I Would Leave Me If I Could: A Collection of Poetry(18)

Can’t decide what’s fake and what’s fact So you’re up late screaming, “Bring on the black!”

Smoked so many cigarettes alone on a bathroom sink I think my lungs are full to the brim with ink And I can’t get it past my throat to my fingers to the paper

to the stingers

of the hive in my head

Last week I had a dream you were dead I was on the phone calling Begging for your body back Screaming, “Bring on the black!”

I’m opening a faucet and I’m scared to let it run It’s been easier the past few months when I would hold my tongue ’Cause when I write it all down I have to face it But when I hold it inside I can pretend it’s okay I haven’t called my grandmother in a year ’Cause she’s the only one I know Who tells me shit I don’t wanna hear But I need to hear

I’ve been in the gym these mornings It takes me 7 minutes to run a mile And 7 seconds to run from my problems I’m working on my lung capacity Fun capacity

Uptight bitch

Take a breath and relax,

it isn’t so bad.

Keep drinking keep dancing Keep hopeless romancing

They say that keys open doors But you handed all your keys To your friends and they dip ’em in a powder sack Screaming, “Bring on the black!”

And every single second is like late-night TV

A Skinemax freebie

Watch the night sweats

drip down his back

Yelling, “Bring on the black!”

My father said,

“You’ll never belong to a man till I’m dead”

So we just belong to a bag instead.

Winners don’t lose, right?

Except sleep.

Counting sheep.

Relentless beep.

Of the hotel TV.

Too high to react.

So I’m up late begging,

“Lord, bring on the black.”





SOMETHING FOR THEM


This is to remind you that you are a lover.

That you melt at a glance at a touch.

That you are a baby.

You are soft and fragile and you need someone to tell you that everything is going to be okay.

That you are an idiot and you are going to fuck up 1 million more times the rest of your life.

But this is to remind you that you are a statue, gilded in marble, and there is white lightning in your eyes.

Change shape.

Give in.





SEVENTEEN


It was cold for California when my phone rang half past 3, my little brother’s on the other line.

He’s shaking like a leaf.

At 17 years old, he lost his best friend on a field.

There’s no battle in our history book compared to how he feels.

Alabaster faces,

all lined up, turning gray.

I watched my brother hold a casket before his graduation day.

The boy’s poor mother cried with screams that echoed through the town.

Like a Siren on a shoreline, begging God to let her drown.

So my brother crawled beside her and he got beneath the sheet.

He let a woman hold him,

so that she could make believe.

She said, “Your arms are a bit smaller, and your hair has got a wave, but you smell just like my little boy.

You’ve almost got his face.”

So he lay there on the couch until the sky turned red and tan.

And in a full-grown woman’s arms, my little brother was a man.





I LEFT THE PARTY


I looked through the window and saw the lights flicker like salt and pepper flakes across the Tokyo skyline.

I saw the amber glowing from the floor lamp in the corner, warming the room with its thick embrace.

I saw the pink in my lips and the orange in my eyes and the blush across my chest.

And I wondered how could I have not noticed the ways in which you dulled my senses and stole the color from the world right before my eyes.

Of all the wrongs you committed, the worst was keeping me from the beauty in anything

that wasn’t

you.





I WISH THAT I WERE MANIC ALL THE TIME


Be patient with me When my limbs become trees And my roots become reeds And the sounds from my mouth start making sense My mind is messy but it’s beautiful like I’m in utero I don’t say it often, but I’m proud of the woman that I turned out to be You might think I’m crazy Wild and young and free But really I’m just: careful

quiet

overthinking

analyzing like

It’s logic

over loving

and emotion

brought me nothing but disaster

so I hold my drink and sit right in the corner smiling.

Wish I were a wild child like I say I am Wish I really meant it when I say that I don’t give a damn Wish that I were manic all the time.

Think I like me better when I’m all outside the lines.

But my colors bleed And they bleed bright red.

I keep this pistol near my bed Inside my mouth

so I can keep my tongue from tearing up my head.