I find that
I am quite
Mad.

For what?
For what?

Everyone is
Happy at
Christmas except
Those who
Aren’t.

Handfuls of 
Dust are
Buckets-full
Of fears.

Dust unto dust
And then you
Are
Dead.

Buried with
The flowers
In April.

White as the
Skin of
Cold, old
Saints.

Mad no more—
For what?
For what?

It is impossibly insensible
The way I allow myself
To dwell & wallow & overthink
You are stamped & stained & ingrained
& it seems I am helpless to do anything but
Remember all your words & actions & every twitch of your facial muscles
My flesh is puckered from the scars
Left by the branding you did all over my skin
My fingers traced your name 
Carefully and haphazardly
Across my hands & arms & thighs
Absentmindedly—
No one noticed but me
Furiously writing you into me
Hoping to write you into existence
(Or in the very least, an existence that meets mine)
You’ve dyed me the color that you are
Whatever color that may be
I haven’t decided yet
Intravenously dripping
My eyes rove about
Darting here, dashing there
My fingers trace & tap & train mercilessly
I am  not in control of my own actions
I am irresponsible
I am unreliable
I’m waking from you
All I can ask is to go under again
This reality isn’t one I can cope with. 

swarmed
by an army
of angry words
flooding from the cavity
of my very own heart
i’m self-condemning
i’m self-righteous
i’m self-sufficient

knives and swords and pitchforks
a mob comes out of my mouth
in the darkened room
i find myself guilty
ready to be tarred & feathered
i am worthless
and so the gavel falls 
heavy on the stand
guilty as charged

the jury goes home
a jury of my peers—myself
or all of my selves
i am many
and all of me 
hates what is in me
with a singular loathing

arrows, darts, straight to the heart of the matter
my insecurities beat me into submission
i am worthless 
& i know it. 

I find myself
Heels over head over heels
In love with you

I am 
I am
I am

In love with a mirage
An idea
A bit of a dream
That I caught & anchored
To the pages of my beloved secret-keeper

You: a place in my mind
Somewhere I go to feel safe
Somewhere I go to feel hopeful
You: a mere outline of a man
To be decided
To be ascertained
To be caught on film
But not yet there
Not yet realized

But I am
In love
With you. 

straight teeth—
lined up in marching rows
one by one by one
they appear
parting lips
flicking tongues
s p e a k i n g
(so they tell me)

i myself have never experienced this human phenomenon
wisps of thoughts
flit through my cavernous mind
but never make it
to my blackhole of a mouth
out into the hanging air
trapped behind
the prison bars
fingers grasped across my face
s i l e n c e d
(once & for all) 

it’s okay,
i’ve never been much for talking. 

i will only bleed
sitting in the tops of trees
watching as the eyes
look up
at the red dye
from the sky
little will they know
that the chemical imbalance
is all mine
dripping steadily
from a heart
that no longer beats readily
it pounds erratically
in the hopes that someone
will hammer out some sort of measure
of honest-to-goodness
normalcy and romance
but for now
i sit in the branches
and look down at the mansions
of those who already know love
of those who are prone to shove
all the love out the window
ungrateful
they know not what it is to be ignored. 

the pink mist
of the suspended droplets

human blood
exploding arteries

death comes unexpectedly
(but so does heartbreak) 

I march for miles
Inside my head
On bloody feet
I onward tread

To reach the place
Where I can find
Perhaps some small
Peace of mind 

Let us be dead
This disease
Let us spread
Let nobody see
We stand still like the trees

But we do not grow
Only sway to and fro
Tossed about by the wind
Locked in chains by our sin

Dead branches that break
Oh, our souls are at stake
Snapping limbs, snapping hearts
Through this pain, we depart

I cannot understand the lines of the quilt
Stitched neatly by grandmother’s hand
In her nearly a dream sort of land
Where hearts were more sturdily built
I will never be able to fathom
How grandfather has stood here
And for twenty years, called her dear
The generations seem a great chasm
We are a fallen mass of excuses
Struggling toward the top of the heap
Always pretending we are so much more
Our limbs are covered in delicate bruises
The streets are piled, bodies deep
When on earth did living become such a chore?