised me such pretty things that your heart soon grew to detest.

I know I should believe.
And I do.
Just not for them,
Just not for you.

12.

Because life isn't worth living
If you can't look yourself in the fucking mirror
And say,
"This Is Who I Am."

-My List, One Up.

LXXIII.

She spoke
with an air
like
chivalry was dead.

I reached for
my pockets at least
twice a minute.

She glanced
around nervously
as if
someone might be watching.

I looked her straight
in the mouth.

She paced the conversation
with
questions she didn't give me
time to answer.

I didn't mind.

LXXII.

We never die in our dreams.
We force ourselves awake before our hearts can cease to beat.
And in the same way you opened your eyes then.
You open your eyes now.
Miracles will only happen if you believe they will.
And things will only change if you let them.

LXXI. (II)

Because it's true that when you are able to capture a moment in the form of a poem, a song, or a picture it is a beautiful thing, to have that tangible representation of a past moment in your life. But it is also true that though it is beautiful to capture a moment , to hold that piece of your life in the palm of your hands, it is tenfold the beauty when there is no word order, no rhythm, no blending of colors that could possibly describe the way you felt in a moment.

You know those moments that we cant capture because they capture us?
That's what I'm looking for.

LXXI. (I)

I'm done with reliving my life through poor photography and poorer prose.
I burned a pile of those flimsy memories, and nothing has ever smelled sweeter.
And I know it's rare to hear me say such a thing but,
This was wasted on you.
This was wasted on you.

LXX.

Some might say that with news of what lies ahead, you should savor this Summer, but it feels like you're already Fall.
I guess you were always one step ahead of me anyway.

11.

"The big reason why folks leave a small town," Rant used to say,"is so they can moon over the idea of going back. And the reason they stay put is so they can moon about getting out."

-Echo Lawrence, Rant

LXIX.

I will never be anything unless I am nothing.

LXVIII.

I found a new life
in the middle of a junkyard.
And I broke the anchor
that had held down
my dreams.
the beauty that I found
in the middle of chaos
like the sound of my radio
drowning out the sunset.

LXVII.

I'm thirsting for something more eloquent [elegant].
I've been drinking you.
I've been drinking you.
Quite a trip, bitter-sweet.
Call it a symphony.

That's what I do.
Adieu, Adieu.

LXVI.

Life is a battle of mediums set in constant motion by the forces inside each of us that strive to find freedom.

When you begin to let go of the things you've been holding on to so tightly, everything kind of falls into place.

LXV.

I am but a lie in the eyesockets of the blind.
Planes mistaken for stars on beautiful blue nights.

don't blink.
don't breathe.

Regret and I were on our way out.
But if you insist, i guess we could play you the soundtrack to just one more heartbreak.

don't sink.
don't swim.

This used to mean so much more.
But i used to, i used to too.
I used to too.
I used to too.

LXIV.

That moment in time when my mind, body, and soul align, be it only for a second, and I am free.

Still searching.
Slowly finding.

LXIII.

I've been reading up on the properties of man.
The infinite, the manifest, and the 'I think I cans'.
Advances in sciences, the art of war, and consequently health.
"Save me from ordinary. Save me from myself."

10.

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.

-E.E. Cummings.

LXII.

A single, careless collision can eradicate something that took years to construct.
As the framework painstakingly falls to pieces, I watch us regress.
And you've always heard of Frost's road that diverged in a wood.
Well this is your stop, and I've still got miles left to go.

LXI.

Live your life like you know that the rest of the world can't stop you.

And here's to everything else that is yet to come.

9.

There's only one thing more powerful than all the armies of the world-
an idea whose time has come.

-Victor Hugo.

LX.

Dance in the rain like you never even knew what the rest of the world was thinking.

Here's to the parts of me that long to be free.

ILX.

Sing in the streets like you never even cared what the rest of the world was doing.

Here's to the times that live on with me forever.

LVIII.

I'm sitting in a parking lot.
I'm looking up at the streetlights.
[I've had my share of close calls]
But I'm not headed anywhere.

