I won't miss you.

It's a dawn that breaks
into your mind's
adamantly cold exterior.

And maybe it's just
a naive maybe
but you can't help
looking for an excuse
to run, hide, escape
from your reality
of always hurting,
that follows her everywhere.

This lie can't break through
your crumbling glamour,
but maybe sparks will burn
through the ice
that's choking her heart
Until she can catch
the stowaway train
that'll finally
take her from you.

Alley-cat eyes

~

Weak ankles dancing
to the sirens, on your pavement stage--

A stowaway smile
and no regrets to your name;

Bloodshot loneliness clinging
to your 80-proof breath--

But your eyes, my dear alley-cat,
put the streetlights to shame.

Friction

Let me shatter your stony fortress, darling;
climb up your minute imperfections and rip off
the poison ivy that twisted
honeyed lies around your tongue and
bile-coated truths onto your fingers—

Let me hurt you where you don't want to feel, dearest;
oppose your every inhibition with my
lip-biting adrenaline dripping into your veins,
an IV of emotion and ink-drenched sunbursts
that you won't be able to retch out, this time—

Let me choke away your starlight, sweetheart;
hold you down with my toxic gravity
and cloud your polluted doe-eyes
with wrist-written promises
of sailing off into a vertical horizon—

Let me drown out your whispered screams, love;
steal your moonbreath as you sleep and wear out
each and every one
of your infallible excuses on my
sandpaper-plastered heartstrings—

Let me sweep you off your feet, angel;
burn away the asphyxiated ribbons of our past
and untie new aglet- and hesitation-less laces,
so maybe we can trip over some paper butterflies
and learn to fall in love once again—

--Trust

a star dancing
in your
laughing, lovely sky-eyes--

always out of reach,
not flying, but
falling
in style--

and never,
never,
never to be caught;
always a feather-heavy
wistful sigh away--

but the sky can't limit
us breath-bating dreamers;

and so
every
frozen fingertip thread-through
is just another grasp
at that alluring, unreachable
star...

~

All that glitters

isn't gold;
well then, you'll say
we're a d i a m o n d--
well,

a diamond is only just
a lump of coal
that made good
under p r e s s u r e--
but, darling,

it's all too
heavy
for me,
and I think
we're starting
to c r u m b l e.

A sky to love

~

You're
moody
and
unpredictable
and
sometimes
wild--
But without you,
my world would
crumble, dearest--

Paint on too much
glamour
and I'll
see
right through you,
because
you're most
breathtaking

when you bleed.

Control

6.

I remember when it was you and me against the world. We'd been friends since forever, and it was going to stay that way: Just us, a quiet redhead and a messy blonde, a reader and a runner, a dancer and a player. Nothing would tear us apart.

11.

Middle school, and all the girls were talking about all the boys (or the cute ones, anyway.) I played on my cello and you danced to the music with the sky in your eyes and a thimble on your smile.

14.

High school was a blur of firsts for us: Our first test-kiss, our first boy-kisses, my first hangover, your first high. My mom left, and your dad died, but it was still us against the world, and always would be.

18.

We moved on to college, and I changed my mind as easily as I could change my nail color, but you'd found a boy, and you said you were going to marry him.


21.

We grew up [or so we liked to say] but we never grew apart, not us. I could control myself now, and you'd almost completely stopped needing to buy your own happiness off the streets.

22.

I knew what your boy was doing, and I was determined to stop it. At least, that's what I said to myself that night; but you spent my birthday fighting with him and slamming all the doors you could find, so I ripped a page off your book and let him be my happiness.

23.

We agreed you didn't have to know about it, and I made him promise to stop. We stopped, too. I stopped needing you to kiss my forehead when my bottles got the best of me, and you stopped telling me when I had to hold you down.

24.

You found out. You found out about a dozen other girls, but I was theloaf who got away. You knew I wouldn't do that; this was the boy you said you'd marry. I held you that night, and we kissed [properly, now] for the first time in a while, and you let me be your happiness again.

25.

You decided I was better than he could ever be, and I agreed. But all that time we weren't us was taking its toll, and I played only on our feelings now, but you still danced with the sky in your eyes even though you'd lost your thimble somewhere along the way.

26.

I don't know how you found out, but you did. And instead of trying to convince you it wasn't true, I let you make up your own mind. I went over and painted his cheek pink with my angry palm, but he had angel-eyes and a silver tongue, and it was over between us anyway, sweetie, so we don't need to be sorry.

--

You drove over that night, while we were breathing too hard to regret you [but you were never a mistake, darling, remember that.]
But something went wrong; maybe your sky-eyes were too clouded with tear-puddles, but I never got to see them again. They were closed in the coffin, and nobody understood when I screamed at you to let me see the skies one last time.

--

It was you and me against the world, darling. But you lied when you said it would stay that way.

You did this.

They weren't perfect, and the cracks were beginning to show.
And when she finally asked him to end it, he knew he couldn't say no; not this time.

~

"Do you still love me?" She asked at length.

"No," He knew he had to say it, but it still hurt.

"Promise?" Why does she have to make sure? Why does she make me lie to her like this? And though it killed him to say it, he had no choice.

"...Yes."

"Thank you," she exhaled deeply, and put her arms around him. He let her hold him for the last time as he tried to swallow down the painful lump burning in his throat.

"I'll miss you," she whispered to him, and his fingers turned numb as her voice crept about his skin.

He tried to kiss her, but she pulled away, and the plaintive look in her eyes told him not to force it.

"Don't," she told him. "Please just don't." So he buried his face in her hair and smelled her familiar scent one last time, and he heard her breathing turning shaky.

"Goodbye," he said, and she smiled weakly.

"Goodbye."

~

He could have pulled her back then, and told her she was making a mistake. But he was the mistake, and he couldn't lie to her anymore.

Dropped

I want
nothing more than to know
that I ripped off your wings
while they were trying to cage me

because I wanted
us
to fly.

Stream of Consciousness

~

Concept paper, concept paper
Oh, god, how do I cite this?
And how the hell do I write
this background in a way that's
less vague
when it's as straight to the point
as the needle I want to drive in her skull?

Chocolate cake, chocolate cake
Holy shit, where'd all the caramel go?
The chocolate "icing" isn't even buttery enough
to really be called icing, and
it's trying to pass off as dark chocolate
when I know for a fact [and from ResHW]
that it tastes like crap.

He better print my paper--
GOD, why is nobody ALIVE?!
I hate
hate
hate
watered-down Coke.

And why the hell is the fan turned up so high?

There's no more time;
thirteen more hurried minutes til
7 o'clock comes around again
Stupid curfew.
Fuck.

I hope I finish this. Holy crap.

AUGH.

WHAT THE HELL.

Screw it.

Un-Barbie

~

She's got perfect grades
and perfect teeth
and every lock of hair is always
immaculately curled--

But she stays up 'til one
just studying
and even after the most
uneventful nights
wakes up in tangles;

She parties all night
and never seems drunk
'cause the student body president
must be prudent and
responsible--

But when she gets home in the morning
she collapses over the toilet, too
and she hides the headaches beneath
that gorgeous, re-electable smile;

She's got the boys' hearts
and won't give hers away (just yet)
and those big blue eyes
could only put the sky to shame--

But really, it's only because
she's too scared that she's not
good enough
and when she remembers this,
the red starts to streak through;

She's slim but not skinny,
and her tiny little feet
could pirouette kilometers
in her rhinestone-studded ankle-breakers--

But her fingers are all too used
to the sting of bile
and she hides the blisters beneath
socks
and her father's old boots~