We're here at our favorite spot.
Where we spend so many nights.
[Well, we've had our share of close calls]
We're just breathing in the cold air.

You're lying next to a vacant slot.
On your lousy bed in evergreen heights.
[Is this what you call a close call]
While you're just stuck out there.

8.

So maybe that's the answer to my question, Why me? Why us? Because we are the ones we've been waiting for. What I want to say to isolated, angry, fearful youth– to all the children society has regarded as disposable, children who cannot love others because they have not yet learned to love themselves, all the sad, the lonely, the frightened who might read my books is this: you are seen, you are not alone, you are not despised, you are unique and of infinite value in the human family. As a writer I can try to say this through the words of a story, but it is up to each of us who come into contact with these children every day in our homes, our schools, our communities and as citizens of this broken world–it is up to us to embody those words— we, each of us, are the word of hope become flesh.

-Katherine Paterson, ABF Stockholm(speech)

LVII.

My absence of tact has a body count of its own,
but you're not one for a history lesson.
And all of these things won't hold weight in a week,
but presently they're dragging me down.

LVI.

There's been a steady rise in suicide during times of revolution,
While we callously gaze in gutters not really looking for solutions.
I feel like a wolf who has been wearing wool for long past my due.
I've perfected lying straight into eyes, it doesn't matter whose.

When push comes to shove eventually something has to break.
So please put me up on that trophy shelf with the promise I'm about to make.
I've decided that now is the time to place my money near my mouth,
And finally let my actions speak for this faith I've been yelling about.

LV.

I've been walking on this beaten path for nearly three years.
There have been moments when I turned around.
There have been times where I've taken shortcuts.
There have even been days or weeks when I've vigorously cut through the woods in hopes of returning to the main road.
There have been instants in which I've quit.
There have been what felt like lifetimes spent in the dark, just feeling my way around.
There have been junctures where I've passed others who decided this path was not for them.
There have been occasions in which I felt like I could go no further.
There have been spans that I did not believe I would be able to overcome.
But from time to time, usually in the mornings right after I wake up, I get this feeling and I see this light.
Generally it's only for a split second, but something about that moment tells me that what I'm doing is right.
That this path, however beaten and unknown it may be, it suits me.
"And so this is how I choose to live, as if I'm jumping [headlong] off a cliff"

7.

northbound & nowhere.

It was in that moment that I felt it was final. We would always be walking the same road, but no longer would we travel in the same direction. There would be no us; there could be no us. There would be you, and there would be me. I would simply stumble north going one-thousand miles a minute while you wandered west moving at a steady, indeterminate pace. We might pass one another on the way, but my wave would be drown out by the sound of your left hand's firm grasp, no matter how much it scared you. You would follow because you've always followed your heart, and that's where it was headed: out west where the coast was big, and the possibilities were bigger. It was in that moment that we let it be final. You would stand there with your eyes digging deeper into the ground under our feet. I would be wearing my yellow sweater that you gave me in a story that lacked plot, that lacked ending, that lacked all of me despite my yellow sweater. But we would be filled by this hope that if we just held on, if we just clung, we could travel on together. Mine was mostly greater than yours, but you wouldn't dare believe it. Because you're heading out west, off the deep end, and slowly, quite slowly, I'm beginning to receive it.

-Amy Sue Rudiger

6.

Moments when all of the ways that we divide ourselves and rank each other and convince ourselves of how different, better, or unalike we are disappear, and we are faced with the fact that first and foremost, we are humans. In this together. And not that much different from each other.

Jew.Gentile.
Marine.Iraqi.
Orphan.Family.
Pastor.Prostitue.
We could be them.

-Rob Bell, SexGod.

LIV.

Time spent looking for whatever it is that is around the very next bend.
Time spent searching for handout vindication that I thought could mend.
Time spent looking for my happiness lost in postage I will never send.
Time spent searching for a means to another vagrant, dead end.

Turns out that the grass was never greener on the other side, I just needed to open both of my eyes.

LIII.

Shout to the sky for all that you're worth.
It's a simple, kind concoction of spanglish and earth.
I'd never seen it coming from the miles afar.
It's a grade school combination of vinyl and tar.
Look out below or make way for the crash.
It's an easily mixed congeal of cynics and ash.
Hoist up the flag and buckle down this land.
It's an elementary blend of paint chips and sand.

This is nothing without water.
I am nothing without water.

LII.

The ground looks like patchwork from thirty thousand feet.
Sometimes I feel like gravity may be too much for me.

LI.

Heavy hearts feel twice as weighted when it's the matter of a fact.
"Goodbyes" are only half as bad if you present them with some tact.

L.

Patronized to say the least, and in dark quiet hallways a light can be seen.
Planes overhead wouldn't notice if I fell, but what difference does it make?

I'm on my way.

Sidetracking was not the effect I had hoped to emphasize, but I got it nonetheless.
One day I'll pack my bags and move away. Maybe I'll head out west.
Maybe I won't. What difference does it make?

I'm still on my way.

So pick me up or let me down either way I'm spent. Turns out nights left wasted were never really wasted at all. I heard it's a slow process, the human condition.
"I don't know if I've been running in the right direction, but I've been running all the same."

We're all on our way.

IL.

I've been trying to get this right.
Been trying to shine like light.

I've been working to stay afloat.
Been working to hold this note.

I've been learning to best this fear.
Been learning to hold life dear.

Nothing can stop you when you're invincible.

XLVIII.

Air fills my lungs.
Blood fills my veins.
Thoughts fill my head.
Love fills my heart.

.Rhyme&Reason.
It's all coming together.

5.

I slipped the picture back where I had found it. Then I realized something: that last thought had brought no sting with it. Closing Sohrab's door, I wondered if that was how forgiveness budded, not with the fanfare of epiphany, but with pain gathering its things, packing up, and slipping away unannounced in the middle of the night.

-Amir, The Kite Runner

XLVII.

I've been driving by the place that I was falling about fourteen times a week.
We both fell hard on that maroon painted tin roof that idealizes salient but bleak.
Occasionally I'll remember times we had, but memories are always bleared.
T.V. shows and strawberry daiquiris two-thousand five new years.
I've been more grateful for this March than any other year gone by.
March 16 is always the day you think about when you will die.
Happy birthday to you Chelsey, in true American bland and boring convention.
Modernism is the style in this concrete jungle built from man's intention.
I never meant for anything less than what was due and deserved.
Some times I should have expended, but instead I just conserved.
If you will watch the ebb and flow of people in the middle of their stride.
You'll see they're nothing more than the summation of memories kept alive.
Contrary to popular belief when I think of you it doesn't accompany regret.
But rather a lesson learned of love and bright eyes from a friend I'm glad I met.
So once again Happy Birthday, I know this is inadequate of what you deserve.
But I love you just enough to believe you just might appreciate my verve.

XLVI.

It's a process of progression. more important than your first impression.
It's coming down to selection. hope my wits line up with my intention.

XLV.

As hope turns to faith, faith turns to life;
& it is so good to be alive.

XLIV.

If history just repeats itself, and most agree it will,
then my about-face inclination will surely die in vain.
And if these late night doestoyevsky-isms are any sort of sign,
then everything I've never written will forever be my bane.

4.

it's becoming so clear to me now.
i don't know what or when or why or how,
but i know it takes more than a pulse to stay alive.
. H O P E .

-Amy Sue Rudiger

3.

I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once and there's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst and then I remember to relax and stop trying to hold on to it and then it flows through me like rain and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure.
But don't worry, you will . . . someday.

-Lester Burnham, American Beauty

XLIII.

I am alive.
I am alive.
I am alive.
I am alive.

XLII.

It's a good day to die.
It's a good day to die.
Cliche words that never lie.
A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I.

XLI.

So let's get this out and onto the table.
I cut people down, around the middle of their thighs, whenever I am able.
I bit my tongue until the point that it bled,
but believe me when I tell you I remember every rehearsed word you've ever said.
I'm only making suggestions. "Perhaps you will be dead when all of this is through."
A loss of certitude as the C.O.D. was the conclusion that I drew.
My inability to to take people as sincere is becoming far outspoken.
Your constant stranglehold set upon my neck has left me choking.
I'd like to vivify your recollections of our love.
You always point out what it wasn't, never what it was.
Now I'd like to substitute this rock I've been sleeping on for something softer, possibly making my sleep less non-existent on nights like these. Blank stares at blank T.V.'s.
So sorry for the disconcertion that I've set upon you in a present tense.
It comes from a magnified inaptitude also known as lack of experience.

XL.

I exprobate myself I was being naive.
That's what you get for a heart on your sleeve.
I've spent so much time watching bridges burn.
You think that I would eventually learn.
You're not always able to pass the blame.
Sometimes you have to stand&bear your own shame.

IXL.

Displaced to this street.
I've been bending facts with crowbars to fit in with these flashy road signs.
Unfit for this part.
I've been telling the truth like a sieve holds water, for the last twelve hours; keeping your questions at bay.
Forced into this place.
I've been gnashing crooked teeth for the sake of irony, someone give me a backup plan.
Left off of this list.
I've been forging my face in the name of indifference, please assume that I'm right.

Never spent much time waiting around.
Never thought so little could bring me down.
Never knew that it might end like this.
Never left much room for hit or miss.

XXXVIII.

Your short stories and anecdotes are keeping me more than at bay.

Now your mouth never closes and your mind won't open up.

"He is really something" was the last thing that I heard before you stranded me here.

Well. Beam me up. Take me out. But let's make it quick and painless.

I'm stuck in this room like Picasso's stuck in his frame.

Days go by and you're still talking, every single question is rhetorical.

You say this will hurt you more than it will me, but I doubt it.

You always mumble and ramble when you are lying.

That's how I know to get comfortable we'll be here a while.

Pre-fifties antennas can tune in to me better than you ever could.

I understand the need for you to let me down softly, but give me a break.

Talk about overstatement, since you've already talked about everything else.

I watch the clock because it's more honest than your eyes.

I'll never know why you always took me so literally about the things that I say.

Now I'm getting all that I deserve.

In the form of an exceptionally wordy parting of ways, you used way too many pronouns and it's lasted for days.

So can we just call it quits? I am up to my neck.
Maybe I'll see you again but hopefully not.

XXXVII.

These shoes make my feet ache
As I stand in the middle of the wake
of your latest demise
in my pretty blue eyes

Ten thousand plus words that I've written this week
Still I haven't found any that effectively speak
All that I want you to hear
So far but yet so near

and there are shamrocks on the wall
but everything else was left for the floor
and this wastebaskets getting full
from things thrown away that meant so much more

This chain on my neck stands for more than I do
But standing for something's for the proud and the few
And I'm not one of those men
Who thinks that this just happens

I was waiting around your window real late last night
I was hoping that you'd be there and you just might
Fix all that I've done wrong
And sing my favorite songs

and there are shamrocks on the wall
but everything else was meant for the floor
and this wastebaskets getting full
from things thrown away that meant so much more

Someone went and stole my Sunday's best
But just keep your head up
And never quit singing
Never quit singing
Never quit singing
Never quit singing

XXXVI.

At the risk of sounding cliché...

We'll display our names pinned to our chest.

And we'll stand for things that we truly detest.

We'll hang all of our convictions in Public Square.

And we'll dress in anything that they tell us to wear.

We'll stare and we'll judge like life's some parade.

And we'll cheer for the kids who always get laid.

We'll sell our integrity and dignity, because there's always a price.

And we'll flaunt in the open our favorite vice.

We'll idolize the "superstars" with a large lack of craft.

And we'll quit reading books to be more readily daft.

We'll drive out expression and the freedom of speech.

And we'll burn inside the boxes of a make believe beach.

We'll train our kids in lust, pride, and greed.

And we'll forget the ones who won't follow the creed.

We'll waste years of our lives in front of colored boxes.

And we'll kill the unimpressionable, like dogs catching foxes.

We'll replace our family for a more successful career.

And we'll slowly but surely pledge faithful to the mirror.

We'll open our mouths for anything, be it food or a thought.

And we'll spend less time defining what we are, than what we're not.

We'll buy into these lies that we're constantly force fed.

And we'll forget that it takes more than a pulse to not be dead.

We'll void all the names of those who rebel.

And we'll cast them, biblically, as the angel that fell.

We'll butcher ourselves with an opulence of selfish ambition.

And we'll laugh at infomercials about those ailing from malnutrition.

We'll bridge the unneeded gap between church and state.
And we'll undo progress at an alarmingly fast rate.

We'll unknow that community and caring is what makes us whole.

And we'll isolate an aperture in the middle of our soul.

We'll beguile the masses with prevalent primetime twists.

And we'll revolve entire lives around the completing of a list.

We'll exchange all of our pain for a hand glued to a bottle.

And we'll trade relaxation for a foot pushed to the throttle.

We'll uphold the double standards and shove equality down.

And we'll kill any creativity that lives in this town.

We'll base our acceptance on style, in a landslide, over substance.

And we'll dry all of our secrets on the back of the picket fence.

We'll degrade those that are different as we lapse into the past.

And we'll make the same mistakes as before but now twice as fast.

We'll become numb to the tears poured from those in peril.

And we'll allow blood to be spilled so that we can stay sterile.

I'll never be known by this label or brand.
Now is the time and this is my stand.

XXXV.

You'll be long gone and I'll be singing the same old songs to another girl who could care less if i mean it.
But no matter what, you'll always mean it less.

XXXIV.

Done with indents,
walking on a fence,
and sleeping on the floor.

Done with cold air,
returning your cold stare,
and searching for the door.

Done with past tense,
always making sense,
and looking for much more.

Done with despair,
my wrists being bare,
and wings that will not soar.

XXXIII.

That was it.

That was all of me.
My key note.

My valedictory.

One last cry

To rally hope.

You can stay supine,
but I'm waking up.

supine ..soo-PYN; SOO-pyn.., adjective:
1. Lying on the back, or with the face upward.
2. Indolent; listless; inactive; mentally or morally lethargic.

2.

Then I turned and ran.
It was only a smile, nothing more. It didn't make everything all right. It didn't make anything all right. Only a smile. A tiny thing. A leaf in the woods, shaking in the wake of a startled bird's flight.
But I'll take it. With open arms. Because when spring comes, it melts the snow one flake at a time, and maybe I just witnessed the first flake melting.
I ran. A grown man with a swarm of screaming children. But I didn't care. I ran with the wind blowing in my face, and a smile as wide as the Valley of Panjsher on my lips.
I ran.

-Amir, The Kite Runner

XXXII.

I overcompensate by underestimating,
and nights like these will never end.

XXXI.

I cursed myself the whole way back to my car.
And I shook from there to my door.
And I have driven most of the people that I loved away.
And I've become very good at talking myself into being the antagonist of these stories.
And I never wanted you to be anything you weren't.
I just wanted you to be you.

XXX.

Our dreamers have been deadmen since long before adolescence.
Closing times turn into nights of weary indiscretion.
Words mean so much more then they used to.
This is so much more than I'm used to.

XXIX.

I sit and ponder the futility of my camera trying to reincarnate the glory of this landscape onto a blank screen or a piece of paper. I needed these two weeks. The way the sun reflects off the clouds when you're below them, the colors you had only dreamed of showing up on a western border as if they lived there, looking down at the earth from thousands of feet above, fighting with myself as i walk along foreign streets trying not to look lost. I've been getting some answers on this trip. Not the answers I wanted, but the right ones. The ones that say I am beautiful and broken, the ones that say this life is a dance, a story, a song, a book. Stepping back and letting tomorrow worry about itself. Not caring when life will climax or show signs of purpose, but just living. Enjoying the fact that I'm alive. I hear violinists and I smile. I look at people and I smile. I make poor analogies about my life being like a cruise ship, and I smile. I'm likening this life to the seasons. There are pros and cons to every season. Some seasons feel like they'll never end, others you wish it were true. Some seasons you feel invincible, others you feel like you'll never smile again. Some seasons are boring, bland, and subtle, others stick out in the back of your mind like a sore thumb. The thing about seasons is that they come to pass. They die when it's time for them to die, and there's always a new season to take it's place. Sometimes it's better. Sometimes it's warmer. Sometime it's joyous. Sometimes it's worse. Sometimes its colder. Sometimes its painful. But it's life and there's always another season.

XXVIII.

I don't think I've ever felt this disappointing.
What I said before about not knowing the right words.
I meant it.
I tried to change gears and talk about the different shades of brown striped on the wall and how they made me dizzy.
Seven Hundred miles away and I've never been at such a loss for words.
So I whispered, "I love you."
I'd never heard a louder dialtone.

XXVII.

Not having the right words makes me shiver, so I keep my mouth shut.

1.

"Good news is what gets us through the longest day of our life.
Good news is what overcomes unbelief.
Good news is worth holding out for.
Good news is worth living for."

-Amy Sue Rudiger

XXVI.

You try to be so clever and subtle with your words,
but it's not working.
They're coming out as blatant, obtrusive knives in my back.
Lies. Lies. Lies. Lies.

XXV.

You're a ghost of who you used to be.
At least for those few short months.
You make small talk about what your past once held but your future let slip.
I want to believe you're still there.
I want to believe that you're the one i knew.
I want to believe you're still smiling, still passionate, still singing.
Before cigarettes. Before new jobs. Before new friends.
Back when the air was warm and we drove with the windows down.
But "Believing ain't what it used to be."
Right?

XXIV.

I tried to swallow my pride,
but we all know I have a weak stomach.

XXIII.

In the end this won't matter...
In the end this won't matter...
In the end this won't matter...
In the end this won't matter...

XXII.

A decaying flower in a cracked sidewalk found by a broken boy in a battered city who lived in a dilapidated apartment with a crumbling family in this incomplete life in an undone world.
Well, the decaying flower that was found in the cracked sidewalk by the broken boy in front of the dilapidated apartments in the battered city with a crumbling family in this incomplete life and undone world, gave the boy a glimpse of hope.
He was the decaying flower and he wanted to let go.
But soon the sun would rise and he, the flower, would grow.
It told him that one day the decaying flower would be reborn and the cracked sidewalk would be restored and the dilapidated apartments would be refurnished and the battered city would be replenished and the crumbling family would come together and the incomplete life would find a purpose and the undone world would sew a new seam and maybe just maybe the broken boy would be redeemed.

XXI.

For the last few nights I've been playing host to the most recurring of all dreams.
It's short but simple.
I'm trapped in a life I don't want to live and every time I try to move I sink a little deeper. Every time I try to run this hill gets a little steeper.
Every time I try to breathe my lungs are a little more constricted.
Every time that I get sentenced I feel a little more convicted.
Every night I wake from this harassing of my sleep to find the same song playing:
"Everything looks better from far away,
Before you see the ripples and the wrinkles.
The city looks so peaceful from far away,
Before you see the night lights turn to firefights.
We could probably sell this house from far away,
Before the dusty shelves and the creaking floorboards.
I wish that I could get to know you from far away,
Before your addictions and my insecurities."

And this song plays to my dream.
And this duo plays to my fears.
I'm afraid of a wasted life.
I'm afraid of being held back.
I'm afraid of anything that needs me.
I'm afraid of everything i lack.

XX.

Where the pearly grey clouds met the subtle night sky
Came a brand new kind of midnight horizon line.
It didn't blossom the sun, but hope it does stir,
Because every star in that sky knew who you were.

XIX.

While you weren't paying attention I snuck out the back door.
I was as spotless as you're reputation, and you'll never see the real me.

I'm only doing this to impress you.
I'm only doing this to stay awake.
I'm only doing this to keep your affection.
I'm only doing this to keep myself busy.

XVIII.

I had a dream last night that God had died.
Some laughed and joked while others cried.
Some danced and sang to God's defeat.
Some mourned the Savior they'd never meet.
"We are our own gods now!" I heard some proclaim.
They said, "We'll never bow to another name."
We had slain our God to become alive and free.
How quickly we found that we were still empty.

XVII.

There was bleeding, there were tears.
It was high noon at calvary.
There is no more need for us to fear.
It was the day God set us free.

XVI.

I've heard it said that the easiest thing to do in life is sink.

XV.

Goodbye is an even word.
Three consonants, three vowels, and one that can go either way.
It shows all the symptoms of a word that I'm hard-pressed to say.
Goodbye is not a rhythmic word.
What with it's soft O's and hard Y.
It's the word I find accompanying me in fateful times of deceit and lies.
Goodbye is a hard word.
Two syllables, seven letters.
Due to it's indifference it has potential to make everything or nothing all better.

XIV.

"You are worth so much more than this."
This seems to be my theme for the night.
"I have this thing where I talk too much or not at all."
"I have this thing where I never get anything right."
We threw words like boxers looking for the knockout.
The topics covered were God, us, and direction.
God was reduced to coping, and we were reduced to ash.
You can't stand, no you can't stand rejection.
"Well how the hell would that make you feel?"
Like a grain of salt in a sea of sand.
The question is hypothetical and you can't reply.
Like a cast aside savior with nails in hand.
I say it now like I've said it before.
You were, you are worth so much more.
I saw you go low, but you've seen me go lower.
And you have been my friend since the start.
I promise that I love you and I will not leave.
This isn't matrimony, but 'til death do us part.

XIII.

One of those days:
When you want something more than subtle and meek.
Like the lines that you write would act themselves out.
Or the things that you read you could actually believe.
Where you stare at this screen and hope it will speak.

XII.

They said the gnashing of teeth would be too much for me to handle.
(To counteract my transgressions...)
They sealed this smile to my face by only the wax of a candle.
Now I'm stuck with this grin,
That's as habitual as sin.
(They were more than correct)
The weeping and gnashing of teeth is all that i hear and more than I can stand.

XI.

When I'm drowning and I can't breathe,
Will you be my walls that keep out this sea?

X.

Every person that I've ever met
Is a person that's been let down
Well I'm always up late at night
Thinking that's what keeps me around.
Every question that I've ever been asked
Had an answer that was right or wrong
Well I'm always up late at night
Sleep asks, "What took you so long"?
Every mistake that I've ever made<
Held a choice that was my own
Well I'm always up late at night
Thinking that's why I'm so alone.
Every night that I spend up late
Is a night that I regret
Well I'm always up late at night
And I can't get to sleep just yet.

IX.

All because you're broken
Insecurities become unspoken
You're scared to trust,
But to love you must.
Or your life remains unopened.

VIII.

Endless flipping of the channels on this dull remote,
For a lack of better words this is what I wrote,
"You may have won the contest, but you didn't get my vote.
You write so many pretty things, but nothing I'd ever quote."

VII.

Rome Is Burning!
What a sight!
I've watched values crumble in this firestorm.
And I've had my fair share of friends walk out at times like these.
In every song I've ever heard about a ship, it was sinking.
And I'm no different.

VI.

Broken Glass & Cigarette Ash.
the story of your life:
Shattered and Smoldering
Busted and Burning
Fragmented and Fading
Broken Glass & Cigarette Ash.
the story of your life.

V.

Attachment is habit that is very hard to break.
Letting go is a portrait that is not easy to paint.
(I've never been a fan of failing)

IV.

I used to write in lyric, but now i write in tone.
I used to have a lot of friends, but now I'm all alone.
I used to be content in life, but now nothing ever breaks.